The Paved Frontier

There are dozens of good articles out there with lists of items you’ll need to start vacationing in your new RV: sewer hose, fresh water hose, bedding, etc.  So we’re not going to reinvent the wheel in this article.  Instead, let’s focus on five RV accessories you should purchase to help ensure safe travel in your RV.  Stuart and I consider these to be necessities.  Our family would never take a trip without them.

Electrical Safety– A Surge Protector:

This is what we consider to be the most important “extra” item to get.  And yeah, they’re a bit expensive- we found our Progressive Industries Surge Protector for 30 Amp for about $90.  This $90 item can save you a thousand or more dollars of electrical work if there happens to be an issue with the electricity you plug into.  We were lucky to have our surge protector this past summer when we were staying at an RV park in New Jersey.  Although it was a well-maintained park, we woke up to our electric hook-up on fire and smoking.  Stu was able to flip the breaker and unplug it without incident, however, our surge protector had melted.  But the rest of the RV was fine!  That’s the benefit of a surge protector in a nut shell.

Our surge protector is a pretty basic model, there are others that protect against low and high voltage- which you should also be concerned with. We will eventually upgrade our protector.  While the added expense may not seem worth it at the beginning, it will certainly seem worth it when it saves your RV’s electrical.  Our advice is don’t take the risk.

Tire Safety– Tire pressure monitor:

Our Garmin GPS and Pressure Pro system

This is the priciest purchase in this article, but it can save you the cost of a new tire (which could be $400 or more) plus the cost of a tow or roadside repair.  Not only can a blown tire be expensive to replace, but if you’re traveling at high speeds, it can be extremely dangerous.  We love ours, which is a PressurePro system specifically for RVs with up to ten tires as well as a tow vehicle.  The basic package, for $490 at the time this article was written, comes with six sensors with the option to purchase more sensors.  This monitor alerts you if tire pressure gets too high or too low, so you can detect a leak early on or let out some air if pressure gets too high while traveling down the road.

While there are less expensive monitoring systems out there, Stu chose this one for it’s easy to read display and good user reviews.

Safe Navigation– RV GPS:

This one is not so much for your safety, but more for your stress level. An RV specific GPS can help you avoid overpasses with low clearance or tunnels with height/width restrictions.  While warning signs should be posted ahead of the restricted area, circumventing them can be confusing or stressful when you’re supposed to be relaxing and enjoying your vacation.  Here is the GPS we have- the Garmin RV GPS Navigator, it has a large screen, good battery life if it needs to get unplugged for a while, and comes with everything you need to get started.  Our GPS is not the best for searching for nearby attractions, gas stations, or RV parks, because it only features certain brands.  When putting it in a new destination, we usually use it along with the Allstays App and a google search on our phone (learn more about the app in our article: The App We Can’t Live Without).

Plumbing Safety– Water pressure regulator:

This is inexpensive, but can save your pipes from bursting and flooding your RV if the water pressure is too high. We have this Valterra Brass Adjustable Water Regulator with a gauge, and it works perfectly.  You only need to use this if you are hooking up to city water.

Sanitation– Gloves and Bleach Spray Bottles:

Emptying your black water tank could expose you to nasty germs.  Always wear gloves and keep a spray bottle with a bleach solution handy to clean up after messing with anything in the black water area.  The bleach solution we use is a 10/1 ratio with 10 parts water to every 1 part bleach.

Stu’s favorite job! Emptying the black water tank!

Another spray bottle for the fresh water hook up area is important as well- spray down the faucet before connecting it and spray down all the connections of your own regulator/filter/hoses as well, to prevent contaminating your fresh water.  Make sure you run the faucets in the RV until the bleach smell is gone before you use the fresh water to cook or drink.  One last piece of safety advice regarding your fresh water hoses is to never use them for anything other than hooking up to city water or filling your fresh water tank, don’t store black water items near your fresh water items, and don’t let the connecting ends of your fresh water hoses touch the ground (especially when you’re in an area where sewage might be present).

What RV items do you recommend to other RVers?  Is there anything you would feel uncomfortable traveling without?

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