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What is the Best Way to Protect Your RV During the Off-Season?

Washing the sides of an RV is easy, but cleaning nooks and roof areas can take all day. Covers featured here keep all areas clean and protected.
What is the Best Way to Protect Your RV During the Off-Season?

If you're like most RV owners, you take pride in its appearance. After all, what's the point of traveling the highways and seeing the countryside in a motor home that's dirty and dingy-looking? That said, doing the work of keeping it clean and well-preserved can be very time consuming. For example, think about when you last washed your RV. Cleaning the sides in big swipes was easy, but scrubbing all the nooks and working up on the roof probably turned things into an all-day job.

When it's time to park your mobile home, a good RV cover will keep it cleaner for a much longer period - an extremely beneficial thing if ready access to running water near your parking spot doesn't exist. With a cover, you'll spend much more time enjoying your RV - and far less time cleaning it.

Effective RV covers, such as those we sell, are made of polyester or polypropylene fabric that's been treated with repellants against water, mold growth, and ultraviolet rays. While repellants won't completely prevent water from getting through, an RV cover will effectively block airborne dirt, pollen, tree sap, leaves, seeds, bird droppings, and other hazards. Water that does manage to work its way in will evaporate quickly thanks to porous materials that release moisture. In fact, RV covers start drying practically as soon as precipitation ends - leaving surfaces underneath completely dry.

Because RVs tend to sit in one spot for long periods of time, ultraviolet rays from the sun can be a bigger threat to paint, plastic trim, rubber seals, and gel-coated fiberglass - all of which can oxidize over time and become chalky and dull. This hurts resale value, because the first thing a potential buyer will notice is faded decals, chalky-looking surfaces, and sun-damaged roof areas. Once those factors catch a buyer's attention, the entire vehicle will seem less well-maintained - no matter how thoroughly mechanical systems or the interior have been kept up. Perception easily becomes reality, and you come up on the losing end.

In this article, we'll look at a range of RV covers we offer - from basic covers that represent best values to those with additional features such as built-in vents to prevent wind bellowing, cinch straps for customized tightening, and zippered sections for interior access.

Selecting the Right Size Cover

Because RV covers are sold in universal sizes, achieving the best fit means choosing one with dimensions that are most applicable to your vehicle. We recommend measuring the length of your motorhome from bumper to bumper yourself. Don't rely on any printed information - because it may not always be correct. When it comes to height, measure from the roof down to the ground instead of to the bottom edge of the vehicle body.

Within the product page of each cover we sell, you'll find a drop-down box showing sizes available. If you find your measurements are somewhere in between smaller and larger size covers, it's best to go with the smaller size. Most cover manufacturers are conservative with their measurements and build in a little extra room over the posted amount.

Covers typically also have built-in slack that's strategically placed to handle roof-mounted air conditioners and side windows that protrude a little bit further. These items do not need to be included when measuring height and width. Likewise, any ladders attached to the rear do not need to be included when taking overall length measurements. Slack can easily be adjusted out with the use of attached straps created just for that purpose.

Classes of RV Covers

Since three class designations of motor homes exist, we've grouped our covers similarly. Class A motorhome (largest) is the one that's built on a commercial bus or truck chassis. Class B motorhome (smallest) is a conventional passenger van that's been modified with a raised roof or longer end cap. Class C motorhome is built on a minimal truck platform that uses a standard pickup or van cab section as its front. Class C RVs come in the biggest range of sizes, depending on what body is placed on the chassis.

Class A Covers

For best value on Class A motorhome trailer covers, we'll start by recommending the Budge ProTECHtor Gray Class A Motorhome Trailer Cover – a basic polypropylene cover designed to provide the durability you need without extra features you don’t want. If you prefer the convenience of zippered access flaps, cinch straps, and built-in vents, take a look at the Polypro 3 Class A RV Cover and PermaPro Class A Motor Home Cover from Classic Accessories, and the Expedition Class A RV Cover from Eevelle.

For those looking for the thickest, most heavy-duty Class A covers, we've got the Eevelle Gold Line Class A Motorhome Trailer Cover and the Budge Premier Class A Motorhome Trailer Cover among others.

Class B Covers

When it comes best values in Class B RV covers, we've got the Budge ProTECHtor, Classic Accessories Polypro 3, and ADCO SFS AquaShed covers. All of them feature vent flaps, cinch straps, and zippered access panels. For thicker, heavy-duty construction that's best in severe weather areas, there's the Eevelle Goldline Class B Cover, Budge Premier Class B cover, and Classic Accessories SkyShield Class B cover.

Class C Covers

For Class C motorhome covers, we've got best-value choices in the form of Budge’s ProTECHtor Gray Class C Motorhome Trailer Cover and ADCO’s SFS AquaShed Designer Gray Class C Motorhome Trailer Cover – both of which feature polypropylene fabric construction along with tie-down hooks and rope.

Adding built-in vents, cinch straps, and zippered access flaps are the Eevelle Expedition and the Classic Accessories PolyPro 3 and PermaPro covers. If you prefer a heavy-duty cover, choose the Camco Pro-Tec Premium Class C Motorhome Trailer Cover.

Once you really examine the benefits, it’s easy to see how an RV cover becomes one of the smartest choices you can make to protect your investment. After all - if a cover for your backyard grill makes sense, you owe it to yourself to purchase one for your home on wheels.

In addition to motorhome covers, we also carry covers specifically designed for RV trailers, 5th wheel style trailers, pickup bed campers, “toy hauler” box trailers, and much more. We also encourage you to browse through other sections of CAMPERiD where you'll find excellent, cleverly-designed RV products such as appliances, water heaters, air conditioners, alarm systems, holding tanks, antennas & receivers, roofing & sealants, and much more – practically anything you could ask for! Should you have questions about anything on our website, we're happy to help seven days a week.

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