Robi's Storage Solution May June 2020

RV Window-Shades Storage by C.B. “Robi” Robison  F364271

Robi Robinson

We Dogwood members enjoy the road in our RVs, but we also know the enjoyment of staying several nights (perhaps weeks) at a place of our choosing.  And whether traveling to the South or Southwest to escape the winter of Virginia, or RVing in the summer, sometimes the Sun really beats down on our rigs and cooks us good.  At times, the RV air conditioners can’t fully counteract the BTUs of heat that the Sun is offering.  One cooling offset method is to place shade material externally on the largest glass areas of our RVs:  the windshield, the driver’s side window, and the entry door.  

My first experience with exterior shades was on our (Dale and my) 2004 Monaco Diplomat which were held in place with snaps.  To reach the top snaps, I had to break out a ladder to mount the shades as well as remove them.  The presence of these shades did indeed keep the “front cap” area of the RV cooler.  However, placing or removing the shades was a job that often did not get done unless we were staying in-place for a week or more, otherwise the effort didn’t seem worth it.  Now with our Winnebago TOUR, I committed to the MagnaShade product that is held in place with strong, rare-earth magnets.  Application and removal can be done while standing on the ground.   

My shades were ordered while attending the February SEA rally in Lakeland, and once shipped to me, it quickly became obvious that the sewn pockets (that hold the magnets in each shade) added substantially to the bulky condition when the shades are rolled up for storage.  Additionally, the manufacturer recommended that when rolling-up (storing) the shades that care be taken to separate the sewn-in magnets as much as possible so that magnetic fields are not in opposition.  To that end, it was suggested to use a swimming-pool “noodle” onto which the shades could be rolled up.  When I first tried this with the windshield shade, the result was a 6-foot long, 9” diameter “tube”.   And that was just the windshield shade.  I tried to reduce this 9” diameter by abandoning the noodle and using the dark-gray foam tubing, sold at home improvement stores for insulating half inch copper pipe.  Now the shade roll-up diameter reduced to about 5”.  But then the next problem showed up:  The sewn-in magnet pockets caused my “roll” to not be round but rather flattened.  Storing this non-rounded shade in, say, a cardboard tube now meant that the tube would have to be much larger than 5” in diameter.  That’s getting pretty large!  The other shades (drivers-side; passenger-side) also assumed this flattened rollup condition rather than being circular.  

Contrast this rolled-up bulkiness with my basement storage which is already at a premium when hauling a dry-camp generator, a blueboy, the BBQ, folding chairs, and my favorite set of tools (damn that AquaHot and “mid ships” house battery bank).  Stated another way: The Monaco had much more basement storage that that of the TOUR.  Even so, the price I paid for the MagnaShades demanded that I store these items with care, and store them in such a way that I can extract or re-store them easily.  

For my storage containers, I didn’t choose “round” but rather “square” by exploiting the off-the-shelf product that you may know as white PVC fence posts.  My driver and passenger shades “rolled up” just enough to fit into a 4” square PCV fence post, but the larger windshield shade required the dimension of a  5” post.  Next:  I wanted this storage to attach to my basement slide-tray so that when the RV slide-outs were deployed, I could still reach these “storage tubes” without being a contortionist (which means:  without aggravating my chronic lower-back pain).  The photos conveys it all:  4 “tubes”, mounted side-by-side atop plywood legs.  The height of the legs and the 5x5 PVC just clears the basement-door opening height, and the legs permit some amount of storage underneath the PVC tubing.  As of this writing, I have yet to install the associated magnets on the inside of the RV windows, but heck:  I’ve got the place to store the shades!  Picture 2 below offers a close up shot.