Really dumb hot water question

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BaylissMason

BaylissMason

Member
Joined
Jul 11, 2017
Posts
8
Location
Midlothian, VA
So we picked up our travel trailer yesterday and went through the walk through. One thing I didn't think of until today was...how does my hot water tank get filled & stay filled? We will only be camping in sites that have water hookups. So when we hook up to the water does it automatically fill the HW tank? And should we drain the system every trip?
 
Not dumb at all. The hot water tank will fill on its own when you hook up to shore water. Don't turn the heaters on before you are hooked up to avoid burning them. You don't have to drain it when you move, I just shut the heaters off before I pull out my shore water and then wait to turn them back on until I'm hooked up to water again. Others may have a different method, that's just what I do. You would need to drain it if you winterize the camper. Surprisingly the hot water heater is insanely easy to maintain. Don't touch it, and flush it out once a year or so.
 
BaylissMason said:
So we picked up our travel trailer yesterday and went through the walk through. One thing I didn't think of until today was...how does my hot water tank get filled & stay filled? We will only be camping in sites that have water hookups. So when we hook up to the water does it automatically fill the HW tank? And should we drain the system every trip?
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It will fill automatically and stay filled as long as the bypass valves for winterizing are positioned correctly. It sounds like you are new to RV'ing. If you are, you have to make sure the heater is full before you turn on the electric heating element if your heater has that option. The way to check that is after connecting to shore power and the water is on, go outside, open the access door and open the pressure/temperature relief valve located at the top right hand corner. If you get a blast of water out of it, the tank is full. If you don't get any water, the bypass valve/valves are not positioned correctly.
No need to drain the water system after every trip unless it's going to be sitting for months.
 
The hot water tank will fill on its own when you hook up to shore water.
Click to expand...

After hooking up, it's best to open a hot water faucet to be sure water is actually coming through the whole system. You'll not get much out of those faucets before the tank has water in it.
 
BaylissMason said:
We will only be camping in sites that have water hookups.
Click to expand...

That is the plan I'm sure, but sometimes you might not have a water hookup or it might be so gross that you decide NOT to hookup.
Also sometimes the pressure is so low that it's a joke.  A tip is to use the water pump in your RV and that will move water from your
fresh water tank to the (hot) water tank as needed. Using the water pump can also boost water pressure if it's low or you are the last
hose on a tree of outlets and other are using water at the same time.
 
Larry N. said:
After hooking up, it's best to open a hot water faucet to be sure water is actually coming through the whole system. You'll not get much out of those faucets before the tank has water in it.
Click to expand...

I totally agree. This is true but just remember just because you get water out of the hot water faucet, it doesn't necessarily mean the heater is full because the bypass valves may be correctly positioned. Just keep that in mind.
 
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