Black/Grey tank drain????

deerslayer · 05-22-2012, 09:01 AM

Didnt relize it when we took delivery of our unit, but after dumping a few times I find my set up very odd. In order for me to dump my gray water tank I MUST dump the black. The black tanks drops straight down to the main dump valve, the grey valve is above this as it should be. I only have the two valve, the main which is also the black and the gray valve. So in order to dump my gray tank I MUST drain the black. Problem with this is, some state parks we camp at do not have sewer hook ups, so I bring along my blue tote to drain the gray tank (I have a wife and teenage daughter so we go through a lot of water for showers lol) so now with the new 5th wheel I cannot dump my gray because of the black water. I really do not want to dump the black water into my blue tote. Has anyone seen this kind of set up before? The unit is a 2012 coachman chaparral open trail 26rls

wagon52 · 05-22-2012, 09:19 AM

Hmmmm....never heard of that. Both of my trailers have 2 separate valves that you can open. I'm sure someone here can help.

TURBS · 05-22-2012, 09:33 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by deerslayer

Didnt relize it when we took delivery of our unit, but after dumping a few times I find my set up very odd. In order for me to dump my gray water tank I MUST dump the black. The black tanks drops straight down to the main dump valve, the grey valve is above this as it should be. I only have the two valve, the main which is also the black and the gray valve. So in order to dump my gray tank I MUST drain the black. Problem with this is, some state parks we camp at do not have sewer hook ups, so I bring along my blue tote to drain the gray tank (I have a wife and teenage daughter so we go through a lot of water for showers lol) so now with the new 5th wheel I cannot dump my gray because of the black water. I really do not want to dump the black water into my blue tote. Has anyone seen this kind of set up before? The unit is a 2012 coachman chaparral open trail 26rls

I've read your post twice and cannot grasp what your trying to say.
Pics?

RubenZ · 05-22-2012, 09:54 AM

Ya, i would need to see pics here

deerslayer · 05-22-2012, 10:20 AM

Unfortunatly I dont have pics right now, and I have been trying to find a pic of it on the internet but have been unsuccessfull. I have a 30 gallon black tank with the large diameter pipe that comes out of the tanks and goes directly to the lowest valve which is at the end of the pipe where I hook up my flexible sewer line when I camp. The greay tank ties into this pipe above that with its own valve. I only have two valves, the main valve at the lowest point and the one above it for the grey, I know it sounds crazy!

deerslayer · 05-23-2012, 09:29 AM

Well I called coachman and talked with a service guy who ran my vin#, checked into it and called me back rather quickly. Said the factory plumbed my tanks wrong and I should be able to dump each tank independantly of each other (simply so I can dump my gray water into a blue tote when at a state park for long weekends). Gave me a name and number, called the dealer and now I am waiting a call back from them Hope to have an awnser by today!

TURBS · 05-23-2012, 09:54 AM

I got what your saying now!

Grey tank valve outlet is plumbed BEHIND black valve.

So you have to dump black in order to dump grey!
Otherwise if grey was dumped it would fill black.

Correct?

deerslayer · 05-23-2012, 10:09 AM

Pretty close, it wont back fill into the black tank due to a 45 degree pipe, but its piped behing the black valve. So Say I ma camping at a state park with no sewer, my gray tank fills up due to usage on sat and I need to dump my grey water into my 25 gallon blue tote I cannot do that because that would mean dumping my black into the blue tote then my gray.....make sense?

TURBS · 05-23-2012, 10:13 AM

That it does!
I wonder how many units like this went out before this was caught?

Hope that sub par idiot that doesn't correctly know how plumbing works still works there?

deerslayer · 05-23-2012, 10:35 AM

Yeah i dont know, I just got off the phone with the service manager at the dealer, told me one other place to look at (which I allready know its not there) and call him back, if its not there than I will take it back to them next week after out trip this weekend and they will see what they need to do to fix it. Just aggrevating that I have to take it back to the dealer, again, for something stupid! I most likely wont get compensated for this problem since its not the dealers fault, but I do want to try and get some type of flush installed on the tank pipes so I can back fill the tanks!

TURBS · 05-23-2012, 10:41 AM

They make a clear flush elbow that attaches were you sewer hose goes with a garden hose fitting on it.

deerslayer · 05-23-2012, 01:06 PM

Yeah i saw those, wondered how well they worked. I was hoping we could maybe put something permanent in since they will have to take it all apart to replumb the pipes. I would like to put in a regular tank rinse but since I have the sealed/heated underbelly I dont want to take anything apart, its only a month old lol

TURBS · 05-23-2012, 02:34 PM

I had "heated" underbelly as well but had the dealer disconnect it because I had low or no heat flow to the bathroom and master bedroom.
Then they installed shut-able registers in the bunk house ,dining and living area to provide more flow to upstairs. This was all done under warranty. We will see this fall how that worked.

deerslayer · 05-24-2012, 06:52 AM

Well at this point I am confused, one guy from coachman said yeah it was plumbed wrong, dealer told me they are gonna fix it next week when we get back, then last night i get a phone call from a very odd number. I almost didnt awnser because of the odd area code, but I did. Ended up being a rep from coachman forest river, nice guy, told me they are going to make it right for me, however, he is saying that its is the way its supposed to be! Said it was one of the things the engineers cut out on my model for whatever reason! Told him it was rather stupid since if your someone who camps without sewer hookups your screwed! He agreed and said it was something they were going to look into changing. So now, I have had 3-4 people say its wrong, including a service guy from coachman, then regional rep says no no no its right but they are gonna change it to make me happy no charge. Not sure if its just a cover up for a factory screw up or he's right. Never the less they are gonna make it the way I want no charge so I am happy!

TURBS · 05-24-2012, 06:59 AM

Good luck. Make sure you let everyone know how this turns out.
Id actually like to know why they thought this would work?

Actually I do "get" why they did it.
I just get why they think the grey wouldn't fill up first. 9 times out of ten the grey will fill first . Hmm

deerslayer · 05-24-2012, 07:21 AM

Well they are having the dealer replumb the lines for me, thats a definate. The rep didnt have an awnser for me on why they thought this would work, just said maybe the engineers should camp more! One thing I can say is so far any problem I have had its been taken care of, coachman has been good about that, which they should since its a brand new trailer!

MilCop4523 · 05-24-2012, 08:31 AM

Mine appears to be similar on the 2012 Salem. However the black water drain lever is higher and to the left of the hose attachment and the grey water is to the right of the hose attachment point and has its own release. I was told one should always drain the black water first and the grey second which assists in a pre wash on the sewer hose to the tank in ground...
I had a different problem this year... the lines to my galley tank were put together at the factory wrong and stress cracked.
I had my water dumping on the ground until the 82 yr old gentleman next to us pointed out we were in trouble. He did a temp fix until we got home

deerslayer · 05-24-2012, 12:13 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MilCop4523

Mine appears to be similar on the 2012 Salem. However the black water drain lever is higher and to the left of the hose attachment and the grey water is to the right of the hose attachment point and has its own release. I was told one should always drain the black water first and the grey second which assists in a pre wash on the sewer hose to the tank in ground...
I had a different problem this year... the lines to my galley tank were put together at the factory wrong and stress cracked.
I had my water dumping on the ground until the 82 yr old gentleman next to us pointed out we were in trouble. He did a temp fix until we got home

Dumping the black tank first is not in question, that is how I do it at the dump station, its common sense. My problem is, on long weekends, with my wife and teenage daughter at state parks with no sewer hook ups I need to dump the grey tank midway through the weekend, I use a blue tote to do this and take the tote to the dump station to empty. I cannot do this with the current set up! I am not wanting to dump my black tank into my blue tote! At the end of the weekend I dump as usual at the dump station, dumping black then grey.

MilCop4523 · 05-24-2012, 12:46 PM

so instead of being in a Y pattern the drain lines are one behind the other in the same line with only one release valve to pull?

If so whats stopping your grey and black water from mixing together when your on a pad sitting for a week or so?
A picture is worth a million words.

deerslayer · 05-24-2012, 02:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MilCop4523

so instead of being in a Y pattern the drain lines are one behind the other in the same line with only one release valve to pull?

If so whats stopping your grey and black water from mixing together when your on a pad sitting for a week or so?
A picture is worth a million words.

I know a pic would be great but unfortunatly I havent been able to grab one, too busy! But the y thing, the large diameter pipe comes straight out of the bottom of the black tank, the smaller diameter pipe comes out of the gray tank, before the grey tank pipe connects to the black water pipe there is a valve to control the grey water, the grey water pipe then connects to the large diameter blackwater pipe on a angle and the one large diameter pipe comes out to the side of the camper. Just before the end cap there is another valve then the end cap you remove before hooking into your campground sewer connection. My blackwater goes straight to this valve. There is no other way of draining the grey tank without fisrt having to dump the black water. As I stated earlier, thats not a problem if you always camp with sewer connections, but we dont, and we spend several long weekends at state parks without sewer. I didnt spend the money on a camper with a bathroom just to take a shower in a state park bath house!

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