Travelling with hot water tank full?

IH_Fan wrote:
Hi Folks,

We travel from site to site, stay for a few days to take in the local interests and tour to the next location. We don't travel with water in our fresh water holding tank as we use full hookup sites.

The thing is, the hot water tank is always full when we travel so I'm hauling water around for no reason. I've looked if there is an easy way to drain the hot water tank, but I don't think there is, except to undo the plastic drain plug. Not the best thing as I swear it wouldn't take much to strip it....and it's a pain to get to.

Is this an issue with anyone else? If you drain it, what is your trick?

Thanks!

As already suggested just leave water in the tank to begin with. However, if you insist on draining it and with a plastic (nylon actually) plug in yours you have the option of doing what I did which has several advantages with one minor downside. Mine is a 6 gal so one thing you have to confirm is that your drain plug is the same size as mine.


This is the fittings for my Hot Water Drain Valve. The grey fitting is a quest 1/2 MPT compression fitting which is made of Acetal as best as I can determine and should have a continuous temp rating of 180 deg. The plug now is nylon and I would like to find a straight 1/2" fitting out of nylon and use that, but until then I will try the one I got at my local RV dealer which is Acetal and so far after close to 7 years all is still fine. The hose is a stainless steel faucet fitting with 1/2 MPT compression to 3/8 compression. The valve is a water shut off valve 3/8 compression to 3/8 hose barb. I got the grey fitting ($1.50) and the faucet hose ($2) from my local RV dealer and the valve ($5.30) from Lowes. If you decide to use the fitting for the tank out of something other than Acetal or Nylon make sure it's temp rated for at least 160 deg F continuous use.




This is the drain installed on the water heater in the stowed position.



This is the drain extended out from the hot water tank. Now it won't drain down the side of the trailer and additionally I can get hot water for cleaning w/o going into the trailer for it. It's nice to have a source of pressurized hot water on the utility side of the trailer for rinsing things like the business end of the sewer hose and fittings, etc.



The only potential downside to this is any sediment might not be expelled as with a normal drain plug because of the reduced opening, however the water is under pressure which should help if you periodically drain the tank with this system I have and you can always remove everything and drain/flush out the tank like you would with a regular drain plug.

Larry