Not had any issues here in Bristol and been working from 8-4 pm
hose reels get drained after last job of the day. One at a time we plug a tail end into each hose reel and pull the whole 100 m off into a neat pile then slowly wind back on as the remaining water drains from inside it, then repeat with second hose reel, then drain all water from pole hoses wring out any cloth's and dry the deck of the van (sides are ply lined up to wheel arches and speed lined, floor is speed lined and van liner back on top of this) I have an outside double plug socket which charges leisure batteries via a CTEC MXS 10 10EC with an onboard circuit breaker inside van, leisure batteries get charged every night. I then have an electric greenhouse heater set on frost stat pointing at both hose reels this keeps the temperature in the back of the van permanently over 0 degrees so no kit in the back of the van has the possibility of freezing, the fan heater also has a circuit breaker and my van never gets condensation inside and I have it set up so system doesn't leak so when we have dry weather the back of the van is generally bone dry anyway.
When I come out in the morning usually 7-30 am I disconnect all of above, start the engine, put the heated windscreen on then fire up the PF 2KW heater, by the time we arrive at the first job water is up to 75 degrees, we then circulate it around the two hose reels (takes minutes) and ready to start cleaning for the day, heater stays on until last job then we just repeat the above.
Using this method means we never get a freeze up, we have plenty of varied work and can always find jobs/sites/blocks to work where frozen path's aren't an issue and using the electric fan heater means we're not annoying the neighbours in the middle of the night with the diesel heater kicking in
and it's cheaper method than the diesel with no drain on the leisure batteries during the night so we know they are in top condition for working with hot water during the day.
