pump mod for roadside stops

That looks like a handy mod, but I'm wondering how you caused a flood by forgetting to turn off the pump. Did you forget to turn off a faucet too?

Do you have a link to the thread about the flooding? My pump is on all season long unless I've run out of water.

Tequila wrote:
I installed a non-locking push button. I no longer have to turn on the pump, a press of the button puts enough pressure in the lines to flush and another press, enough to wash my hands.

Even though my pump switch is inconveniently hidden by the sofa slide when it's in the travel position I can't say we've ever forgotten to turn the pump off after a roadside stop. Interesting idea though.

I have a 2 gallon expansion tank in the system, so we never have to turn the pump on for a roadside stop. There's more than enough pressure to flush and wash hands.

The risk of leaving the pump on is that if you spring a leak anywhere, the pump will run until the tank is empty. Has not happened to me but has happened to folks I know. The way these TTs bounce down the road it's not improbable.

Very cool...

BurbMan wrote:
I have a 2 gallon expansion tank in the system, so we never have to turn the pump on for a roadside stop. There's more than enough pressure to flush and wash hands.

The risk of leaving the pump on is that if you spring a leak anywhere, the pump will run until the tank is empty. Has not happened to me but has happened to folks I know. The way these TTs bounce down the road it's not improbable.

Expansion tank also........

No pump burrrrrrp late at night to wake up the misses

Years ago, on a trip from Sacramento, we were towing a trailer with one of my hot rods to a Goodguys show in San Diego. About 8pm my wife went to use the rest room and forgot to switch off the pump. About three hours later she got up to go again and stepped into a soggy mess of carpet. A magazine I'd left behind the faucet in the wet bar had bounced enough to turn on the faucet, not much but enough. Since we had planned on dry camping, we had 100 gallons of fresh water on board. That tank was now empty!. We spent several hours in Laguna Hills swamping out the rig...so it does/can happen....Dennis

BossCamper wrote:
That looks like a handy mod, but I'm wondering how you caused a flood by forgetting to turn off the pump. Did you forget to turn off a faucet too?

My kitchen tap has a gooseneck, it will rotate 360 and the taps are feather light to the touch. Had a pee break, forgot the pump, hit rough road, gooseneck rotated & tap turned itself on. 1/2 tank of fresh water inside. Fortunately it was in Arizona an 95 degrees with 5% humidity. I had to cut open the underside and pull out all the soaked insulation. It was a $1500 repair bill to pull the tanks to get at the rest of the soaked insulation and repair the underside & re-insulate.

I posted a thread in the tech section about a leak detection system I installed as well. here is the link.http://forums.woodalls.com/index.cfm/fuseaction/thread/tid/28411809.cfm

Under $100 in parts. This is not just for a pump accident it will alert if there are any plumbing leaks near where you install a sensor. You are only limited to where you can manage to fish a wire..



Below is the schematic. The section in red is a further improvement which i explain below the schematic. N.O. means normally open & N.C normally closed relay contacts. I will list the parts below.

1) First you need an uninterrupted 12v supply (Not the 12 v feed to the pump, that is switched). I used the 12v supply to my slide motor which was in the same area. You need to fuse this supply with maybe a 5 amp inline fuse. The only current will be to supply some lights, the water switch power, and operate a relay coil and a buzzer. 3 amps is probably enough. And you need a ground.

2) run the 12v supply to the center terminal of a double pole single throw switch. Put one side to the 12 input of the Kemo water switch and the other side through a 12v indicator lamp to ground. This lamp will light if you cut the power to the waterswitch, and will remind you it is turned off. You will have to do this after fixing a leak, until the sensors dry out in order to use your pump.

3) Interrupt the hot side of the pump, which is in all likelihood probably muretted already, so just open it up and run 2 #10 wires from each side and through the normally closed contacts of the slave relay. Hook the coil of of the slave relay to ground & 12V, running the 12v side through the relay contacts of the waterswitch (which are normally open). The pump wire leading to the master switch should be wired to the center contact of the relay, the other wire to the normally closed pole it makes contact with.

4) Take a feed off the 12V side of the relay (which is only energized in case of a leak and run it via a single pole single throw switch to a 12v buzzer (the other side of which is connected to ground). This will enable shutting off the irritating buzzer in case of a leak until you locate it.

5) You can put as many sensors in parallel with each other as you like by running wires from one to the next etc,. or home run them all and tie them together.

Note: If you have a city water in line solenoid valve you can probably send 12v to it off the internal relay in the waterswitch as long as it does not have excessive current draw. Use the same feed that is going to the coil of the slave relay. The solenoid valve has to be the normally open type. In that configuration, both the pump will be shut off and the city water blocked. The latter requires some plumbing skills. The system will also warn about leaks not related to plumbing with the audible alarm if you place sensors where they are likely to occur. For example under a 110v outdoor fridge which is thawing & spilling water.



Here is an improvement to the schematic in red. I have tested this, it works. Adding the circuitry in red using the normally open contacts in the slave relay will cause the slave relay to latch when it operates and not drop off when the sensor is no longer shorted. This means that in case of a pump caused leak, water moving away from the sensor will not cause the pump to restart. If you were driving, this is possible as the spill will be moving around. With this addition, the pump will remain disabled until you manually turn it off at the main switch and on again. only thing you have to make sure is that the hot feed side of the pump is wired to the center contact of the relay and the pump side to the normally closed mate. In the unmodified version, it did not matter.

What happens is when the relay operates, 12v from the pump feed is now applied through the relays normally open contacts, that are now closed, to the coil preventing the relay from dropping off. In other words, the relay is held up through its own contacts. This will only occur if the pump is physically turned on at its master switch. If not, it won't come into play and it does not need to. The only way to get the slave relay to drop is to remove power from it by turning the main pump switch off. You can then turn it back on and the pump will operate. The extra lamp in the circuit will light up to indicate the slave relay is in the locked up position.

Sensors from china

http://www.ebay.com/itm/131365430525?_trksid=p2060353.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

Electronic module:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00U0R2272?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o05_s00

12 V DC Relay ( 12 v, need normally closed contacts to interrupt power to pump)

http://www.amazon.com/Auto-Truck-Relay-Socket-SPDT/dp/B007JPPQH6/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1434252166&sr=8-3&keywords=12+v+relay

Buzzer alarm:

http://www.amazon.com/9-15V-HYD-4218-Active-Electronic-Buzzer/dp/B00HG7H2TM/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1434252306&sr=8-1&keywords=piezo+buzzer

Plus 2 mini switches one SPDT / one SPST, terminal strips, and a 12 v indicator light from local electronics store. The SPST switch to kill buzzer and the SPDT switch to shut off power to module and throw 12v onto the warning lamp at the same time. (12v on center terminal)

BTW I told the manufacturer of my trailer about the push button mod, they thought it a great idea and have forwarded the suggestion to their design team.