A Devastating Discovery

[egarant]

I am filling my fresh water tank and notice steady drips of water coming out right below the drivers side jack mount which is on the same side as the water fill. I FREAK OUT.

I open the cabinet door under the sink and I can see the floor is wet and it is wet around the water fill door.

I slowly unscrew the water fill door and pry it off only to see this...



The water fill is completly disconnected.

When this camper was up in Yakima getting an entire new front end cap as the OEM had delaminated, I remember Brad Boyle from Eagle Cap pointing out some upgrades they did including a new water fill door!

I will reconnect it correctly but what in the heck should I do from this point?

I did send some pics and details to Brad Boyle up at Adventurer/Eagle Cap, I will be interested to hear his response.

Mr. E

[Grit_dog]

SidecarFlip wrote:
Never heard of a Worm drive clamp backing off on it's own. Physically impossible I'd say.

No, they will. Just not in this situation.

[S_Davis]

I will be buying in the next year and had been looking at Adventurer Truck Campers, but after seeing their response they just got crossed off the list. In business it is not about having the problem it is about how you deal with it when it happens. If it was about a product failure or a maintenance issue that might be one thing but it is clearly poor product choice and assembly. If something like this happened on one of my construction jobs(HVAC Contractor). I would be at the least covering the repair for the customer.

[JimK-NY]

I guess the bottom line is to avoid buying from a manufacturer that does not stand by their product and will not fix obvious manufacturing defects. I was fortunate enough to find a truck camper dealer who told it straight and also refused to carry several brands.

[tattoobob]

Reality Check wrote:

tattoobob wrote:

bb_94401 wrote:
A clarification: The hose clamp doesn't loosen, it is the hose that changes. How it happens depends on the chemical composition of the hose.

Plastic hose under pressure from the clamping system, cold flows and no longer seals whether on the suction side or pressure side of a system.

Think all those leaky air lines on a semi or compression fittings on water lines. Even the rubber radiator hoses lose resilience and develops a compression set with time and eventually leaks antifreeze.

Net result is that if you use spiral clamps it is good practice to re-tighten them if you wish to avoid a leak. Part of my spring ritual for my dump truck, other vehicles and the head in the sailboat.

The above doesn't help if the spiral clamp was not installed on the hose barb fitting correctly. Two clamps, one near the end of the hose once all the way on the hose barb, the other near the end of the hose barb farther back on the hose, is a better practice than a single clamp. Even better is to use a different seal design altogether.

This is BS, I work with hose clams everyday and what your saying is just not right. I have never in my 55 years have had a hose clamp loosen up! hoses fail rubber breaks down plastic cracks but Hose clamps do not back off on there own.

^^^^ maybe I'm missing something, but I'm pretty sure you're calling 'BS' on someone that wrote exactly what you stated. BB wrote "The hose clamp doesn't loosen".

Wow I guess your right sorry about that

[Reality_Check]

tattoobob wrote:

bb_94401 wrote:
A clarification: The hose clamp doesn't loosen, it is the hose that changes. How it happens depends on the chemical composition of the hose.

Plastic hose under pressure from the clamping system, cold flows and no longer seals whether on the suction side or pressure side of a system.

Think all those leaky air lines on a semi or compression fittings on water lines. Even the rubber radiator hoses lose resilience and develops a compression set with time and eventually leaks antifreeze.

Net result is that if you use spiral clamps it is good practice to re-tighten them if you wish to avoid a leak. Part of my spring ritual for my dump truck, other vehicles and the head in the sailboat.

The above doesn't help if the spiral clamp was not installed on the hose barb fitting correctly. Two clamps, one near the end of the hose once all the way on the hose barb, the other near the end of the hose barb farther back on the hose, is a better practice than a single clamp. Even better is to use a different seal design altogether.

This is BS, I work with hose clams everyday and what your saying is just not right. I have never in my 55 years have had a hose clamp loosen up! hoses fail rubber breaks down plastic cracks but Hose clamps do not back off on there own.

^^^^ maybe I'm missing something, but I'm pretty sure you're calling 'BS' on someone that wrote exactly what you stated. BB wrote "The hose clamp doesn't loosen".

[SidecarFlip]

Never heard of a Worm drive clamp backing off on it's own. Physically impossible I'd say.

[Grit_dog]

OR the camper monkey just cut the new hose too short, slid it over the small end of the fitting, realized it was too small, filled it with plumbers putty? and/or forgot to tighten the clamp!
Probably so he didn't have to tell the shop foreman he just cut $30 worth of hose 3" too short........
Hope the OP got er fixed by now. Seems like a straightforward repair.

And yes, if hose clamps backed themselves off with any sort of regularity there would be cars scattered all over the shoulders every day with no coolant in them.
Unless it's a high frequency vibration connection worm gear hose clamps stay as tight as you make them unless you overtighten and strip the clamp.
These hose clamps will loosen occasionally on my snowmachine exhaust. Heat shields, vibration dampers and hot dog coolers get clamped onto the pipe. They loosen up sometimes.
In this instance, a little rtv/silicone gasket sealant works wonders. Like a shock absorber. Fill the screw area and around the screw head with rtv. Dampens the vibrations and kind of acts like thread locker.
Same for exhaust springs.

[tattoobob]

bb_94401 wrote:
A clarification: The hose clamp doesn't loosen, it is the hose that changes. How it happens depends on the chemical composition of the hose.

Plastic hose under pressure from the clamping system, cold flows and no longer seals whether on the suction side or pressure side of a system.

Think all those leaky air lines on a semi or compression fittings on water lines. Even the rubber radiator hoses lose resilience and develops a compression set with time and eventually leaks antifreeze.

Net result is that if you use spiral clamps it is good practice to re-tighten them if you wish to avoid a leak. Part of my spring ritual for my dump truck, other vehicles and the head in the sailboat.

The above doesn't help if the spiral clamp was not installed on the hose barb fitting correctly. Two clamps, one near the end of the hose once all the way on the hose barb, the other near the end of the hose barb farther back on the hose, is a better practice than a single clamp. Even better is to use a different seal design altogether.

This is BS, I work with hose clams everyday and what your saying is just not right. I have never in my 55 years have had a hose clamp loosen up! hoses fail rubber breaks down plastic cracks but Hose clamps do not back off on there own.

[bb_94401]

A clarification: The hose clamp doesn't loosen, it is the hose that changes. How it happens depends on the chemical composition of the hose.

Plastic hose under pressure from the clamping system, cold flows and no longer seals whether on the suction side or pressure side of a system.

Think all those leaky air lines on a semi or compression fittings on water lines. Even the rubber radiator hoses lose resilience and develops a compression set with time and eventually leaks antifreeze.

Net result is that if you use spiral clamps it is good practice to re-tighten them if you wish to avoid a leak. Part of my spring ritual for my dump truck, other vehicles and the head in the sailboat.

The above doesn't help if the spiral clamp was not installed on the hose barb fitting correctly. Two clamps, one near the end of the hose once all the way on the hose barb, the other near the end of the hose barb farther back on the hose, is a better practice than a single clamp. Even better is to use a different seal design altogether.

[deltabravo]

tattoobob wrote:
Brads answer totally blows my mind, Hose Clams do not loosen or they wouldn't be using them almost everywhere, Cars, Trucks, Boats, and so on. I would Call him on the phone and have him lie to my face so I could tell him off

Ditto.

Hose clamps on my radiator and heater hoses in my truck have never loosened on their own.

[Moose10]

Ozlander wrote:
How is that 'A Devastating Discovery'?

Looks like the fill line came off and the vent line is not connected.
Something to be expected when you let someone else work on your stuff.

Well said!

[RVguy77]

Composet Products has a lot ways to fix water damage. I would check them out

[tattoobob]

stevenal wrote:

Brad wrote:
... We try to do our best always but inevitably hose clamps loosen...

No they don't. If they did, nobody would be using them since the results are devastating. Nothing loosened here that wasn't already loose. Workmanship, pure and simple.

Brads answer totally blows my mind, Hose Clams do not loosen or they wouldn't be using them almost everywhere, Cars, Trucks, Boats, and so on. I would Call him on the phone and have him lie to my face so I could tell him off

[ryoung]

I don't know the timeline between the repairs and your discovery of the disconnected fitting, but I would think they would offer a warranty on their repair work.

I will definitely leave this company off my list as I possibly look for another TC within the next year. Thanks for the post.

ryoung