Sleeping in Jeep/RTT how to stay warm in cold weather?

[Blanco Willys]

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[Jeeperz Kreeperz]

In addition to some of the other suggestions mentioned above, here are a few tips I learned from a seasoned winter camper when I was young that completely changed my experience while cold weather camping:

• Moisture on your body is your enemy. I never understood how important this was until I took all the following steps:
  1. Use a high quality synthetic base layer, or sleep naked. No cotton or even a synthetic insulating layer. This is counterintuitive. Your mind is telling you to put on more layers. That just results in perspiration - which makes you cold.
  2. Vent your sleeping bag. This too is counterintuitive. Your brain is telling you to seal up everything tight to not let the cold air in. But that’s just sealing in the perspiration - which is your body’s cooling system (an incredibly efficient cooling system, I might add). Occasionally vent your sleeping bag to help with moisture control.
  3. Vent your tent. Also counterintuitive. This one I’ve found is really temperature dependent. The warmer it is, you can get away with venting more often and/or leaving a larger portion portion of the window/door open. It’s a bit of a balancing act of keeping heat in the tent, but not allowing a ton of moisture to accumulate. But even in extremely cold temps, there’s value in letting moisture out, and fresh, dry air in.
  4. If you have not followed the steps above, and are shivering and uncontrollably cold, strip down and try to wipe off your entire body of perspiration (you won’t even know it’s there, but it is), and put a fresh base layer on.
• Keep your head warm. It’s surprising how much heat you lose out of your head. Depending on how you sleep, and ambient temps, you might need just a good sleeping bag hood, or a wicking cap, or a thicker hat, or a balaclava or face mask.
• Don’t drink a bunch of water before bed. Your body will use up its own heat to keep everything in your bladder heated up to roughly 98 degrees F. I’m not advocating dehydration - but rather, slight under-hydration, and only at night. This approach will also reduce perspiration, as well as your need to urinate in the middle of the night.
• Corollary to bullet point above: If you do need to urinate, just get up and do it, rather than worrying about how cold it is outside of your sleeping bag. By getting up, you will have successfully vented your sleeping bag, maybe your tent, and emptied your bladder of all that water that your body was heating up. Once you get back tucked in your bag, you’ll see an improvement.
• Have a snack before bed, and even in the middle of the night. This gives your body something to digest, and it ’keeps the furnace’ burning a bit, and helps with internal body temps.
• Stay away from alcohol. Even one drink serves as a vasodilator that opens up your capillaries near the skin. This initially makes you feel flushed and warm, but longer term, it’s sending more blood out to your skin - which is counteracting one of your body’s best weapons against the cold, that of boosting your core body temp and keeping blood around critical organs. And all that blood near the skin is increasing perspiration - and we’ve already talked about how evil that can be in the cold!

Before learning all of these points, winter camping was like torture. But now I actually love it.

Stay warm out there!

 

[baskiboat]

Wow, great tips. I recently slept in 12 F and I used my Honda 2000 generator to power my electric blankets inside my sleeping bag. We stayed toasty warm. There was frozen condensation on the tent walls even with the vents open. On eco mode the generator runs for about 10 hours on a gallon of fuel and is pretty quiet. Then in the morning I plugged in my nespresso and made a latte!

 

[dpike]

Yeah, I have a DC electric blanket that I got from Walmart for 18 bucks that I run from a house battery, it makes a huge difference even on low. I clipped the socket end off and put an Anderson connector on the blanket since I use those for most of my house electric.

 

[FLTrailRider]

The other option which has not been mentioned so far if the propane heater that is used in many RV's and in the higher end offroad trailers.

Check out the propex model 2211. Not cheep but they work excellent, no fumes and easy to set up. There are several youtube videos on setting these up.

 

[micahpop]

Holy shit, not cheap might be a bit of an understatement...

 

[MtCamper]

Long underwear, stocking cap and a good foam pad to sleep on. You have to insulate below you because that crushes your bag and negates its insulation. If it is really below 0˚F, I've often put a mummy bag inside a rectangular bag. Be sure to open the bags in the morning to let the moisture evaporate. I get a kick out of those roughing it with a genny and heating blanket.

 

[Storey21]

I’ve done camping in snow this winter. I sleep in the jeep with a foam mattress, a very thick sleeping bag, fuzzy blanket as a liner, toque, and well dressed for bed. Yes, my sleeping gear is bulky, but a good nights sleep is worth every inch of space. I’ll also cheat a little and run the remote start of it gets really bad. But between me and the dog, it’s pretty cozy in there. My absolute favourite way to sleep, wouldn’t want the hassles of an RTT and diesel heater

 

[AcesandEights]

...

• Don’t drink a bunch of water before bed. Your body will use up its own heat to keep everything in your bladder heated up to roughly 98 degrees F. I’m not advocating dehydration - but rather, slight under-hydration, and only at night. This approach will also reduce perspiration, as well as your need to urinate in the middle of the night.
• Corollary to bullet point above: If you do need to urinate, just get up and do it, rather than worrying about how cold it is outside of your sleeping bag. By getting up, you will have successfully vented your sleeping bag, maybe your tent, and emptied your bladder of all that water that your body was heating up. Once you get back tucked in your bag, you’ll see an improvement.

...

I don't think that's true. It's not like the liquid is ambient temp and you have to raise it, it's liquid already at temp and you have to maintain it, which is insignificant because liquid holds heat well enough not to be significant. Your body is a (internal) temperature and it's the outside temp it's working against, not (significantly) the internal organs or liquid. The amount of blood is much more significant than what is in your bladder. My opinion anyway.

 

[dangads895]

I’ve done camping in snow this winter. I sleep in the jeep with a foam mattress, a very thick sleeping bag, fuzzy blanket as a liner, toque, and well dressed for bed. Yes, my sleeping gear is bulky, but a good nights sleep is worth every inch of space. I’ll also cheat a little and run the remote start of it gets really bad. But between me and the dog, it’s pretty cozy in there. My absolute favourite way to sleep, wouldn’t want the hassles of an RTT and diesel heater

Did you have lots of condensation/ice on the windows in the morning? Ive tried this a couple times and woke up with ice on the inside even with the window slightly cracked, not sure how to avoid this!

 

[Storey21]

Did you have lots of condensation/ice on the windows in the morning? Ive tried this a couple times and woke up with ice on the inside even with the window slightly cracked, not sure how to avoid this!

Condensation is going to happen, even if you crack a window. I set up the temp control to be on recirculating/AC/heat to help dry out the air, and keep a cloth handy for wiping the inside of the windows.

 

[WasMFD]

Native of the Florida Keys and my annual trips are Winter Camping. So anything below 40 is cold for me but I typically camp in the mountains with temps in the 20s and teens. Coldest was 7 with a windchill that was -11(that was insanity but I stayed w/it). I do take a little buddy just in case I cant suck it up(got close with the 7F). Always sleep in the Jeep. With seat folded I lay down a role of aluminized automotive windshield shade material then topped with a Waterproof SUV quilted cargo protected. This is topped wit a air mattress that I sheeted with a cheap Ikea thick down comforter. All this makes for a nice bed. No the trick that works for me. I use 2 sleeping bags; one double all season(50F) over the top of a down 20F wide mummy. I have used several zero bags with down, synthetic and combos. Even borrow a $2500 Canadian -76F; yes, it was warm but so bulky it was impractical(it stuffs in to a duffle bag that stands 39" tall and weights 21 pounds. Some to two bag combo has worked best when sleeping with a base layer on and head covering. Windows are vented using K9 window vents and I use a small(tiny) USB powered fan. I found the slightest of movement of air inside the wrangler reduces my condensation to almost zero! Camping in Winter is magical for even 78 y/o kid like me.

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