Water Pressure Regulator

[2112]

My regulator failed and I need a replacement. The Watts are up to ~$150 now.

Has anyone had any luck with these cheap RV Guard regulators or something similar in this price range? There are several that look identical. All the reviews on the different brands seem to be hit or miss.

Are these serviceable like a Watts?

Thanks

[Cummins12V98]

LOTS of things to "Worry" about. Having your water shut off at night is not one of them. May as well turn off the propane tanks as well. But that would mean you could get cold. OK then I will use a small electric heater. OH NO that could get knocked over by the dog and the shutoff may not work and catch the RV on fire.

Should I mention not going outside because the sky could........., naw I may take that risk.

[willald]

dedmiston wrote:
...we never use the pump when we have full hookups. I'd much rather use the silent water service from the camp. We've probably logged a few hundred nights with FHU and I've gone through a bunch of cheap pressure regulators, but we've never had a pressure related failure. I wouldn't hesitate to keep using a regulator and take advantage of the silent water hookup and give the pump a vacation of its own..

Good points as well. Only thing is, the water service from the campground in some cases isn't necessarily 'silent', either. On some RVs I've owned in the past, the city water inlet valve can make a buzzing noise whenever it lets water in.

I'm surprised you didn't mention the other good reason for using campground water service instead of the pump - Water pressuring fluctuating up/down when pump cycles on and off.

With just about every RV I've owned, if you run water continuously (like when taking a shower) with the pump, you will notice the water pressure frequently fluctuate a little every few seconds - goes up slightly when pump cycles on, pump cycles off, it goes down a little, then back up when pump cycles back on, etc. It is typically more consistent, not back and forth like that when hooked up to the campground water supply.

I know some people upgrade their water pumps to models that don't do this as much, or add an accumulator tank that helps with this also.

Anyway....I think this (using water pump vs campground water pressure) is one of those '6 one, half dozen the other' kind of discussions, and everyone will do it their own way, and neither one is necessarily right or wrong. 🙂

[dedmiston]

4x4van wrote:

dedmiston wrote:
I'd much rather use the silent water service from the camp.

Silent is nice, but that same silence will be responsible for major damage inside the RV if a line or fitting breaks, especially in the middle of the night. There will be nothing to alert you of the leak other than water pouring out of your RV.:E

Sorry, but I'm going to have to file that under paranoia.

Can it happen? Sure, but the odds of it happening, especially with regulated pressure? Pretty slim.

There's a long list of things that can go wrong in our lives. I worry about some of them, I prepare for others, and I choose not to fixate on the rest of the list.

I sleep great at night. Literally and figuratively. Not worrying about phantoms and bogies is one way to sleep better. And not running a noisy water pump when we get up to pee is another way.

I think a lot of stuff that vexes us nowadays comes from not being chased by bears anymore. If we were still being chased by bears, we wouldn't fret about half the stuff that we do. I think we're wired to worry about a certain amount of things in the world. And now that our species seems to have mostly solved the problem of being chased by bears, we've had to adopt other things to fixate on. Or we could retrain ourselves to shrug our shoulders and say "meh" about some of these things.

I say "meh" to worrying that my plumbing is going to explode while I sleep. Meh.

(Now watch me get eaten by a bear.)

[Cummins12V98]

FYI if you check your water pressure and it's lets say 60 that does NOT mean it won't be 100 psi later. I know this for a FACT.

Smart to use one IMHO. I have a RV lot that the pressure is around 80psi and have my WATTS set to 60 and have owned it for at least 10 years of full time usage with zero issues. Plenty of flow unlike the CHEAP units.

[4x4van]

dedmiston wrote:
I'd much rather use the silent water service from the camp.

Silent is nice, but that same silence will be responsible for major damage inside the RV if a line or fitting breaks, especially in the middle of the night. There will be nothing to alert you of the leak other than water pouring out of your RV.:E

[willald]

dodge guy wrote:
I haven’t used one in near 20 years of RVing. Everywhere from the Rocky Mountains to the east coast and Canada to the Gulf! Always left my water on. I have one I bought along time ago because I was told I needed it. Never found a need for it. It now just sits in the bin in the water bay.

Hmm....Interesting approach.

All it will take is one time, for you to hook up to water at a campground with very high water pressure (like the one I was at last summer in Kentucky, where water pressure was right at 70 the whole time). By the time you realize your 'need' for it, it may be too late, as you may learn that need in the form of repairing a busted pipe and cleaning up a big mess.

Seriously, dodge guy, you've been dodging a bullet there for an awful long time. I wouldn't tempt fate any more...

[BarneyS]

dodge guy wrote:
I haven’t used one in near 20 years of RVing. snip... Never found a need for it. It now just sits in the bin in the water bay.

Hmmm. Never found a need for it YET! You never need one until you need it. 🙂
Barney

[dodge_guy]

I haven’t used one in near 20 years of RVing. Everywhere from the Rocky Mountains to the east coast and Canada to the Gulf! Always left my water on. I have one I bought along time ago because I was told I needed it. Never found a need for it. It now just sits in the bin in the water bay.

[JoeH]

I've had a Valterra adjustable regulator for at least 15 years. I had to rebuild it once. Rebuild kits are readily available.
Valterra Regulator

[docsouce]

I bought the" Twinkle Star" adjustable water pressure regulator from Amazon 3 years ago. Cost $26.99. Just looked it up and still $26.99. It has gotten a lot of use and still works fine. It can be taken completly apart to service it too. Last year it stopped working so I took it apart. I found the water inlet screen broke for some reason and a piece of the wire got caught in the pressure adjusting spring.
Removed it put it back together and it has been worked fine.

[dedmiston]

Just to be a contrarian... :B

Probably 75% of our camping is boondocking and we use the heck out of our pump. I think I've only replaced the pump once on any of our rigs when it developed a leak on one of the connections. (It made sense to replace it when I tore into it.)

But we never use the pump when we have full hookups. I'd much rather use the silent water service from the camp. We've probably logged a few hundred nights with FHU and I've gone through a bunch of cheap pressure regulators, but we've never had a pressure related failure. I wouldn't hesitate to keep using a regulator and take advantage of the silent water hookup and give the pump a vacation of its own. Yes, I'll switch over to our fresh tank if it's too cold for the hookup, but that's an exception and not a habit.

[willald]

Well, using water pump and fresh water tank all the time and not relying on campground water pressure and a pressure regulator wasn't really the original topic here, and I apologize for hijacking the thread some to discuss such.

However, from reading everyone's experience with this (water pump and FW tank) approach, sounds like I may have been a bit too paranoid about water pumps wearing out, and that isn't really much of an issue. I may well just switch to using water pump, fresh water tank all the time and not worry about it.

There's definitely several advantages to this, not the least of which is like already said, you can switch off the pump whenever you leave the RV and not have to worry about a pipe bursting and causing a huge mess. Consistent water pressure is nice, too.

[folivier]

I've done the tank fill & use method for over 8 years and had no problems with pumps. Another benefit to doing this is if your tanks are in a heated basement and the water coming out of the ground is 36º is has a chance to heat up before you use it.

[dieseltruckdriv]

willald wrote:

MFL wrote:
^^I agree, there is a reason the Watts regulator costs more. The RV Guard model looks like the Valterra regulator. Bad thing about a cheap model, just more expense, when you decide to toss it, and get a proven high quality one.

Myself...I quit using any, just fill my 60 gal fresh tank as needed, and have a great, consistent water pressure. Nice too, in case you ever have a water leak, you catch it right away.

Jerry

I curious....How long have you used this approach, and how many water pumps you replaced?

I like this idea, but am always hesitant to, as I'm concerned that the water pumps they put in RVs, like many other RV components, aren't meant for prolonged use.

I'd be concerned that if we used the water pump all the time for everything water related like you are advocating here, we'd be replacing a lot of water pumps.

How has your water pump held up under this kind of constant use?

I do not use external water connections except to fill my fresh tank.

I have faith in my Sureflo pump. In my last 5er, I accidentally left my pump on for a day and a half, running dry. I was sure I ruined it so I ordered a new one and replaced it. I am still using that pump to pump water from my 60 gallon bladder to my tank in my current 5er. I haven't done a thing to that pump yet.

We had our last 5er for 8 years, this one is on it's 5th year, and we stay over 100 nights a year in it since we like it better than our home, but can't afford to full time yet.

[2112]

This is the one that just failed on me after 4 years. The pressure drops to close to zero when I turn the water on. Couldn't even flush the toilet.

I had the blue plastic Camco before that.