Hair

[irvsiegel]

  When I shave my face, or when my wife shaves her legs, the hair goes down the drain.  At home this is no problem.  What about RV holding tanks?  Should we take some measures to prevent hair from entering the gray water holding tank?

Irv

 

[Jim Dick]

Irv,

Good question. Hadn't thought about that one. I guess electric razors would help. Anything that goes down the drain could aid in blocking the drain or tank. I'd say the drain is the most likely culprit for blockage. Be sure to run enough water to flush the hair into the tank. A good flush of the grey water tank each time would certainly help eliminate the hair. It's not like it's going to become a huge fur ball and block it.

 

[Gary RV_Wizard]

Hair is biodegradable, like food and human wastes, so is basically no problem. The only difficulty is that hair tends to gum up with soaps and form sticky clots - think of hair in the shower drain at home. Long hairs are the worst, while short bristles from shaving are probably of little or no concern.  Your shower is far more likely to produce clogs than razor trimmings in the sink.

When you have the opportunity, i.e. a sewer connection and plenty of city water available, use plenty of water in the sinks and commode to flush all your drains well.    Your RV waste water system uses the same size pipes as a home, but low water volumes and possible lengthy times between uses can let crud accumulate in an RV system that would not happen in a house.

 

[Shayne]

Hair is bio-degradable but at a much slower rate the we would think.  Soap and hair are the two biggest problems causing drainage stopups.  Drain cleaners do not sesolve hair , but they do desolve the soap and crud around hair, so it will fluch done the drains.

 

[John From Detroit]

Assuming you shave more than once a quarter,  Rasior stubble won't likely clog anything.

Now as we all know there's nothing in this world like a long haired girl make me act so funny make me spend my money make me feel reel loose like a long necked goose

And that hair WILL cause problems

(not just plumbing)

 

[Smoky]

There are two ways to combat hair.

First it tends to collect in the "gooseneck".  Fortunately, that is easy to clean out on a periodic basis.

Second, being biodegradable, a monthly dose of RID-X will speed it along the way.  We use RID-X in both our black and gray tanks.  For the gray tank, we wash some RID-X down each drain (3 sinks and 1 shower).

I have a question related to this topic.

As hard as we work to keep food and debris out of our gray water, over time I am certain the gray tank builds up some sludge on the bottom.  I would like to find a safe chemical to use for an annual treatment.  Something I could pour down the drains and let sit overnight that would dissolve any gray tank sludge.  Is there such a product?

 

[scottydl]

Drain cleaners do not sesolve hair , but they do desolve the soap and crud around hair, so it will fluch done the drains.

I've purposely never used a chemical drain cleaner (i.e. Drano or similar) to clear hair clogs at home... I like to limit my exposure to deadly chemicals.    Anyway I read about a "home remedy" method of clog-clearing, which consists of boiling a pot of water with a little ammonia in it.  Remove any drain cover/filter, and carefully (but swiftly) pour the boiling liquid straight down the drain.  Works *every* time.  Would such a "pressure method" cause any potential damage to RV piping (which obviously is not as complicated as household plumbing)?

 

[John From Detroit]

I think your best choices in cleaning the gray tank of sludge build up is one of the biological tank treatments Hopefully some of the bacterial treatments will digest the sludge.  Best time to treat is when parking for a while (Store mode) for a 36 gallon holding tank I'd use about 10 gal of fresh water and one packet or measure of treatment, non-chemical treatment  Let sit for a week or two, flush out (Use a clear plastic adapter so you can see what comes out, If it's not clear. you did good

I have not (yet) tried this

 

[Gary RV_Wizard]

The concern about  RV plumbing is woefully exaggerated in my opinion. It's not really much different than a house system with a septic tank, except there is a valve on the outflow of the tank. It uses the same size and type of pipes and follows the same basic rule, i.e. "stuff" runs downhill.  I suppose the greater volume of a home septic tank lets it withstand more chemical abuse, but  an RV system is not really fragile and will not roll over and die if you throw in  moderate quantities of food waste, drain chemicals, hair, etc. Toilet paper is by far the hardest thing it has to deal with - all this other stuff is a piece of cake!

 

[Smoky]

Gary:

Thanks for those words. It reassures me that my constant use of RIDX is likely all I need to do.