Roadtrek Voltstart and pets

[markopolo]

From the Ecotrek brochure http://www.roadtrek.com/download/95964

Travel with pets? You never have to worry about your battery running low when leaving a pet behind, the VoltStart system is a pet owners dream, keeping the batteries charged to make sure your travel companions stay in a comfortable climate setting until you return.

I'm curious to know what people think about leaving your pets in a van and relying on this to control the climate to keep your pets safe and alive.

I can see pet owners ticking the option box on an order sheet but I wonder how comfortable people will be when it comes time to actually use it for pet safety.

I tend to be cautious and therefore think of what could go wrong. A breaker tripping, air conditioner failing to start, a pet turning something on or off, bystanders thinking the pet is in danger, an inverter issue. The list could be very long.

It could work 100 times and fail once ...........

[mumkin]

This is why I ordered it... for the dog. My plan wasn't for leaving the dog in there for hours and hours, but just for an hour or two for shopping... or a quick tour of a small site that doesn't allow dogs. That said, I don't really travel all that much in the high heat of summer.

One can be too obsessive about worrying about failure... even if you are in a campground with power, the AC could theoretically die while you are gone. So, does one never go anywhere that the dog can't go?

[mikes47]

Originally Posted by mumkin

One can be too obsessive about worrying about failure... even if you are in a campground with power, the AC could theoretically die while you are gone. So, does one never go anywhere that the dog can't go?

Very well said, Mumkin

[booster]

They lost a K9 here a little while ago when the dog was left in the squad car, and the auto start failed when it was called on to turn on due to the temp rise in the car. Now they are talking about adding cell phone callers also based on temp in the car.

[mumkin]

Giving one bad outcome ignores all the positive outcomes. Police leave the dogs in the squad cars - running - all the time... every day... all over the country. One can't possibly plan for every contingency every time.

[booster]

It wasn't listed as condemning how anyone does or think about anything. It simply pointed out that a valuable animal was lost, and that the folks who deal with the policies are now feeling it may be worth a having an extra layer of safety. We have heard the same from many pet owners. No system is perfect, for sure, but independent layers of protection decrease total failures the best, I think. We have locks on our doors and a security system, which is basically the same layered type of thing, but we could still get robbed.

[mkguitar]

More cops have "forgotten" their "partners" in the car here- I haven;t heard about any failure of an ac system but always possible.


while traveling we do find ourselves where we have to leave the dog in the van, whether a facility that doesn't allow her, or grocery shopping.

we wouldn;t do it at 110º, but at 75º we will. windows open, water in dish, vent fan on.

an ac system would be even better

Mike

[wincrasher]

Well for those of you with "normal" vans, the EC-30W you can get for your Onan will trigger autostart on a coach temperature setting, as well as low voltage. And it's only a $500 item you can easily install yourself. Highly recommend it and can assure you it works very well.

[mlts22]

+1 on the EC-30W or another auto generator start. If combined with something like RT's Volt Start and a transfer switch, this would give two systems that would have to fail before the A/C would fail.

For police dogs, when I was at a convention last year, there was a company selling pagers which would warn about the heat or A/C status in a police car, and if the vehicle continued to remain hot, would pop the door so the dog could get out. Better a dog on the streets than a dead K9.

[Mike]

Are they retrofittable to older (circa 2002?) 2.8KW models with only remote push button starts? Mine has no usage meter, just the remote push button start.