Sanitize ice maker and hot water heater - How to?

Just some musings.

I start with the fresh water tank and the water heater tank empty.

The first thing I do, is remove water filters. We have three: a whole RV filter, a cold water filter under the sink that filters chorine for the kitchen faucet and the (residential) refrigerator, and a filter in the refrigerator.

I don't know the capacity of your fresh water tank and water heater. Regardless, that will be a lot of mixture to put in your water hose. In my case, it would be almost 7 gallons.

I put all 1 and 2/3 cups of bleach in a gallon of water and pour that into the hose.

Connecting the hose to the RV before putting the mixture in, make it very difficult to get the fluid in the hose. The air in the hose must escape somehow. I have one end of the hose "high" and pour the mixture into the hose. Depending on the "lay of the land," one end of the hose is attached to the faucet and the other to the RV. Then fill the fresh water tank.

I turn the pump on and fill the water heater. Next, I run water through all of the faucets, including toilet and the outside shower. Then, I run water though the cold water "tap" in the refrigerator. I refill the fresh water tank - 10 gallons went into the water heater.

I let things sit for at least 3 hours. During this time, the ice maker is still operating. It will produce two or three batches of ice.

After at least 3 hours, it's time to rinse. Before the second rinse, I replace the cold water filter under the kitchen sink.

Tom

Most us sanitize our systems in the spring. The system starts out empty and all the water that gets pumped through the system has sufficient bleach to kill anything (that includes the hot water tank and ice maker) - I let it sit overnight and drain everything and add some hydrogen peroxide to help eliminate the residual chlorine smell. I don't think you have to do anything special to address hot water tank or ice maker so long as you start off with a winterized rig b4 you sanitize.

Your water heater sanitizes itself - heat does that job. Ice maker? 1 run of ice would do it.

I'm a former pool and spa technician, so here's the deal: the bleach form of chlorine is a very fast-acting oxidizer, and if there's bacteria in your water lines, they are killed immediately, assuming the bleach can get to them. Letting the solution sit for extra time doesn't really accomplish anything. But you're doing a good job of sanitizing!

Regarding a spray for the exterior of faucets, etc - I would use a Clorox spray. They use a longer-lasting form of chlorine - if you mix up a sprayer of bleach and water - it's good for your one application - a week later, that solution isn't effective any more. Peroxide is a good second choice for a topical sanitizer.

I always tried to fill our freshwater tank from a chlorinated source; and then used a carbon-block filter attached to the kitchen faucet to either filter out "stuff" - or remove the taste of the chlorinated fill water.

As for using bleach for faucets, I did that a few years but I had a few issues.
I kept getting it on my cloths with the expected result.
It kept crystallizing in the sprayer and clogging it.
Hard to store. You really have to put it in something because of the damage it will do. Traveling over mountains can cause it to drip out the end of the sprayer.
After a bit of research, I started using hydrogen peroxide instead. It's safer and kills germs by oxidizing them but it needs to be kept in its light resistant bottle because UV can kill it. Fortunately you can just insert a common sprayer into the larger size bottle.

Scott

I assume it's a typo, but you're missing an important step in the general sanitize procedure. After you fill the tank, turn off the fill valve and disconnect (or at least turn off) the city water connection and turn on the pump in the RV. The goal is to get water from the tank to the faucets, rather than water from your house which has no bleach in it.

It generally doesn't take too long to get the bleachy water to the faucets. It's pretty easy to tell by smell when you're set.

The water heater can be sanitized in the same basic way--after having the drain plug in and the bypass valves set to normal operation etc, open a hot water valve and let the air out until you get bleachy (cold) water coming out. The water heater is then full of the bleachy water. There's no need to turn it on; in fact, doing so would tend to drive off the chlorine more quickly.

Once sanitized, it can take a good bit of water to get most of the chlorine out of the water heater. I suppose one could speed up the process by draining it with the drain plug, but at least on my heater manipulating the drain plug is inconvenient. I don't consider it necessary to completely refill the fresh water tank and drain it, either; a minisucle concentration of bleach in water is not dangerous. I just drain the solution out as best as it will and rinse it with a little fresh water. There's nothing dangerous about being more thorough, of course.

I'm afraid I can't offer any suggestions about the ice maker. (My ice maker consists of a set of plastic trays that are set on the freezer floor manually, and they're cleaned by washing them with the dishes.)

Baja Man wrote:

MY process:

Lever to Fill tank position. I usually use a 1/4 c of household bleach to every 15 gallons of tank capacity. I add a 1/4 c to a gallon of water and pour this solution into my water hose which is connected to MH. I then place the other end into my homes water bib. I fill tank until it overflows. I then turn each spigot on, one by one, on for 1-2 minutes and close. Let sit 5-6 hours or overnight. Then I drain tank, fill with fresh water, and drain again.

Now.....

1. How do I sanitize my water heater? Does it need to be turned on?

Do the same for the hot water taps. No the heater doe not have to be turned on. Do you run run the clean water (last fill) through the taps ?

Baja Man wrote:
2. How do I sanitize my refers ice maker? Does it need to be turned on and making ice? If yes, how many cycles of ice making?

Yes, the ice maker need to be making ice while you have the chlorine water in the tank. I would want it to make 3 cycles. I would also want at least 2 cycles of the final clean water.