Who was the genius...
...who designed the Dometic 300 series toilet? Our year old Whitewater Retro 195 began to smell like an outhouse. I figured it was a vent problem, but nothing I did seemed to help. DW said, "Could it be the seal between the toilet and the floor is leaking?" We had had that problem in our TC with an Aqua Magic toilet.
So, I decided to remove the toilet and see what shape the flange seal was in. I got the toilet out of the trailer and realized it was the toilet itself that smelled. It was worse than any odor the now open black tank was emitting. The flange seal was in good shape, BUT I discovered about a cup full of black water was trapped between the inner and outer bowl moldings.
When I got the whole thing disassembled, I discovered that there is an O-ring that is supposed to seal the inside bowl from the outer shell. It is square in cross section, and it is not compressed in any way. In fact the fit was so loose that the O-ring was twisted during installation at the factory, making the seal even less secure. It did have some silicone grease on it, but it obviously allowed black water to get out of the bowl and into the outer shell. Whew! Talk about a smell. Good thing I have a strong stomach.
I cleaned all the parts and put the toilet back together and installed it. It works fine, and the smell is gone, but I told DW if it starts to smell again, we'll toss it and get a different toilet. It makes me sad, because this toilet works better than any other we have had in an RV. It is just so poorly designed that it is truly unsanitary.
So, I decided to remove the toilet and see what shape the flange seal was in. I got the toilet out of the trailer and realized it was the toilet itself that smelled. It was worse than any odor the now open black tank was emitting. The flange seal was in good shape, BUT I discovered about a cup full of black water was trapped between the inner and outer bowl moldings.
When I got the whole thing disassembled, I discovered that there is an O-ring that is supposed to seal the inside bowl from the outer shell. It is square in cross section, and it is not compressed in any way. In fact the fit was so loose that the O-ring was twisted during installation at the factory, making the seal even less secure. It did have some silicone grease on it, but it obviously allowed black water to get out of the bowl and into the outer shell. Whew! Talk about a smell. Good thing I have a strong stomach.
I cleaned all the parts and put the toilet back together and installed it. It works fine, and the smell is gone, but I told DW if it starts to smell again, we'll toss it and get a different toilet. It makes me sad, because this toilet works better than any other we have had in an RV. It is just so poorly designed that it is truly unsanitary.
