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jck_dmb · 09-11-2016, 02:47 PM

I am a new owner. I've been on the road for over a month with minor issues. Just had my first major issue.

2017 23D International

My fresh water tank was 75% full
My Black was 0%
My Grey was 11%
I'm perfectly level in all directions.

I have hooked up to city water before with no issues.

I have used the fresh water and pump with no issues.

Problem:

I hooked up to city water at 7:00pm. In the morning, I had a huge leak which looked to be coming from under my shower/toilet.

Any thoughts? Advice? I am only using the fresh water tank now, with no issues. I'm nervous to hook back up to the city line.

I'm in Park City. Home is Boston. Should I try and get into the airstream dealership in Salt Lake? Will they service my AS if i did not purchase it there?

Thanks in advance!

pcskier · 09-11-2016, 03:10 PM

Stay away from Intermountain Airsteam in SLC. On their last breath from what I've heard. What about adjusting your route home to pass through Jackson Center?

subfan1 · 09-11-2016, 03:21 PM

I had the same symptoms on ours. I located and removed the valve tighten screws reinserted it's been fine for 3 years now. Before you do that assure the line into the trailer is tight. Do the easy one first

HiJoeSilver · 09-11-2016, 07:19 PM

Start peeking in all accessible areas with some water pressure to see if you can spot the drip. It sounds fairly slow since you weren't swimming in the morning. Hex screw should get the shower handle off then a couple screws to get the face plate off. Then you'll be able to see the shower valve and check for leaks.
Also check FW connections to the toilet. The transition from PEX to soft rubber hose going to the toilet may have come loose.
Pictures and complain like h@// to AS about any water damage!

This is the kind of crap that keeps me from buying new. AS has a backlog of 1300 trailers. They normally crank out 50 a week. They're trying to crank out 80 a week without adding proportional extra workers. On my tour a few weeks ago I was not impressed with what I saw. Lots of room for improvement but not willing to make the process or time in production available to workers.

Bigventure · 09-11-2016, 07:31 PM

You hooked up the fresh water to the black tank flush and filled and pressurized the black tank. Just empty it and put the hose where its support to go.

It's operator error. Not an Airstream defect.

HiJoeSilver · 09-11-2016, 08:58 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bigventure

You hooked up the fresh water to the black tank flush and filled and pressurized the black tank. Just empty it and put the hose where its support to go.

It's operator error. Not an Airstream defect.

Possible but usually accompanied by an overflowing toilet.
If the black tank drain valve was open all night it's more of a possibility. Could have been a leak in the flushing line that's not normally pressurized long periods. Open drain would have kept tank from filling and pressurizing causing the proverbial fecal fountain.
If you used water and had pressure after the 7pm hookup, and the pump definitely wasn't the source, then you were hooked up to the right spot.

jck_dmb · 09-11-2016, 09:51 PM

are you in PC??? Love it here. Where do you get your as serviced?

jck_dmb · 09-11-2016, 09:57 PM

That wasn't the issue. It was hooked up correctly. But thank you for trying.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bigventure

You hooked up the fresh water to the black tank flush and filled and pressurized the black tank. Just empty it and put the hose where its support to go.

It's operator error. Not an Airstream defect.

wanderingduo · 09-12-2016, 12:54 AM

Sounds like a pex ring wasn't tightened enough, so city water pressure exposes the weak connection, but pump does not.

Airstream QC issue.

Johnco · 09-12-2016, 10:31 AM

Not sure where the fresh water hook up is on a 23, but if it is in the area of the shower I would suspect the pressure regulator that is part of the city water hook-up. They are notorious for cracking and leaking down the interior walls. The fact that you are getting the leakage only when you are hooked up to city pressure leads me to believe this may be your issue. Simple fix by removing the city water inlet and replacing with a new unit, about a half hour and a $45 part.

**jcanavera** · 09-12-2016, 12:11 PM

Do a quick check on the level of your freshwater tank. There is the chance that you have a defective check valve in the pump that would allow water to enter the fresh water tank when you are hooked up to city water. If you find that your fresh water tank is now 100% full, the leak is potentially the tank being overfilled. This happened to me when my Airstream was brand new. The dealer replaced the pump.

Jack

HowieE · 09-12-2016, 12:45 PM

A quick test for a leak in the water system is turn the pump on until it shuts off. Leave the system in this state for a hour or more, don't draw any water or while you sleep. Turn the pump on. If the pump runs you have a leak.

I am surprised at the comment of the pump leaking back into the fresh water tank. Pumps used to be 4 diaphragm systems and really could not leak back. But no telling what cheap Chinese junk Airstream is using now.

Silvertwinkie · 09-12-2016, 01:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by HowieE

A quick test for a leak in the water system is turn the pump on until it shuts off. Leave the system in this state for a hour or more, don't draw any water or while you sleep. Turn the pump on. If the pump runs you have a leak.

.

This is not a 100% sure fire way to test because the valves themselves as they age loose pressure over time (made in China or not). Also, with a water heater in line and running, hot/cold can also lead to the pressure variances that could trigger the pump.

Given the amount of water that is coming on with the city water connection applied, the question isn't if there is a leak, the question is where.

The rear floorplan on your 23D is similar (read not exact) as my 25C. Most of the plumbing that feeds that area come from under the bathroom sink area. If the 23D is the same, the city water connection is there too. I would open the cabinet doors and remove panels to gain access to the guts back there and take a peek at what you see. Worst case, a pipe clamp has slipped or is not fastened completely. Hopefully the issue is in a readily accessible area.

SandyMS · 09-12-2016, 04:18 PM

We have a 2016 Pendleton. We have used it several times. Each time we initially hook up to city water while we are camping we get some water coming out under the base of the bathroom cabinet between the cabinet and the toilet. When we turn off the hose and then use the pump we don't get any water. The next day when we turn the city water back on we get no water leaking. This is a puzzle. Any suggestions?

ALso, when we use just the water pump we will occasionally hear the pump prime itself when no water has be used. Is this normal? or do we have a leak in the line somewhere? We haven't seen any water anywhere else.

wanderingduo · 09-12-2016, 04:35 PM

No it is not normal for the pump to run at random. Make sure you have purged air out of all faucets in the rig and outside (outside hand held shower). If the pump still primes itself then you have a leak somewhere.
Water leaks are not a good thing! Get it repaired. There are many threads on the topic of leaks. You should proactively look for leaks in places like the inlets for both the city water and black water flush.

HowieE · 09-12-2016, 04:39 PM

If the pump cycles without water being drawn you can start to look for the leak. The frequency of the cycle gives some indication as to the size of the leak. Quick cycle big leak. If you have an accumulator on the system that will change effect the cycle timing.

amm3824 · 09-12-2016, 06:07 PM

I've had this happen on both rigs I owned (think it was a 2005 25-footer, and now a 2010 16-footer), noticed a leak very shortly after bringing them on their first journeys.

Given the newness of your trailer I bet you're running into the same thing I did: new rig with teething problems that didn't get discovered at the factory, but that once fixed, will be good.

In both cases, similar symptom: pump would run for a couple seconds on its own, with no water systems in use, and a very slow drip from the underbelly.

On my 2010 it turned out to be a hard plastic plumbing tube supplying the wet bath area. The tube ran under a cutout in the wooden wall but was pressed up really tight against it, creating enough force to slightly distort a connector and cause the leak. I simply enlarged the cutout just enough to give the tube some freedom and the leak stopped, hasn't happened since.

I suspect it wasn't discovered at the factory because the test wasn't done after the trailer was being towed, when things had a chance to flex and settle, and they settled with too much pressure on the plastic tubing.

On the 2005 it was a leak at the water inlet due to something not being screwed down tight enough, hard to recall but maybe around the pressure regulator, which I accessed from under the sink. Noticed the leak as a slow drip outside on the belly, only when the water pump brought the system to full pressure and turned off. It took a long reach under the sink and some cursing but was an easy fix.

Your 23D may be laid out differently but I was able to gain access to the bathroom plumbing by removing the mattress and the plywood mattress support, revealing the tubing and giving me enough access to the cutout in the bathroom wall to go to work.

The fixes were simple in both cases. It's just that getting to them was not as easy. Especially if you're on the road (I wasn't). Until you can get it home or to a dealer, just try to keep as little pressure in the water supply lines as possible by keeping the pump off and also running the sink for a few seconds after shutting it off.

I've never seen a bad crimp on a plumbing line to connector, so I'd look closely at plumbing lines (mechanical pressure against them) and devices such as the regulator, filter, etc.

If you're back home in Boston and need a hand give me a shout and I'll be glad to try to help. I'm about 1.5 hours from there.

SteveSueMac · 09-12-2016, 06:41 PM

Hmmm - we had something weird on our last trip too. City hooked up, fresh was already full. I noticed a small leak from the vent on the FE tank (had to open the door to sees me here the water was coming from). DW checked the forums and we shut off city and ran fresh from the pump. Turned city back on, no leak. Ok. But by the next morning, the leak was back from the FW air vent while city was connected.

Anyone have that problem and a solution? Ours is a 2012 27FB Flying Cloud.

OTRA15 · 09-12-2016, 06:52 PM

Probably a malfunctioning check valve in or near pump which is supposed to prevent city water pressure from running through pump into the fresh water tank?

Empty water tank and then hook up city water. Monitor water level in fresh tank every minute for the next 15 minutes. The percentage should rise if the city water is leaking back through the pump into the fresh water tank.

If percentage stays at zero, please report anomalies. I think the check valve can clear itself and work one minute, the fail the next. Replacement should solve but this may mean replacing the pump in some models, as I understand it.

No expert on this. Just an idea or two! Intermittent leaks are hard to diagnose.

Cheers,

Peter

BFSSBN · 09-13-2016, 02:54 AM

Do you have a pressure control regulator? Some parks are higher than others. and some interior water lines may have begun to leak especially by the shower handles where that water supply line is connected.