Chlorinating tank while on the road

[trlrqueen]

Devil is in the Details
I have read the AS manual and am a strict rule follower. The problem is how to work out the actual procedure without having 39 gallons of chlorinated water pour out on the ground or spend hours running my water pump to empty the fresh water tank into the gray water tank for dumping.

My plan is to add bleach to the tank before leaving on a camping trip. We will arrive approximately four hours later, at which time we will try the process of using the water pump to empty the tank (realizing that we will have to refill the tank with fresh water and then pump it out again).

Does anyone have any thoughts on this process? Can I damage the water pump by using it continuously for such a period of time? How long will one flush cycle take using only the water pump?

[Bluto]

Fill, colorinate and drain the tank several days before the trip. Then add fresh water and your good to go.
Why do you want to do all that when traveling?

[perryg114]

Adding bleach and then driving is going to get all the bad stuff out of the tank as a result of sloshing. Unless the tanks is real dirty you don't need to use lethal amounts of Chlorine. I don't drink out of the fresh water tank so it does not have to be pure as the driven snow.

Perry

[jcanavera]

If you can do this at home prior to departure, it is so much easier. Obviously running the pump as you have prescribed places wear and tear on the pump. It is so much easier to open the valve and let the tank drain.

I do one trip a year where we rely completely on the water we haul in. The day before I leave I sanitize in the am. Later on in the afternoon I drain, do one fill and then drain again. I have lots of other things to do like wash and pack the trailer so quite honestly the process is much easier to do than to deal with this once I arrive at my destination.

Jack

[trlrqueen]

Thanks, Jack. Is that the only sanitization you do during the year? We don't drink the water from the tank either, and the water seems to be OK for washing dishes and bathing. It's been in the tank for a couple of months and we have seldom used it, but its still clear (to the eye!).

[AWCHIEF]

When I fill my tank I add a bit bleach. If I don't use the water within a two or three weeks I will drain it at the house and refill. I have flat rate unlimited water so no quilt. In the past year I have only used the water from the tank twice and it tasted just fine. The rest of the time I have been hooked up to park water when out camping.

[trlrqueen]

Do you add the bleach at every refill and leave it in until you use or drain the water?

[trlrqueen]

That was my thinking, Perry.

[Lily&Me]

We sanitize the fresh water tanks once a year, when we head south in January.

Because of where we head from, this has to be on the road as we dewinterize at the same time.

It takes a couple of days to get the fresh water rinsed to the point we are willing to drink from it or cook with it, after which we do so without any problems, ever. Keep our blue filter changed every couple of months, and the water running through regularly, and no worries.

I wouldn't want to bathe or cook with water that has sat in the tanks for a couple of months. Just seems risky to me. Should anything take a notion to grow in there, one could contract it...........

We try to use up water and then drain our fresh water tanks whenever we are not going to be using the Interstate for more than a day or two. Refill when next ready to head out.


Maggie

[AWCHIEF]

Originally Posted by trlrqueen

Do you add the bleach at every refill and leave it in until you use or drain the water?

I add it at refill, I have about a 18gal tank and add about 1/4 cup or less. Just enough to keep the beasties at bay. I have been doing this for 20 years or so on my boats and it works fine for me in the trailer also. I don't mind the little chlorine taste. I drink the water, wash and use it for cooking. Make sure you use unscented bleach. You can also buy “special” water treatment that is basically nothing but bleach in a small expensive bottle.

[mojo]

You have a new trailer so I doubt that there has been enough time to for anything to build up in your tank. A cup of bleach in 40 gallons of water is enough to disinfect the tank but not enough to cause concern when draining on the ground. It is best to drain out residual water if you don't use your trailer for a month or more so the water doesn't develop an unpleasant taste from sitting.

But disinfecting once a year before the season is usually enough. Having a water filter on one spigot and perhaps a Britta filter jug is sufficient for drinking and cooking water. And I would much rather shower with water from my trailer than use the community baths at any campground

[Protagonist]

My Airstream owner's manual says to use (gallons ×0.13) ounces of bleach to sanitize the tank. For my Airstream with a 26-gallon tank and 6-gallon water heater, that's 4.16 ounces of bleach. But that's for a "shock" treatment of a tank. If you treat to this level, you've got to drain the tank afterwards.

To disinfect the water in a clean tank, it only takes 8 drops of bleach per gallon, or one teaspoon per 5 gallons. You can drink chlorinated water, as long as the concentration is not too high. The EPA Safe Drinking Water Act primary standards call for a maximum residual disinfectant level (MRDL) of 4 parts per million. If you used 1 teaspoon of bleach per 5 gallons, no need to drain the water after treatment, just use it normally.

As long as there is ANY chlorine left in the water, it will kill off any new microbes that might get into the water. If you drain off the chlorinated water and add new water, you may be adding new microbes as well, which kind of defeats the purpose.

Some people with very sensitive taste buds can taste as little as 1 part per million of chlorine. There are two ways to deal with this: (1) let the water sit for about 4 hours so the chlorine evaporates— in the fridge is fine so the water is good and cold— before drinking it; (2) use a granular activated carbon (GAC) filter on the drinking water tap. Carbon removes chlorine.

So, in my case, shock-treat the tank once per year at 4¼ ounces of bleach per tank, but I also disinfect the water at 1 tsp per 5 gallons at every fill.

[Alumaholic]

Everything mojo does, and...

I have learned the most efficient way to put plain, unscented Chlorox in your fresh-water holding tank is to put a plastic funnel into the female end of your white, water hose and pour 8oz of bleach into the hose itself.
(The hose must of course have a Camco filler tube with shut-off already installed on the male end. This was an Air Forums tip)

Now here's the real answer to you question.
You can drain 6 gals at a time by draining and refilling your H2O heater.
I can drain my 54 gallon holding tank very quickly using this method after I have let the bleach solution slosh around.
Step 1. Turn the pump off
Step 2. Open the H2O heater over-pressure relief valve
Step 3. Remove the H2O heater drain plug. Drain the tank.
Step 4. Replace the drain plug
Step 5. Close the over-pressure relief valve
Step 6. Turn on the pump and refill the H2O heater.
Repeat
Don't forget Step 2 or you will get shot in the face with the drain plug and 6 gallons off chlorinated water. (Don't ask me how I know this.)

[dznf0g]

I'm on the Mojo plan as well. However, if during the season I have reason to suspect real trouble, like a boil order/do not use order (only happened once in all my camping years), I'll do it again.

If I have water that sits in the tank for a couple weeks or just seems "funny", I use the backpacking formula of 2 drops per liter for drinking water. I forgot how the math works out per gallon X 61 gallons, but it ain't a lot of bleach.

[Silver Goose]

Depending on which water pump is installed in your trailer, it may be rated for 1 to 3 gpm flow rate so you could figure on 15 to nearly 45 minutes of run time to pump out 39 gallons. I'm in the camp with those who recommends simply draining refilling and repeat. This is simple if you can do it at home, but I understand that some have to figure out another way, and many campgrounds have prohibitions on draining anything onto the ground.

[Alumaholic]

Originally Posted by dznf0g

... I forgot how the math works out per gallon X 61 gallons, but it ain't a lot of bleach.

0.13 X Holding Tank Capacity in Gallons = Amount of Sodium Hypochlorite in Ounces

This is if you intend to let it sit four hours to do its job. We don't find rinsing very important at these levels.

If you don't have four hours, you may double the amount of bleach for quicker disinfection. But rinsing becomes more important.

[AWCHIEF]

I don't really measure any of the bleach precisely. About 1/4 cup (more or less) to my tank works fine, no beasties and little taste of the bleach. I don't see any reason to get all anal (obsessively self-controlled) about it. Been doing it this way for years with no ill effects.

[dznf0g]

Originally Posted by AWCHIEF

I don't really measure any of the bleach precisely. About 1/4 cup (more or less) to my tank works fine, no beasties and little taste of the bleach. I don't see any reason to get all anal (obsessively self-controlled) about it. Been doing it this way for years with no ill effects.

Likewise, except that one time I mentioned while on the road. If I am gonna drink it, I measure. For the spring sterilization, I just put the jug up against the fill port and pour.

[dwightdi]

The Illinois water authority requires that there be 1 ppm of chlorine remaining at the farthest distribution point for residential water suppliers. Swimming pool recommendations are 3 ppm for pools and 10 ppm for hot tubes.
For occasional shock treatment of the tanks, Protagonist's recommendation of 4 ounces of normal household bleach will do it. I would dilute it by half for easier handling and add it to you normal white hose to fill the fresh water holding tank. Fill the water heater and distribution system from that tank. Driving it around for an hour will assure that it contacts the top surface of the tanks. Letting it set for a couple more hours after that should do it. The "Shock" chlorine they use for swimming pools is twice as strong, so you need to dilute it further. Since most of us fill from municipal supplier no further chlorination is needed to keep us safe but you could add an ounce or two household bleach for the standard tank, if you are paranoid about wisteria or other things. We usually carry a couple gallons of drinking/cooking water with us in a clear plastic dispenser bottle, that we keep next to the sink. Local water sometimes does not taste as good as water from home.

[ventport]

Also you should run some of the shock bleach water through the plumbing to kill any bad stuff in the pipes. I do this with about 5 gallons of water before I dump the fresh water tank of the bleach mix.