RV Door Insulation for Winter

If you're a full-timer like me, there's a good chance you, too, scour the Internet for inspiration and ideas for dealing with the special opportunities and challenges of this lifestyle. One topic of much discussion, I know, is how to winter successfully in an RV. As I've mentioned, our travel trailer doesn't even pretend to be a four-season model, so we won't even attempt to winter in places that get below the high twenties. Still, we regularly face those slightly below freezing temperatures and face many of the same issues that those of you wintering in colder places, hopefully with a better-insulated RV, deal with.

I'd like to share with you an idea I had for insulating the doors. I've never seen this idea elsewhere, so I hope some of you find it useful. Here's a picture of one of our two doors:

What we've done is attach a piece of quilted reflective insulation (which comes in 2' widths, exactly the same as most RV doors) and attach it to the outside of the screen door, so it fits in between the screen and the main door. We attached the insulation with medium size binder clips (available in the office supply section of the store):

and cut out around the door handles (for both screen and main doors) so the handles are still fully operational.

The door still opens and closes as a single unit, and the bonus is that the window is covered:

so I am no longer bothered by light coming in at night when I am trying to sleep.

I am planning to also make a curtain to go over the door; I already have the fabric and hope to have it finished soon so I can show you a picture. I'm in the middle of making new curtains for the entire main room so decided to include the door so I don't always have to look at it; it is not a thing of beauty. (I have seen some RV doors with more attractive interiors and am hopeful our next unit, in several years, might have such a door. But that's in the future...)  I'm very excited about the new curtains and am looking forward to the big "reveal," coming soon.