I've looked through the most recent dozen pages of threads in this sub-forum and can't find anything on leaking black tanks in units similar to the age of ours (1999 30' Excello). We bought it from the original owners in 2006 - it had sat unused for 3 years.
Which makes me wonder what is the nature of my problem. Given the difficulty of discovering it, I thought I would see if anybody here might have suggestions.
Like many, I've had occasional problems with a 'trickle' leaking blackwater valve - discovered the hard way when you remove the pipe cap. I've always managed to resolve it by repeat flushing or, if that didn't work, snaking a garden hose (with the tip set to wide-spay) backward up the drain pipe. That seems to always do the trick.
But my current problem came about last weekend. We spent the weekend at a campsite - no problems, no smells, no leaking tank. Before we left, I flushed carefully (triple flush) since it had gotten little use, there wasn't going to be a big FLUSH, and I wanted to make sure no TP got stuck in the valve.
After a short 1hr drive home, I realized I hadn't put in a blue-pack with water... so I did.
The next day, preparing to take the unit back to storage, I saw a large (and smelly - you know that blue-pack smell!) stain on the ground. Looking under the trailer, the belly pan that contains the water tanks was leaking blue stuff out of the lowest corner.
I removed the pipe cap - no liquid at all, blue or otherwise.
I've never seen pics of the connection of the drain pipe to the valve to the tank (if that's the sequence).
could there be a leak at a pipe fitting, allowing the liquid into the belly pan? Do I need to drop the belly pan to fix this? Any comments (especially from Andy!) would be appreciated.
Signed...
Blue Funk In Texas!