Question on Winterization by Dealer

sowbug · 11-22-2015, 03:33 PM

I took our new TT (used twice this fall) to be winterized this past week by the dealer. Since I am a newbie, I watched them do it so that I can do it next time. There were a couple things that I observed that seemed at odds to what I have read in the generic Forest River manual. They used the antifreeze only method and we live in eastern Tennessee.

1. They ran the hot and cold facet until AF ran through (toilet also), but they did not add any additional straight antifreeze in the sink traps or toilet. Maybe enough of the AF went down the drains to protect the traps?

2. At the end, they drained the grey and black water tanks. Should there be some AF in these tanks over winter?

The manual says to put 1 gallon of AF down each sink drain and toilet to protect the traps and the black and grey water tanks. They did not do this step.

Thoughts?

Crusadernoob · 11-22-2015, 03:50 PM

Traps don't hold much, just a little antifreeze will do. Personally I do dump some antifreeze down the sinks, toilet so I have some in all 3 tanks. I like the piece of mind that whatever small amount of water DIDNT drain out of the tanks doesn't freeze against my valves, that's why I add some to the waste tanks.

Buck1032 · 11-22-2015, 06:59 PM

I too am in East TN and I do pretty much what your dealer did. May I ask which dealer you took your rig to?

sowbug · 11-22-2015, 07:11 PM

Chilhowie RV in Knoxville ....they have really been great to work with.

I noticed that you have a Surveyor. We have a 2016 Surveyor 291BHS. This is our first TT so we have a lot to learn.

Buck1032 · 11-23-2015, 09:22 AM

On a side note, my wife and her family are from Knoxville. She had an uncle up there that had been RVing for decades and he dealt, bought and traded with Chilhowee for a very long time, that's what sort of prompted us to drive up there, we are in Cleveland. We started looking locally, ie Camping World, Northgate RV, Dunlap RV. We then starting looking North, ie, Buddy Greg. Chilhowee was by far the friendliest and easy to deal with. We are very happy with them and our TT.

hdmtnrider · 11-23-2015, 03:08 PM

Make sure the also ran antifreeze thru the outside shower, that is if you have one! Also, did they pour a little down the shower drain?

bobm253 · 11-23-2015, 04:00 PM

did they bypass the water heater and then drain it?

SuicideSaints · 11-23-2015, 04:20 PM

Maybe I missed something but if they ran the faucets then AF went down the drains by default......

You dont need to pour extra down there if AF ran from the faucets. Same goes for shower and toilet.

Make sure they hit the outside shower if you have one and the HW tank should be bypassed before doing all this.

tomrob1161 · 11-23-2015, 07:16 PM

You didn't mention anything about the water filter. I assume you have whole trailer water filter. I take mine out before I run antifreeze through it. As a precaution, I go by the Forest River manual recommendation of putting a gallon of antifreeze in each holding tank. It doesn't get real cold here in N. Alabama, but it's a lot cheaper to put a gallon of antifreeze in than to replace a drain valve.

Good luck and enjoy RV'ing.

sowbug · 11-23-2015, 07:37 PM

Thanks for everyone's reply. Very helpful to get insight on this.

They did drain/bypass the WH and ran water/AF through all sinks, showers (inside and outside), and the toilet with the pump until it turned pink. They also pushed the button on the sanitary water inlet until AF squirted out.

My confusion was that the generic Forest River manual said to use a total of 4-6 gallons of AF. The manual said to pour an additional 1 gallon of AF down each sink drain, shower, and toilet after going through the process to winterize the black and grey water tanks. They did not do this last step, but it seems from the responses that this may be overkill since enough probably went into the traps when they ran water/AF through the system.

Apparently, they did not leave any AF in the grey and black tanks since they drained these tanks at the end of the entire process. I think I may add some myself just to be safe. It also sounds like it can keep the valves from drying out over the winter.

Buck1032 ... I definitely agree that Chilhowee was the best to work with in the Knoxville area since we visited them all multiple times. We had one particularly unpleasant experience (high pressure sales) with one (not to be named) 45 minutes west of Knoxville.

Buck1032 · 11-23-2015, 08:13 PM

We most likely experienced the very same crazy high pressure sales people you did. Left that one and went to Chilhowee. It was like a breath of friendly fresh air talking to our sales rep.

Delco Bobby · 11-23-2015, 10:13 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sowbug

I took our new TT (used twice this fall) to be winterized this past week by the dealer. Since I am a newbie, I watched them do it so that I can do it next time. There were a couple things that I observed that seemed at odds to what I have read in the generic Forest River manual. They used the antifreeze only method and we live in eastern Tennessee.

1. They ran the hot and cold facet until AF ran through (toilet also), but they did not add any additional straight antifreeze in the sink traps or toilet. Maybe enough of the AF went down the drains to protect the traps?

2. At the end, they drained the grey and black water tanks. Should there be some AF in these tanks over winter?

The manual says to put 1 gallon of AF down each sink drain and toilet to protect the traps and the black and grey water tanks. They did not do this step.

Thoughts?

You had a better experience than me. My dealer would not let me watch what they do for their $90 winterization service. They wanted another $80 to dump the tanks; I refused that expense. Did it myself yhe next day.

I stopped at a store a few miles away and noticed water pouring out of the RV. They told me later that they leave the fresh water drain open, a heads up would have been appreciated.

I couldn't find the cap and the service writer didnt know what happened to it or if it even has a cap. It might just have a valve.

Oaklevel · 11-23-2015, 10:22 PM

Our trailer is 36 feet & I use about 2 gallons. What they did sounds fine but I do dump some in the holding tanks if I had any left over from last year,

SimchaSabre · 11-30-2015, 02:11 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sowbug

1. They ran the hot and cold facet until AF ran through (toilet also), but they did not add any additional straight antifreeze in the sink traps or toilet. Maybe enough of the AF went down the drains to protect the traps?

I've always taken a little extra AF to make sure the traps were filled with undiluted AF in all of our rigs....as I did initially with our current Sabre...at least until, I discovered that our Sabre used waterless traps instead of P-Traps.

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