Cannot open grey or black tank

samsontdog wrote:

The Travel Trailer is and has been in Yuma Az for the last 6 months in storage. The plumber cut a large section of sheet metal trying to get to the valves and gave up and said to call a RV Place that works on RVs. So that is what she is against at this time. I am out of the picture as I am just the owner of the property that she is renting

I have an option, it may or may not work but I had a similar situation one spring.

The dump valve was left open over the winter to air out the tank. That year, I did not spray silicone on the valve blade, I forgot and it left my thought process until spring. Note to self, don't forget next time...

Come spring, the rubber was so grabby, I could not pull the valve closed or open. It was like it was welded shut almost. I had a pull rod valve setup and the valve is buried under the coroplast cover. The rubber dried up with no lube on it and it was locked up from being stored with the valve open.

I used my spray silicone "device" to blast liquid silicone up the center of the 3" dump pipe, around a 90 degree bend (5 feet from the inlet) from an aerosol can with a straw up into the valve gaskets. Kept spraying and wiggling valve in and out and it finally worked the silicone into the gasket and it broke free.


Here is the "device" to get the silicone up 5 ft to the valve on the black tank. I use this as my normal lube setup. 6 foot length of 3/8" polyethylene tubing, silicone in a spay can, blow gun with compressed air behind it.

Shove the hose up the pipe until it reaches the valve, spray in some silicone, blast it up the hose with the air. Repeat a few times while working the valves.





I never tried shoving a hose up the grey tank pipe, it had 3 hard 90 degree bends. It might work with a 1/4" hose. Here is what I did for a permanent lube setup

The grey water tank valve is buried up a lot longer. For this one, I dropped the cover, drilled and taped in a fitting on the elbow downstream of the dump valve. I ran the long hose out of the cover and attached it to a fitting just upstream of the dump cap so when I dump, any water if it gets in the hose, will stay contained in the dump system.

Been using that for the last 12 years and it works flawlessly. Need to lube the valves 1 to 2 times a year, takes about 5 to 10 minutes and the longest part of the job, is getting the air hose to the camper. When the rubber gets dry, full or empty tank even in the camping season, the valves can work real hard. A little silicone in the right place and 6 to 8 months works great. Do the spray job when you start to feel excess drag.

With the cover off





Outside the cover


Just unhook the polyflow fitting, (push lock Legris style), and squirt the silicone in that long tube and blast it up to the valve.

Something like this may help the lady with the camper. Or the plumber/RV guy coming to help.

Hope this helps

John

For more tank compartment pics, see my Flickr page here https://www.flickr.com/photos/camper-johnb/sets/72157688819813792/