Water Problem

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dmiller226

Active member
Joined
Aug 30, 2017
Posts
34
Location
Coastal North Carolina
I'm afraid I've made a costly "newbie" mistake by not winterizing my travel trailer. It usually doesn't get that cold here, even in the winter but this year we had a hard freeze that lasted several days.

My problem:  today, I went out to the camper to mess around a little and as usual, went around checking everything. I turned on the water pump but wasn't getting any water at all from my kitchen sink and very little (just a trickle) from the bathroom sink and toilet. I could hear the pump running but no water coming out. I do have water in the tank, about half full. I then hooked my water hose up to my house and same thing...no water. However, when I went to unhook the hose I realized I had water leaking from under the trailer (seemed to be mostly coming from the area where my grey tank pipe goes up into the trailer). I then went back inside and saw that I had a little water on the floor around my toilet and also in the cabinet area under the kitchen sink.

Water hose burst because of freezing?
 
Me thinks you got problems.
The good news is the PEX didn't bust. The bad news is, some fittings probably did. As well as maybe some of the faucets, since they are basically just plastic manifolds. The water heater may be split too (I had one that did).
Check it out really good. Did you hear water "running" anywhere?
 
Are you handy doing repairs? 
If not, I might ask a local plumber, certainly would be less than taking it to a RV Stealer.  As above, probably some pex connections, and plumbers can fix that that pretty easy.
 
Have never had a line break due to freezing, PEX can take freezing rather well it runs out
Have had the odd fitting (Elbows and threaded adapters) and had one come apart once (Faucet fitting used a friction washer)

That 'Seperation" was the first plumbing failure in this RV. thankfully it was bleach water in the lines so no mold was supported. Very clean floor as a result.
 
Be glad your's isn't an older coach, like mine.  I had a heater fail in my "basement" during one of the cold snaps, and all the pipes underneath froze and burst.  Apparently, Fleetwood used CPVC for a couple of years right around 2000 in the Bounders. 
Mine is in the shop now, being repaired.  I received the insurance check the other day, and it was over $9k, plus my $500 deductible.
The coach is being re-plumbed in PEX, so this shouldn't happen again.
 
Before you get too panicky, are you sure you didn't have the city water "fill" valve open (fill position)?  That would produce most of the major symptoms you described.

Water on the bathroom floor suggest a broken flush valve in the toilet, the fitting that opens to allow water into the toilet bowl. Under the sink suggests a fitting at that point. Usually they crack rather than bust wide open.

Water underneath the trailer probably means a cracked cold water fitting. The water runs along the belly until it finds a way out, so the breakage is not necessarily where you see the water emerging.
 
Just got the diagnosis and not what I wanted to hear. Water heater is cracked due to having water inside and freezing. That's why no pressure. Won't know if any other fittings, etc are damaged until I get a new water heater installed.

Going to be a costly mistake but definitely not one that will happen again.

Lesson learned. Winterize, winterize, winterize!
 
A call to your insurance company may be in order. They may be able to help you out.
 
kdbgoat said:
A call to your insurance company may be in order. They may be able to help you out.
Click to expand...

+1 on call the insurance.  I started working on mine before I remembered full coverage.  They paid to fix my whole coach.
 
dmiller226 said:
Just got the diagnosis and not what I wanted to hear. Water heater is cracked due to having water inside and freezing. That's why no pressure. Won't know if any other fittings, etc are damaged until I get a new water heater installed.
Click to expand...

If it's just a minor crack, you probably could get it welded for a fraction of the cost of a new one.
 
You should be able to isolate the water heater from your system with the bypass valve(s) so that you can run your water and check out the rest of the system and not have to wait. You may want to wait for warmer weather to troubleshoot in case you have pipes blocked by frozen water. Using PEX and Sharkbite type fittings will make the repairs a lot easier, although more expensive. If you have to replace piping with PEX, I recommend using the colored Pex....red for hot and blue for cold. Makes it a lot easier in the future to identify the pipes.
 
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