Sea Level II Install on 2004 Journey

I have joined the SeaLevel II installation group. I did not want to remove the OEM tank measuring system so left it in place. Because the One Place panel leaves no significant extra room I initially was going to mount the SeaLevel model 709 display panel in the tank dump compartment. But I noticed that I had a clear access through the adjoining corner of the bathroom wall to the One Place panel so located the display panel at that location. I don?t monitor the tank measurement gauges regularly so out of sight is not a problem. 

Pulling a cable from the dump compartment to the One Place panel was not as hard as I thought it might be. It took a number of tries to fish a snake from the top to the bottom and the snake was easy to spot and grab through the small squinty vision crack that was available between the top of the tank and the coach under body after I removed the tank protection panel. The black tank vent stack runs through the One Place wiring space so that helped me locate the snake.

I made up a cable from spare #18 wires I had. I taped four wires together and installed them in a wire loom: 1) spare power wire in case in the future I want to put a display panel in the dump compartment; 2) ground wire; 3) LP gas wire; 4) sending unit wire (the sending units are connected in parallel so just one wire is required back to the display panel.)

I tapped into the One Panel water switch hot side for power. I installed a ground bolt in the dump compartment so it is high enough that the tank protection panel hides it and all the new wiring. I did this ground bolt because the install instructions said to have a common ground for the display panel and the tank mounted senders.

Because my Journey?s exterior gray and black tank dimension is 7? (and I am guessing that they are all the same size) and the bottom edge of the tank is rounded, I had to make a sender length decision which I now realize I should have stopped and asked before I completed the installation. I cut the sender to a 6? length and the alternative would have been the minimum length of 4 ?? as you can only cut in 1 ?? segments. I reasoned that maximum sender length would be best. But the rounded bottom tank edge caused me to have to mount the top of the sender within 5/16? of the top tank edge. Since the top tank wall is 3/16? to 1/4" the 5/16? measurement prevents interference and my ?P? reading is good at P52 (more about ?P? readings below). So everything seems to be working OK. With the sending unit located as it is I was told that 100% will occur when the fluid level reaches the top of the top pad which will mean the tank is absolutely full. Is this good tank management or should I have either cut another pad off or risked mounting the sending unit slightly lower so it was attached to the start of the curve? The factory technician said that he would have done it the same way I did. So when I get the tank full I?ll see how it works out.

I followed the instructions pretty close by sanding the two tanks where I installed the sending units and cleaned the sanded spaces with alcohol before installing the senders. I even temporarily taped the senders to be sure they worked correctly before permanently mounting them. But the next time I tape I will only tape the very edges. I taped more then the edge thinking that the masking tape might not hold the board in place. I was very glad that I taped the sending units and highly recommend this step. You need to know that the sending units work correctly before you permanently mount them. Initially my sending units did not look like they were going to work.

Both units (gray & black) seem to measure the tank correctly. The factory tech told me it is the tank height that is being measured not the volume. As my Journey gray and black tanks are pretty close to 7? in exterior depth I cut the SeaLevel sending unit to 6? in length which gives it an effective height of ?4? which means there are four 1 1/2" sending pads in each sending unit. This means that each sending pad has the capacity of four reads. So for my 6? sending unit has 4 pads x 4 reads = 16 possible reads. The tank height is thus divided into 16 increments and each segment is considered a percentage of the physical height and displayed in the panel as a percent of the tank height from 0% to 100%: 1-increment=0; 2-increment=7.15%; 3-increment=14.3%; 4-increment=21.45%; etc to 16-increment = 100%. I was told by the factory that there is a 3% error rate and the displayed numbers are rounded to the nearest whole number.

Because the gauges seem to be measuring correctly I moved on to the signal tank penetration test. The installation manual uses an example of ?P26? which indicates a 26% tank penetration power. My tank penetration power was ?P00?. The manual did not discuss what P00 represents. I called my salesperson and here I had some bad luck. He told me it represented zero tank penetration power and something was wrong with the installation. So we spent a while discussing the installation. My installation looked just like the others I have seen in this forum. So nothing he suggested worked so he said he would call the factory. 1 1/2" hours later the answer was that ?P00? means maximum tank penetration. So a lot of time was wasted. I re-installed and the ?P00? became P52. Go figure!

I took off the masking tape and permanently installed the sending units. Since our tanks are protected by the metal panel I saw no need to further protect the sending units with either a duct tape covering (sales person?s idea) or an undercoat covering as discussed in Technical Services Bulletin #19.

Later I called the factory to discuss my installation with a technician and they assured me that my work sounded correct and further assured me that after I took a few trips filling and emptying the tanks that if the sending units were not working correctly they would replace them.

I have not yet tried to hook up the LP tank or the fresh water tank. I was not able to find a way to snake the wiring across the ?interior? tank space. So I wired it underneath through the exterior automotive part. If I would give up the OEM installation I could re-use those wires. But the OEM water and LP tank gauges are not my big gripe as they measure close enough. So I am keeping the One Place panel original and the OEM system as a back up. Who knows maybe someone will come up with a miracle cure for cleaning the tank innards! 

02/12/2008; The Freshwater Tank sending unit installation is now complete.  I choose not to attempt to measure the entire fresh water tank depth.  The overall tank on our 2004 Journey 36G measures approximately 16? tall.  The irregular part of the tank where I mounted the single 12? sending unit is approximately 14? tall but the water exit fitting takes up the bottom 1 ?? of that space.  That leaves 12 ?? to mount the sending unit.  So the bottom of the sending unit is setting on the top of the water exit pipe fitting leaving about a ?? margin space at the top of this irregular tank section.  If the entire tank height needed to be read, a second sending unit would be required; for a tank installation similar to our Journey it would be mounted behind the tank drain valve.  Other forum members have successfully completed this type installation.

What I think this all means physically is that the single SeaLevel II gauge will show empty on my tank when the water level reaches the top of the water exit pipe which is the bottom of the gauge.  It will show 100% (full) when the water level reaches 14? deep.  It will not read the upper 2? of tank space.  When the tank is physically full the SeaLevel II gauge will show 100% until enough water is drained so the water level reaches the top of the sending unit.  This also means that when filling the tank the SeaLevel gauge will report the tank full at 100% when there is actually still 2? of tank space remaining.  But it is not the filling that concerns me; it is the emptying.  And now I will have a gauge that will measure the available water more accurately. 

I am hoping the SeaLevel gauges will provide an accurate measurement for the black and gray tanks to help provide better trip management. After a years use I am a satisfied customer and the install was worth the time and money.

I have attached a couple of photos of the installation:

Stephen - outstanding!  It appears our tanks are exactly the same - I measured our FW tank at 16.5", and gray/black at 7" high.  I have wanted to improve the tank monitoring practically since the coach was new and I figured out that 1/3 Winnie supplied resolution was not adequate.

Excellent job and write up Steven.  When considering the fresh tank, my important issue was how much was left in the tank.  For black and grey is was how full it was. The new senders are a world of difference than the limited info obtained from the OEM system.  I am much more comfortable dry camping now than before.  Great pic too!

Sarge