Carrying water. With a paltry 18 gallon fresh tank, we've learned to conserve and devise ways to expand our capacity. There are two water uses for us:
1. Fresh water from our well in the 18 gallon tank. We are lucky to have great well water. Except during an emergency none is used for drinking or cooking, only washing, showering, and flushing. We take showers every other day, depending on dirt, temperature, and hanky-pank which can take as little as a gallon of water. Using that little water approaches an art form or presto ballet in conservation.
2. Fresh drinking and cooking water from our well in various plastic containers, the amount expanding and contracting with the temperature while camping/traveling; total amount of time in the boonies. The favorites are one gallon refrigerator water jugs blue in color below. They are very heavy duty and have not leaked or cracked even after going through a freezing cycle. They live in a lower cabinet near the door where we can store 6- one gallon jugs. I had to reinforce the latch on that lower door to beat the force of 48 pounds of water jugs knocking on the back of that door. The jugs, with a couple 1-1/2 ltr. spacers fit snuggly down there and have no chance to get knocked around. Next faves are 1 liter Nalgene jugs with great screw on lids. We use 1 liter of water to make coffee in the AM. Next are about 30 to 48, 16 oz. plastic water bottles for drinking. They live behind those lower bed access doors in the camper, with some in the cab. During warm and dry weather, we can go through 48 of those in 7 days off grid. Lately, we've added a half dozen 1/2 L. aluminum dual wall jugs to the mix. Other options are fizzy drinks and beer as fluid replacement.
I have had poor results using commercial one gallon plastic water or milk style jugs. They have all leaked or burst over time (over the routes we travel) and caused the floor to get some rot, over time.
Jeanie and I spent some time finding heavy duty one gallon or so water jugs and came up with these:
For extended trips and with the jeep trailer in tow for a large traveling group (like over the Mojave Road) the water jugs keep getting larger up to the above 26 gallon pickle jar jug, a leftover earthquake preparedness water container used when we lived in L.A., clearly a earthquake hazard zone. A convenient way to refresh your fresh water tank would be with a fluid pump on the end of your drill driver and a 6 foot, 3/8ths inch, plastic hose.
We've never run out of water as we've learned to judge how much we will use.
The main thing is we have learned to live with minimum water use, but that's a whole separate but related issue. The real problem is how to extend the time of filling of your black water tank without increasing that tank's capacity.
I still like carrying water at as low an altitude as possible. I like the front hitch idea as it would act like a collapsable barrier if you hit another vehicle. Six, 5 gallon fuel cans on the front hitch carrier, not so much.
