Boondocking water fill System

I spend a fair amount of time exploring remote areas and one of the issues has been running out of water. My little 5er only has about a 25 gallon tank and even with conservation efforts 5 or 6 days and I am running low.

I have two 7 gallon water jugs in the back of the truck - Wal-Mart specials for about $14.00 a piece. But trying to lift those and pour the water in the water fill tube is always an issue. Decided it was time to get creative. So I bought some clear tubing and a 12 volt pump that I drop right down in the water jug and at 200 gallons per hour it empties the jug in a couple minutes. In two trips to the hand pump the camper is full again and more than enough to stay my full 14 days in the forest service campgrounds.

I added enough wire and a switch to the pump and some clips to snap onto my batteries so it easily reaches from my water fill area to the house batteries....

HERE is the pump I am using - it is long and skinny and submersible, so you just drop it in the open spout on the water jug or a 5 gallon bucket and in a matter of minutes it empties the jug.

Making my life easier is my goal this summer....

Jim

This is a repeat of another post in another section....fits better here!

Another variation of this is what I've got is two 5 gallon water cubes from WalMart. I added extra tubing length to my anti-freeze line which I never use for that purpose. Now I just close the tank to pump valve and open the anti-freeze to pump valve and place the cube near cabinet and insert the tube right into the jug. Instant water for the RV. 

This is an interesting topic as my current coach is first one I've owned that didn't have a gravity fill capability. That means Wigpro's solution won't work.

While the anti-freeze line solution is interesting, my preference would be to get this spare water into the main tank. The only way I can see doing that is some sort of pump arrangement with a short standard garden hose attached which I can then attach to the city water fill on the coach. Would have to be sure pump put out enough pressure to overcome the check valve in the city water fill (guessing it doesn't take a lot). Perhaps I could use Wigpro's 12V pump with garden hose attached.

Taking a November trip which will involve a short boondock (by Wigpro's standards!) but would like some backup if needed.

Thoughts?

Kill 2 birds with one stone!
Buy a spare for your camper's system pump.
I wired mine to plug in to my trucks camper plug for 12V, it's plumbed to connect to my city (fresh tank) water inlet.
I added a length of pvc pipe to a garden hose quick connect on the inlet hose, this easily reaches the bottom of a 35 gallon plastic drum that sits on it's side in front of the fifth wheel hitch in my pick up bed (on it's side so the bed cover will clear).
35 & 50 gal plastic drums are readily available in farm country, round up comes in them, round up is non toxic so they are easy to clean out.
The pump is a little more pricey but as I said, "two birds with one stone!!

When I relocated the water pump in our coach from near the bed, I also added a selector valve and length of hose that lets me either pump water into the fresh tank by opening the normal fill valve, or pump water or antifreeze to the coach piping by leaving the fill valve closed.

After using 5 gal buckets and a funnel to fill our tank I decided to make something that would be easier. I bought a bilge pump kit for a boat and wired it in the compartment beside the fill location. Now all I have to do is drop the pump in the bucket, put the hose in the fill tube and turn on the switch...so much easier!

I used to carry a spare 12v pump, even though our coach had a gravity fill alternative. Much easier to run a pump to a short length water hose into the city inlet and suck the water from a water jug (we carried a 5 gallon water container back when we boondocked more often) than to hoist that heavy sucker up and pour into the gravity fill.  You don't even need an expensive pump - I used a $20 bilge pump for a small boat. They are low pressure, but you don't need a lot (just enough to force the check valve open). I found that the little 2-3 gpm bilge pumps could barely push water past the check valve, but a 5 gpm model did it nicely.

Harbor Freight has a 12 volt utility water pump for $40.  At 260 GPH it sucks a 5 gallon jug empty in just over a minute and with 50 PSI pressure it could be used as an emergency replacement for the rig's main water pump - all it lacks is a cutoff switch to turn it off when you're not drawing water.

before I bought my new TH I only had 45 gallons of fresh water. I purchased a concession trailer fresh water tank (30 gallons) I placed in in the bed of my truck and had additional water reserves. This made me purchase a shur flow water pump and some tubing w/ fittings. just plug the shur flow into any ac outlet( I have Duracell Power pack or generator) pump the water into my fresh water tank.
Now that I have 100+ gallons in the new rig I use the extra water for washing the 4 wheeler when we return from the swamps and mud holes while boon docking. Using this method I keep water for consumption available and use this extra as wash water. If I really need the extra 30 gallons I can pump it into my tank. One little tidbit.... I purchase a Mini shop vac from Lowes and gutted the motor leaving just the on off switch and the canister. I drilled a couple holes in the canister to allow incoming and out going water, then wired the switch to the water pump. Now it is a nice compact unit protected from the elements and I just connect the hose and flip the switch. I have found that I can use this even when I need to power wash my boat while in dry storage.

We do a fair amount of boondocking, so I installed a second 25 gallon freshwater tank, which gives us 115 gallons of freshwater. Fortunately, we had enough room in the basement storage area for the tank, but it did involve a bit of plumbing, because it fills from the same City Water hookup that the main tank uses. Beyond that, it's really the same design as what Dutch and some others have implemented.

The whole assembly sits on a platform that can be removed in about 10 minutes if necessary (Picture 1), and it's got a backlit water gauge so you can visually see the water level in the aux tank (Picture 2). The aux tank has its own Sureflow water pump and, like Dutch, I installed a valve that enables it to draw from either the aux tank, or from a water jug (Picture 3). There's a six foot hose attached to the valve that lets me draw water out of our 5 gallon collapsible water jugs. I've only had to do it once, but it beats the heck out of breaking camp and driving the RV someplace to get water.

The pump is controlled from two locations - a switch panel in the medicine cabinet in the half-bath (picture 4), or from a control box in the same bay as the aux tank. I use that switch when I'm filling from water jugs. I installed a low water level sensor in the aux tank, so when I'm in the half-bath transferring water from the aux tank to the main tank, a light will illuminate when the aux tank is empty. 25 extra gallons may not seem like much, but it's made a heck of a difference.

Kev