Driving in Windy Conditions

This topic is so subjective. I have been in 25mph that seemed worse than some 40mph days. Depends on a lot of factors. I know that my DP is the best in the wind of everything I have towed. Seems pretty stable.

My coach can handle 30-45 mph winds pretty good, and I do not worry about the handling. But what I do worry about is the big awning. I had the sprocket on the end of the big awning damage a few years ago driving from Las Vegas to California. I had to stop in a rest area and secure it with rope that I had. Once it starts to move back and forth, it does not take it long before it takes off like a sail. Seen it happen too many times.

The coach with full water and fuel tank can handle pretty strong winds. The strongest have been driving down Cajon Pass with the Santa Ana winds. Many big rigs that are driving through empty will flip over right around the Cucamonga area.

Gasoline motorhomes with long hangovers are terrible with cross winds. So it is best just to stop and wait it out. Use common sense when driving with strong winds.

In southern California the strong winds are in March and April.

Other than short lived thunderstorms out east the worst winds that I have driven through was a 30-40 mph head wind on I-10 in Texas. I keep an eye on the vacuum gauge when I drive I noticed a drop of about 5 ins of Hg with that wind. It felt like the parking brake was on. When a 18 wheeler past me and pulled in front I saw the gauge return to almost normal. I continued the trip behind him with and the emergency brake came off. Side winds of 30-40 mpg did not bother me. I have yet to find that strong of a tail wind to drive in.

I live in one of those high wind areas in the upper desert of SoCal and second the other poster about doing the driving in the morning. If I stayed at home when winds got over 25 mph, I wouldn't get to do much camping (or keep my job for that matter). In my area, winds typically pick up in the afternoon with the "good stuff" at 3 pm and later. Most of the time it's pretty low, 35 mph or less but occasionally it's higher (at times MUCH higher). I will say for someone not used to it (unfortunately I am), even 35 mph can freak you out but I assure you it's not dangerous at that speed UNLESS your driving skills or your rig are not up for the task. I have driven with 65 mph gusts before and the rig was stable at 45 mph (the slide topper awning however was not stable). I didn't intend to drive the rig at those wind speeds BTW.

The worst winds in new Mexico, Arizona and Utah are normally in March and April. They can happen at any time but those months are always worse with many days in a row with high winds.

Personally, I will not drive when the winds go much over 25 mph. I am out there to enjoy myself and it is just not worth it to me.

AT what wind speed....?

I am unable to answer that directly as well.. Too many factors.

But the answer is this: When you get to asking "is the wind blowing too hard".... It is. Find parking.

True story... Now if you think of it you often drive in like a sixty MPH breeze (Calm winds you are going sixty MPH) I was headed east across Taxes, er, Texas, a few years back (About 7) and there was a bit of breeze.. In fact the tumble weeds were passing me... going straight down the road... like I had the brakes on.. KEY PHRASE: Straight down the road.. The winds were coming from DEAD ASTERN which is the motor home's strongest aspect.. MPG on the dash display was hanging around 13.8 (normally closer to 8).

Nice drive.. Till I exited the freeway and then it was slow and very careful going till I parked.. Weather man said gusts over 100 MPH sustained of 90.

But that was DEAD ASTERN winds,, one of the many factors.

A cross wind.. Well i'd like to keep it to a small fraction of that.

That same season I was heading for Palmdale, CA (moose lodge) and was chatting with another RVer a few hours behind me.. We both stopped or fuel and food at the same truck stop. He choose to spend the night, called ahead to the CG he had reservations at and told them he did not think he'd make it due to the wind, They told him No Problem you can't get into the park just now anyway.. He ask why.. Seems a class A exiting the park caught a gust of wind and rolled over on it's side and it was going to take hours to get it back on its wheels and out of there.

We are planning a trip in that direction around the beginning of July. Is there a time of year that the winds are less intense? We took that trip a few years back around the middle of June pulling a TT and it was an awful experience fighting that wind.

I was driving on I-80 through the Utah salt plains almost to the Nevada boarder heading west a few years ago. It was in September so it was a summer storm that consisted of high winds and rain. My clue should have been the rain was going sideways instead of down. I slowed but kept driving because I need to get back home. I decided to quit driving when the wind actually pushed me sideways into the next lane. The steering wheel was turned to the right, but I was going left. I had to slow to under 20 to regain control. Luckily there was zero traffic around me. I drove at under 20 mph to the next off ramp and found a place to turn the RV into the wind and just waited until the storm passed.

Pathfinder RV wrote:
We are planning a trip through California, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, New Mexico and Texas this spring. During past similar trips, the winds were very strong, making driving difficult at times. At what wind speed should we not drive our 27 foot class A motorhome?

It's going to depend on your coach, driving skills and speed. I never drive much more than 50, anyway and probably slow down even more in extremely windy conditions. As long as I feel comfortable with the handling, no problem and when I no longer do so, I pull over. We had a 3 state encounter in the desert SW once, with it being so bad that sitting in an AZ campground for the night was more aggravating that driving. We left our slideout in and just putting up with it, until it finally settled down for the night or somewhat, anyway.

One spring we got stuck in Clayton NM at the state park due to high winds for 3 days. There is a sign in the town claiming to be the windiest. I had to turn the class A into the wind at the campground twice due to extreme buffeting.