Blow out water lines question

[docnascar]

First time trying the blow out method. The one thing that I typically dont see is what do folks do with the freshwater pump?

The one thing I read was to fully drain the freshwater tank. Then turn the pump on and let it run until no water comes out and then continue for another 15 20 seconds to continue to clear out any remaining water in the pump. Is that sufficient?

I've used no pink stuff in any lines, just air. I did put the pink stuff in the traps and in the toilet bowl.

Also my GD 2400BH has a black tank water inlet for a spray bar to clean inside of the black tank. Is it necessary to blow the line for that considering there are no valves and it's not pressurized? I already did it but just curious if its needed.

[Gdetrailer]

Lantley wrote:


Fixing the Pex is generally easy enough. It's finding the leak and gaining access to it in order to fix it that is the challenge. That does not include any damage caused by the leak.
Murphy's law dictates the leak will not be in a easy to access spot!
For the record standard insurance policy procedure is to pay for damage caused by a leak but they don't actually pay to fix the leak itself.
The damage is generally a bigger problem than the leak!

My point is use anti freeze and avoid any issues. Antifreeze is cheaper than shark bites. Easier to use than a saw, requires less effort than removing the underbelly. Does involve drying anything out. Antifreeze is also much cheaper than replacing, fixtures, valves,pumps or a host of miscellaneous parts

:R

Silly person you are, just can't wrap your head around this dirt simple way of clearing the lines.

You simply repressurize the stupid water system WITH AIR in the spring time to TEST the system!

Yeah, it IS THAT simple.

I have to check and fill my tires anyway in the spring, tires lose pressure over the winter months so I do BOTH things at the same time in the spring. Or perhaps you NEVER check and air your tires, perhaps that is why so many folks grumble about tires blowing out on them?

Put 30 PSI of air on the system then let sit for an hr then check the pressure, no drop, no air noise and you are good to go with water.

AIR will not do any damage and you WILL hear it hiss if something is wrong.

A $39 Harbor Freight compressor can easily do both jobs or like I do, add 50ft of air line hose to my shop compressor. I have done it both ways.

EVEN if I were to use RV antifreeze I WOULD STILL PRETEST WITH AIR ONLY in the spring.

That is how you test brand new plumbing in new homes, stub out then add a air gauge then pressurize with air. Wait an hr and check for pressure drop, no pressure drop you are good to go with water.

As far as finding and getting to lines, no, they are not hidden in walls, they are run in a chase at floor level (fivers and some MHs might be under the floor in the basement but still not all that hard to access) in a RV, sometimes may run under the tub but pretty good chance that they WILL be not all that hard to get to..

At least in the several TTs I have had they both have been very easy to get to, out in the open under a couch, base cabinets and such.

Fixtures? Really, $50 at Home Depot or Lowes will get you FAR BETTER faucets than what RV manufacturers use, first thing I do is remove and toss the RV faucets, they are Dollar General quality stuff.

LEAVE the faucets OPEN and absolutely NO water will be trapped in the faucet, PERIOD.

Do YOU fill your water heater up with the pink stuff? Perhaps you should, perhaps you do not realize that when you drain the water heater, the drain IS above the bottom of the tank, it leaves at least 1 inch of water in there (water can't go below the drain hole).

Like I said, IF YOU feel better using the pink stuff then by all means use it. HOWEVER, there have been and are plenty of other folks who do not and never have any issues for many years.

[Lantley]

GDEtrailer wrote:
People around this forum act like a broken line is a huge expensive ordeal, it is not, PEX is cheap and easy to work with and with sharkbite fittings can easily fix a broken line in less than 5 minutes.. PEX also is quite tolerant for flexing caused by ice expansion when compared to copper lines or the old Quest (grey stuff) plastic..

Fixing the Pex is generally easy enough. It's finding the leak and gaining access to it in order to fix it that is the challenge. That does not include any damage caused by the leak.
Murphy's law dictates the leak will not be in a easy to access spot!
For the record standard insurance policy procedure is to pay for damage caused by a leak but they don't actually pay to fix the leak itself.
The damage is generally a bigger problem than the leak!

My point is use anti freeze and avoid any issues. Antifreeze is cheaper than shark bites. Easier to use than a saw, requires less effort than removing the underbelly. Does involve drying anything out. Antifreeze is also much cheaper than replacing, fixtures, valves,pumps or a host of miscellaneous parts

[Gdetrailer]

drsteve wrote:

ksg5000 wrote:

BarneyS wrote:
Why not spend a bit on a couple gallons of RV antifreeze and be 100% sure your are ok or blow out the line and HOPE you got all the water out? Barney

Many don't like the residual taste of antifreeze - and in the PNW we get the occasional warm weather during winter and it's nice to be able to add water and go camping w/o all the flushing.

If you can taste it you didn't flush it good enough.

For some folks, they may have a far less "tolerance" to taste/smell and may be highly sensitive to what does not bother you..

For instance, my Mom (RIP) used to drive us crazy, insisted that we only buy her ONE specific brand of milk after she gave up driving. She could not stand the taste of the different brands of milk. Could not buy it at our corner store 2 miles away, had to drive 20 miles away (one way) and HOPE the store had it in stock.

We could not tell much if not any difference but my Mom COULD.

Milk now days is stripped down to the separate parts, each dairy has their own "formula" and method of "adding back" these parts at the ratio they want and blending it. DOES make for some very slight different taste. While it was not an issue for us, it was for my Mom.

We didn't POO POO her for her milk choice like you are POO POOING other folks here for not wanting the antifreeze taste..

Plastic ABSORBS CHEMICALS OVER TIME, even chemicals which are inert/harmless. It takes a lot of time and water to clear MOST but not all of those chemicals.

Some of the remaining chemicals left bound to the plastic will slowly continue to LEACH back into your drinking water. That leaching can influence the taste for some that are hypersensitive to it.

Myself, we don't drink from our RV water system, we buy bottled water for drinking, cooking and ice. We do that because quite frankly we do not like "city water chlorine taste" that you get from any campground that has municipal water or treats the water with chlorine (we have a deep well at our home and not city water).

I don't prefer to pump the system full of RV antifreeze when over 15 yrs I have only had ONE issue with a frozen line and that was my stupidity for closing the manual shut off valve to the toilet. Have not ever repeated that and the lines have not broken.

People around this forum act like a broken line is a huge expensive ordeal, it is not, PEX is cheap and easy to work with and with sharkbite fittings can easily fix a broken line in less than 5 minutes.. PEX also is quite tolerant for flexing caused by ice expansion when compared to copper lines or the old Quest (grey stuff) plastic.. And by the way, my TT HAS the ORIGINAL 35 yr old grey Quest stuff which was badly maligned to be "brittle"..

Most RVs run the water lines along on top of the floor in a chase and are not all that hard to get to so replacing is not all that hard to do. The only items to be concerned about is the water heater and the toilet valve, those are not easy and can be costly to replace.

But as I have said, if you are not comfortable with air only then by all means use the pink stuff.

[GrandpaKip]

BarneyS wrote:
Why not spend a bit on a couple gallons of RV antifreeze and be 100% sure your are ok or blow out the line and HOPE you got all the water out?
Either way takes about the same amount of time by the time you get the compressor out and hooked up. Also, I have never had any residual taste remain after running water through my lines in the spring.

Did it both ways during over 40 years of RVing. Found out the hard way that the black tank flush line does not get winterized by using the antifreeze. Now, I blow the lines out and then put the antifreeze in. Takes just a bit longer but I know for certain that my RV is safe during the cold Michigan winters. 🙂
Barney

I rigged up a line that goes from the outside shower to the black tank flush inlet and the water inlet. Shoots the pink stuff in both.

[Beaker]

Glad I read this thread! Did mine today with the pink but realize I forgot low drain point and outside shower.

[drsteve]

ksg5000 wrote:

BarneyS wrote:
Why not spend a bit on a couple gallons of RV antifreeze and be 100% sure your are ok or blow out the line and HOPE you got all the water out? Barney

Many don't like the residual taste of antifreeze - and in the PNW we get the occasional warm weather during winter and it's nice to be able to add water and go camping w/o all the flushing.

If you can taste it you didn't flush it good enough.

[ksg5000]

BarneyS wrote:
Why not spend a bit on a couple gallons of RV antifreeze and be 100% sure your are ok or blow out the line and HOPE you got all the water out? Barney

Many don't like the residual taste of antifreeze - and in the PNW we get the occasional warm weather during winter and it's nice to be able to add water and go camping w/o all the flushing.

[BarneyS]

Why not spend a bit on a couple gallons of RV antifreeze and be 100% sure your are ok or blow out the line and HOPE you got all the water out?
Either way takes about the same amount of time by the time you get the compressor out and hooked up. Also, I have never had any residual taste remain after running water through my lines in the spring.

Did it both ways during over 40 years of RVing. Found out the hard way that the black tank flush line does not get winterized by using the antifreeze. Now, I blow the lines out and then put the antifreeze in. Takes just a bit longer but I know for certain that my RV is safe during the cold Michigan winters. 🙂
Barney

[drsteve]

Antifreeze is quicker. It is also more reliable. In the spring I flush it and sanitize the system. Never have a problem with taste or smell.

[Lantley]

docnascar wrote:
Well, I chickened out and used the pink stuff. I am considering blowing out the lines again to remove most of the pink since the lines and valves have been flushed. This is in hopes to reduce the amount of effort it takes to remove that pink stuff taste in the spring time. Now that I know the valves and water pump dont have any residual water in them I won't worry.

I'm thinking between the lower amounts of residual pink coating the lines and using baking soda in the spring, it will be easier to remove that taste.

You did the right thing. Simply put blowing out the lines is not 100% foolproof vs. antifreeze.
THe residual water that may remain in the lines will always have the potential to create issues.
However if you run anti freeze through everything there won't be a problem.
I understand lots of people use the blow out method successfully.
Blowing out lines may have a 90% success rate. It may even be 95% successful. However do you want to gamble with the 5% error/failure rate?
Most likely the pex piping will be OK, it's a fitting or fixture that will fail.
Failure will be much harder and more expensive to deal with than 3 jugs of antifreeze.
For me the decision is easy. I don't want any surprises come Spring time. Antifreeze is foolproof

[docnascar]

Yeah I hate the taste and have yet to find a solution to remove it quickly.

[ksg5000]

docnascar wrote:
Well, I chickened out and used the pink stuff. I am considering blowing out the lines again to remove most of the pink since the lines and valves have been flushed. This is in hopes to reduce the amount of effort it takes to remove that pink stuff taste in the spring time. Now that I know the valves and water pump dont have any residual water in them I won't worry.

I'm thinking between the lower amounts of residual pink coating the lines and using baking soda in the spring, it will be easier to remove that taste.

That's a first. Once you put the pink stuff in you might as well have left it for the winter. Next time around just blow the lines correctly and anybody who says you have to blow the line and add pink stuff doesn't know how to blow the lines.

[docnascar]

Well, I chickened out and used the pink stuff. I am considering blowing out the lines again to remove most of the pink since the lines and valves have been flushed. This is in hopes to reduce the amount of effort it takes to remove that pink stuff taste in the spring time. Now that I know the valves and water pump dont have any residual water in them I won't worry.

I'm thinking between the lower amounts of residual pink coating the lines and using baking soda in the spring, it will be easier to remove that taste.

[Ride_S40T]

davehultin wrote:
I used to blow out our lines, but would still use the pump bypass to pump some antifreeze through the pump, and also pour some antifreeze into all the drains. I'd blow the lines for about 30 minutes for each faucet, and I never ever had any problems using the "blowing it out" method.

Now I blow it out and fill the lines with antifreeze. I figure at < $10 the antifreeze is a pretty inexpensive insurance policy.

Think we winterized and de-winterized 4 times last year as we camp through Dec and early as Feb if it's relatively close to or above freezing on a weekend. Used only air.

We used air the first time this Fall. This time though, we heard a lot of gurgling and couldn't get what I felt was enough water out of the lines. Around 35-40 psi on the compressor.

So we ran a little pink after blowing the lines and indeed, quite a bit of water was pushed before the pink. Yikes. We do leave the faucets open so there's room for expansion so don't think it would have been an issue but running pink took less than 10 min, 2 gallons ($5.00).

Estimate it will only take around 5 gallons to flush all of it so no biggie. Bonus was that Keystone put a petcock on the water pump and all we had to do is flip it to the cut off hose they attached to the pump and stuff the end into the bottle of antifreeze. Flip the pump and off we go. Effortless and no mess. Piece of mind.

And as an aside, our pex is stamped 100psi as I'm guessing most all RVs are. What a tech had mentioned is the connectors and elbows may not always be rated the same...not sure. I'm sure one of our techs on here can chime in.

[drsteve]

GrandpaKip wrote:
I got tired of lugging the air compressor uphill to the trailer 2 or 3 times a year, so I went back to the pink stuff. It’s fast and simple to use the onboard pump. It takes 1 1/2 gallons and 20 minutes. We do not drink out of our faucets because we are spoiled by our well water’s taste and we carry our own water supply in the truck for drinking.
Don’t forget the outside shower and black tank flush.

X2. The pink stuff is easy, cheap, and fast. Been using it for 30+ years, never failed me yet.