Not running out of fresh water

turbo130 · 05-02-2019, 09:30 AM

Last summer we camped at a national park campground for a week. My wife and I used our shower once each using a shut off at the shower head to conserve water. After our showers I notice that the showers took two thirds of our fresh water and we really had to conserve after that. I have now purchased a Niagara Earth Massage handheld 1.5gpm and a KES shower head shut off hoping that this will help with conserving water. We also have a 5 gallon jug that we use for fresh water which my wife has also purchased a pump so we can pump water into the trailer water tank if we want too.

ALJO · 05-02-2019, 10:01 AM

I found milkcrates with gallon bottles handy for me, easy to handle and easy to poor in the FW tank fill.
Have eight milkcrates (32 gallon) and can choose how much to take for the boonies.
Milk bottles are stronger than water bottles, so to clean a gallon milk bottle use 1/2 cup vinegar and 1/2 cup water and shake thoroughly. No milk taste after that.

oldmanAZ · 05-02-2019, 10:01 AM

If your trailer has the 'lights' for the fresh water etc., they can be notoriously inaccurate.

Before your next trip, verify the accuracy of your freshwater lights. One method...
Fill the tank and drain it using, for example, a 5gallon bucket. Alternately drain some and check the lights. That will confirm if the lights show what is really left in your tank.

turbo130 · 05-02-2019, 12:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by oldmanAZ

If your trailer has the 'lights' for the fresh water etc., they can be notoriously inaccurate.

Before your next trip, verify the accuracy of your freshwater lights. One method...
Fill the tank and drain it using, for example, a 5gallon bucket. Alternately drain some and check the lights. That will confirm if the lights show what is really left in your tank.

I figured that the lights are not very accurate a few years ago I did run out of water dry camping and had to hitch up and drive over to the potable water spigot.

Grumpy · 05-02-2019, 12:27 PM

If you filled up before you got there you probably arrived with less than a full tank.

Quantum · 05-02-2019, 01:06 PM

I found on both of my Jayco trailers that it is hard to fill up the fresh water tank completely.

My experience is that the water flows out the overflow tube before the tank is truly full. I could easily get another 2-4 gallons in my 22 gallon tank on my x213.

On my 28BHKS I noticed the same thing. Although this tank is much larger, I still wanted to maximize my water holding as we have 5 people taking showers.

On both my trailers, the overflow tube drained under the trailer and once is started flowing, it was like a siphon and kept sucking fresh water out of my tank. I rerouted the tube to the air inlet on the fresh water tank fill.

ALJO · 05-02-2019, 01:25 PM

By the inlet that's where they used to install the air outlet, but for the last 15 years they don't do that anymore. When I moved my FW tank I re-routed to the FW tank fill.
If you re route upwards 24" and then down syphoning problem is solved. Better dan capping the lines and forget it one day. A tank rip is more expensive and have seen a view during working on RV's

turbo130 · 05-03-2019, 08:43 AM

My dad years ago installed a 100 fresh water tank in his travel trailer. In the five years that we have owned the trailer we have only been out 4 times. My father in law lived with us for over 9 years and he did not like to camp. He has passed away and now we will be able to travel more and hopefully use the trailer more to really get all of the kinks out of it.

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