Water from RV

[Grumpa]

Do you or not drink water from the RV water system,clean sanitized?

[TyroneandGladys]

All the time. Sanitize the systems once a year and filter the water going into the tank with this filter.
Just a tip always taste the water before filling your tank some water tastes horrible and you do not want to contaminate your tank with bad tasting water.

[ncrowley]

We use a sediment filter and a charcoal filter. Then we feed the filtered water into a water softener. We have a Y where we can take the water out after the filters and before the water softener and that is the water we drink. So far, the water has always been fine to drink at the places we have been. We can always resort to bottled water to drink, if we need to. We are considering staying at an RV park where they tell you that there water is VERY hard and does not taste every good so we will show up with plenty of water in our water tank and not hook up to their water at all.

[ldonabed]

We don't drink the onboard water. I'm afraid the little bit water that may have been in the tank will be funky after a few months of sitting. Plus I feel guilty for wasting the water... We buy a few gallon jugs of water at the beginning of our trips & refill those jugs as needed at the water kiosks that you can find in front of a lot of grocery stores (usually for about .35/gallon). We'll reuse them a few times, then buy new ones.
And now that we store our 5er in another town it would be difficult to sanitize the tank.

[jffnkrn]

I have posted in other areas as well. YEP, we use it just like at home. She don't drink it cause of the taste, chlorine that is. We fill with city water and any water we hook up too. Yes i use a filter when hooked up, even at home, just because it will also remove any little sand particles that are found in our water. Remember the city source is safe. We use our unit monthly and only about once per year, only due to my OCD i put about a couple ounces of bleach, this is basically if we don't use it for more than a month, fill that tank and run all the fixtures. then after a day, i drain all and refill, then drain again and refill. We are now on the road and have been gone almost a week, filled up before we left, used some on the road, then hooked up at an RV park, hooked up with filter and now dry camping on the way home which will take about 3 days. when home, we will flush and fill and ready ourselves for the next trip. Go ahead, sanitize, flush it, fill it up, flush it again and use it and enjoy. Good Luck & Be Safe ! ! !

[Lwiddis]

"But some have heavily chlorinated water, so we'll use bottled water for coffee, drinking, or making ice cubes."

Mbopp, any good bourbon will counter bad ice.

[Lwiddis]

"What makes the tank any different than the 50 year old pipes coming into your house"
SCVJeff, Los Angelinos would love to have fresh water pipes that were only 50 years old. Father Serra put in most of Los Angeles' pipes.

[TechWriter]

We full time and have seen some pretty funky campground water, so we filter the bejeezus out of our water.

We also treat the water tank with bleach at least twice a year.

[mbopp]

It depends. Some cg's we go to have good water so no problem there. But some have heavily chlorinated water, so we'll use bottled water for coffee, drinking, or making ice cubes.

[SCVJeff]

jfkmk wrote:

SCVJeff wrote:
What makes the tank any different than the 50 year old pipes coming into your house?

No air in the pipes.

really? What about all the oxygen constantly refreshed by the water itself? Why do you think pipes rust from the inside> out?

[ctilsie242]

My two centavos:

I will drink the water from my tank, after I sanitize it with a round of bleach, then rinse it.

However, for a good chunk of the year in the winter, I move my RV to a campsite and leave it there for 4-5 months. So, I leave the tanks empty. During this, I use bottled water for everything.

[obgraham]

We use the tank water for everything. In a B, with the small tank, usually the water does not sit for long. But if it does, and acquires a bit of a stale taste, we usually have on hand 1-2 bottles of the cheapest bottled water there is.

Why people fear their water, in a country with the safest water in the world, I don't know.

[phillyg]

Cleaned and sanitized, sure. But were almost always on city water and we carry little in the tank when traveling.

[Mr_Mark1]

We don't drink the coach tank water per se as I buy bottle water to keep in the fridge and we just grab a bottle when we want it. We certainly use our tank water to make coffee and for cooking, etc., and we use the ice cubes from the freezer icemaker.

Our coach has a fairly sophisticated water filtering system and the fridge has a filter of it's own. We have something like 5 filters in the water bay and I have them changed about every 6 months. The fridge alert system lets me know when to change the filter (about once a year).

The way our coach is set-up, we only pull water from the fresh tank. Since it's 189 gallons, we don't fill up at every stop, only when needed. I haven't 'sanitized' the fresh tank yet as we are using it very regularly.

Safe travels,
MM.

[coolmom42]

Different parts of the country have widely varying mineral content in their water. If you drink water that is drastically different than what your gut is accustomed to, it can cause gut issues for a while, until you get accustomed to it. Small children and pets are most sensitive to this. It doesn't mean that the water is unsafe or unsanitary, and it can be very high quality. Just has a lot of naturally occuring minerals.

This seems to be the biggest problem when you are in an area that has much more calcium and magnesium in the water than you are used to. So if you come from the Gulf Coast, Florida, or other "soft" water areas, watch out for it.

My insides are used to hard water and I've never had an issue anywhere in the US.