Date:         Sat, 6 Nov 2010 23:26:45 -0400
Reply-To:     David Beierl <dbeierl@ATTGLOBAL.NET>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         David Beierl <dbeierl@ATTGLOBAL.NET>
Subject:      Re: Some potentially stupid actions
Comments: To: mcneely4@COX.NET
In-Reply-To:  <20101106193907.VUYVI.2401810.imail@eastrmwml37>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed

At 06:39 PM 11/6/2010  -0500, Dave Mcneely wrote:
>There is no reason to have the propane valve ON when driving.  Just
>because earlier versions of the camper manual failed to provide this
>common sense safety warning doesn't mean it doesn't apply.  But
>folks who think otherwise will go ahead and do as they please, I
>can't stop them.  Since the discussion is old, and evidently
>useless, I'll say no more on the subject.

Dear David,

The point in question -- running the fridge while on the road -- is a
lot more complex than just a common sense safety warning.  It is a
matter of risk balancing, and there are strong opinions both ways in
the RV community.  If an observed risk of (conservatively, assuming
cooking amounts to half the non-12v related fires and that all the
rest are from propane, *AND* that all the rest happen while the
vehicle is moving) of one RV per 20,000 per year is too much for you,
by all means shut off the gas to the fridge.  However do bear in mind
that you're now running the fridge on twelve volts, and it's a
circuit that it's not entirely implausible to imagine might start a
fire inside the cabinetry; so your risk-balancing now contains an
imponderable factor.

By driving a Westfalia with camping gear in it you've already
accepted a risk which I strongly suspect is at least one order of
magnitude greater.

I'm reminded for some reason of the time AAA published a study
showing that there was a net loss of safety involved in requiring
child safety seats in aircraft -- *but they recommended it
anyway!!!*  This isn't the same, but I'm still reminded.

Nowadays the fact of a warning sticker no longer necessarily implies
a credible danger, I'm sorry to say.  Thank the lawyers.

Yours,
David