Anti freeze into fresh water tank

Many times the pump suction pickup line does NOT reach to bottom of tank
Hence pump runs dry before tank is emptied

Several gallons of anti-freeze may end up being double what you would normally use.

And then you have bunch of anti-freeze you have to get rid of in fresh water tank and tank drain doesn;t allow complete drainage. So yiou fill,drain,fill drain, fill drain

Inherently Lazy---so am I
Use the 'winterizing' kit and SAVE yourself time, effort and more work then was necessary to begin with

It wouldn't be so bad if an RV had a tank that would completely drain. Some are so poorly supported that they have permanent distorted beer bellys hanging down. It seems common to see the suction fittings on the side so it can take a good amount of AF.

I'll never put AF in my tanks again. I've run 200 gallons of water through it and thought I finally had it out. Then wait a while and turn on the faucet and it foams again.
All summer long it foams when it has sat a while.
No thanks.
Air for the lines and AF for the traps.

I have the 'usual' line in...but..being inherently lazy, the thought of just dumping into the fresh tank and running the pump appeals. I always close the valve to the hot water tank..unless I forget, of course. Meh..I am sure I will go the normal route...it just popped into my head...the why not?


Gary Haupt

My brother-in-law did it once... took him two years to completely get rid of the taste in the system. Absent a built-in pick-up system for antifreeze, I would just drain everything, blow the lines with compressed air, and put the antifreeze in the drain traps (which is how I did it with our previous travel trailer).

Rob

Putting antifreeze into the fresh water tank and pumping it from there is a valid method of winterizing, but generally not the best method unless it's the only one available. It requires a good bit more antifreeze than pumping it from the bottles (you need enough to cover the pickup for the pump), it often results in more or less diluted antifreeze since frequently the tank drains do not drain quite all the water out, and it is a lot harder and more time-consuming to rinse clear afterwards. Still, it's a method that does work and a few RVs make it impossible, or nearly so, to do anything else.

I'd put it in the same category as winterizing without bypassing the water heater...both work, but there are better ways.

We bought a used truck camper the owner warned us he oops got pink in the fresh and hot water tanks. About 5000 gallons a water later we had the taste flushed out.... great way to get rid of a Saturday morning...

Always used flush kits / water heater bypasses’sz

garyhaupt wrote:
I have always drained the fresh tank, connected the anti-freeze into the line at the pump and run the stuff around. It occurs to me..why not just toss a couple gallons into the fresh tank, run the pump and be done with it? I mean..yes, you have to rinse come spring, but one does anyway.

Gary Haupt

other than taking a while to really flush all remnants of 'the punk stuff' from the fresh tank your idea will work. but if you have a system thst will pump directly from a bottle why not use that?

I had no problem doing it that way with a previous trailer that lacked an anti-freeze pickup tube at the pump.