Fresh water

Coach-man wrote:
hualing a ton of fresh water around is very wasteful! Water weighs a lot, about 7.5 lbs. per gallon.

TyroneandGladys wrote:
a full load of water is not going to effect mileage to any great degree and short of floods excess water will not kill you but not enough can and has.

Two conflicting statements here. You can figure out the real impact for yourself with some quick calculations:

The question is whether to carry a lot of water (even full) or carry a little bit of water (even empty.) So subtract the "little bit of water" from the "lot of water" amounts to get a number of gallons of "extra" water. Then multiply that number by 7.5 pounds per gallon to get the weight of the "extra" water.

Now take the weight of that "extra" water, divide it by the actual total weight of your RV (include the TV weight if a trailer) and multiply that by 100. That gives you the weight of that "extra" water as a percentage of the RV weight.

Now look at that percentage: if it's a big number (lots of water in a light RV) then it could make an important difference - probably not so much of a mileage hit unless you are in a lot of stop and go traffic or in the mountains, but maybe it'll affect performance. But if it's a small number (not a lot of water, and/or a heavy RV) then it probably won't make much difference at all.

If the percentage is low, then it doesn't matter where you fill, do it where it's most convenient (like at home.) If you think the percentage is too high, then fill up closer to your destination - just be aware that water may be hard to find (perhaps the campground fill station is out of order) or may be of questionable quality. If you get there, and the only water is really poor quality and the DW says it's too icky or smelly, what are you going to do? (Not all filters take out all contaminants or oders.) Also, if you use somewhere like a gas station, or a spigot at the campground entrance, remember that it might take some time to fill the tanks. (I recently had to wait about 20 minutes to park in my space at at a dry camping dog show because another trailer was blocking my site while they were filling water at the common spigot.)

For me, it's an easy decision: the difference between a full tank and 7 or 8 gallons is only 1.7 percent of my total weight. Not much difference at all. So I always travel with a full tank since I do so much dry camping, and it's so much easier to fill up with known good quality water at home, rather than search for (potentially poor) water at the destination or at a truck stop/gas station/etc.

But it's a decision everyone must make for themselves: the smaller the rig, or the bigger the tank, the more of an issue it is. But if you work out the actual percentage, you might be surprised that the difference isn't nearly as big as you thought.

foopy1 wrote:
First off what is IMHO? I mostly want to know "where" to fill up. So, I guess it is campgrounds, RV Parks or gas stations. Thank you all

In My Humble Opinion

Jim....that response was hilarious! and I see some truth in it. THANKS

Walmart Garden center!

Foopy,
You're relatively new to the forum. Just accept the fact that if you ask for directions someplace, somebody will tell you how to build a car. :)

foopy1 wrote:
First off what is IMHO? I mostly want to know "where" to fill up. So, I guess it is campgrounds, RV Parks or gas stations. Thank you all

In My Honest Opinion! IMHO

I fill water at home. The idea that you can fill where ever, doesn't cut it with me. I usually get up to two weeks on a tank, plus the "bottled water". I use water from an Artesian well with really great water for drinking, cooking and coffee. I don't use anything but Nalgene bottles for the water, liter and half liter sizes. half the bottles I freeze, and use as needed. I, also, have a three gallon HDPE water container when I will be gone a long time. The washing/flushing water in the tank can be replaced when needed, and the extra 250lbs. I haul around is a lot cheaper to do than buy bottled, regardless of price.

THANK YOU !!!!!!

IMHO stands for In My Humble Opinion.:B

IMHO = In my humble opinion

You can always try a church or a BPOE hall, county and city parks sometimes have spigots available. Sometimes Fast Food places will have a spigot outside (to wash their sidewalks) I have watered-up in someones front yard (small town, I asked and they said sure!!) Flying J gas stations always have water available.

Get yourself a Water Thief aka: Water Bandit too:

Camco Water Bandit

The big thing to remember, when wanting to utilize any of the above mentioned ways, always ask politely first.

WoodGlue