Water in 19' Bambi & Fulltiming

[zlee]

I'm currently researching what it'll take to get into fulltiming in a 19' Bambi - sometimes just me, other times two of us. Doug K brought up a point that the water tanks are too small for full timing, though I know there are people who do full-time in 19's. What do y'all do about water?

I figure that about half to 3/4 of the time we'll be on hookups, but the rest of the time likely in dry campgrounds or on a friend's driveway or land, etc. We're pretty good at water conservation, power I'm a little more concerned about but I figure that's why God gave us generators. :roll eyes:

Case histories? Opinions? Examples? Horrible warnings?

Zina

[TBRich]

Zina... Water is not an issue when you have hookups, of course...you can do dishes all day long and take long showers and be just fine...but when dry camping or boon docking, the story changes quickly. As mentioned briefly in your pano window thread, we handle water needs in 2 modes, depending on where we are going. Mode 1: If we are going somewhere with no water hookups but has water available in the campground (or otherwise available) we arrive with a full tank of fresh water. We carry a hard-sided 6-gal water jug so we can bring water to the Bambi and fill the tank as needed. I say hard-sided because those collapsible 5 gal water jugs full are like handing 40 lbs of jello when you try to put the water into your rig. (We carry one but only as an emergency item)...hard-sided containers are far easier to handle. The 6-gal we have has a flat design so it packs well, and 6-gals are easier to handle by yourself than 7-gal containers (water weighs about 8lbs a gal). For us the downside of the 6 gal jug is that we can't haul it filled...we have a tonnaeu cover on our truck and the 6-gal standing upright is too tall to close the tonneau.)

Mode 2: If we are going somewhere where there is no water available, we arrive with a full tank and take two 7-gal containers full. The 7-gals are squarish so they are short enough to fit in the truck bed under the tonneau. Between the full fresh water and 14 gals of extra water we can get by for nearly a week if we are conservative with water use. And of course they can be refilled should water be available somewhere within reason.

Getting water from containers into your fresh water tank is something of an art form. The spouts on water jugs are not conducive and we used to lose as much as we got in. We finally found a good solution. We bought a large hard plastic funnel at an auto parts store that has a down spout with an L-shaped offset angle...it's intended for putting oil in your engine in tight situations. We cut the last "jog" of the offset part off so that we can insert the end of the downspout into the fresh water port of the Bambi, and it's rigid enough to stay in position while we pour the water in. I think the funnel cost just $3 and it makes getting the water in so much easier. Another tip is to carry a small collapsible luggage or equipment cart with wheels to haul the full water jugs from the campground's water spigot to your campsite.

[zlee]

OMG, I cannot believe how helpful and giving people are on these forums.

Thanks SO MUCH for that, it's great to have all the little tips from people who have done it before. I am going to be copying and pasting all of this info from the forum to a master file for myself...