Dewinterizing woes

The one in the middle the by-pass, the handle should be 90 degrees to the line to be closed. The other two should have the handles parallel to the line to be open.

A little confusing but I hope it helps.

Remember the first thing the water pump must do is fill the water heater and this will take a while.

Likely antifreeze got into the hot water tank if you didn’t leave the bypass open to flush the line “upstream” of the tank. Easiest to simply flush the tank and refill as it is hard to get rid of antifreeze inside the tank.

pull the anode rod if you have one and drain and flush the tank. position valves as stated above. Never put anti freeze in the WH or the fresh water tank.

As already stated by others, it sounds like you have some antifreeze in you water heater. It will take several fill/emptying to get it out of there to stop the foaming.

The heater should remain in bypass mode until the dewinterization process is done. If not, then some antifreeze can get into the water heater and cause your problem.

In the picture below, the top and bottom valves should be closed and the middle valve open for winterization. This puts the heater in bypass mode. Then after running water through all the lines, close the middle one and open the top and bottom. This puts the water heater in normal mode.

By the way, I always blow out my lines before starting winterization and with the heater drain plug removed. Doing this gets all the water out of the short pieces of tubing between the water heater and the valves. Then I put it in bypass mode and put in the antifreeze.
Hope this helps you out. :)
Barney

Thank you very much fellows, much appreciate this.

Wondering if valves are universal across RVs- whether 90 degree to the line is considered as closed. I think that what 12 man says is a bit different to what Barney says in that regard, but the gist is the same - when I dewinterized I let the pink fluid into the water heater and cant seem to flush it out.

Right now I am on my driveway and worry that will overflow grey water tank but heading out tomorrow to campground and will try again there. Thanks for the tip guys - will also buy a 16mm? socket to remove heating rod to better flush out the tank.

The valves in the picture I posted are regular "turn till open" or "turn till closed" valves. Some trailers have the same valve configuration but have 1/4 turn valves where the handle pointed across the pipe direction is closed and the valve handle pointed parallel to the pipe is open. Same results either way.

There are still other winterization valve arrangement involving only two valves but you indicated you had a three valve system which would be like the picture.
By the way, I think my water heater plug takes a 15/16" socket (Atwood heater). I think the Suburban heater takes a 1".
Barney

no they are not universal across all RVs as mine only has one vale to bypass the water heater