Dewinterizing Questions

[LucasJ]

My Roo is winterized. I am starting to dewinterize and wondering if you can flush out antifreeze with the city water connection? Or should you run water through the fresh water tank and pump? I'm also thinking to leave hot water heater bypassed until all is flushed out?

[Rhumblefish]

Short answer: Yup, mostly.

You CAN use the city water connection to flush MOST of your system, but you'll miss (1) the antifreeze to the pump and (2) the pump loop to the system - this is a negligible amount of antifreeze to get to most of the system. However, at that point, you can complete your dewinterization by adding water to the gravity fill/fresh tank, and firing up the water pump. Leaving some anitfreeze in the antifreeze inlet won't hurt anything (as it's locked safely away from your fresh water supply behind the antifreeze/winterization valve).

Make sure that - if you did anything to your inline water filter (like add an empty soda bottle to it), you take that into consideration and make sure you have a usable filter to install in place once you're dewinterized (we have a member who forgot, and was puzzled by a lack of pump pressure, till he realized the pump was forcing his antifreeze-soda bottle lid to block the return line from the water filter).

Note that if you added antifreeze and ran it out to your showerhead AND you have a ShowerMiser that you ran antifreeze to as well, then you may have antifreeze in the fresh water tank.

Don't forget to dewinterize to your outdoor shower and low point drains, as well. No sense in leaving any antifreeze in any part of the system where it can leach into your system through typical flow/use.

If your hot water heater was bypassed for winterization (as it should have been), wait until you've fully dewinterized before you set the hot water heater bypass back to normal usage. Note: there's no antifreeze in there, but there IS water in there that sat in the very bottom of the tank over the winter (the stuff you just couldn't get out via the outboard tank drain/anode port).

As a result, I like to sanitize my system at the start of the season (anytime the system has sat empty for a while, to be honest; small amounts of water sitting for any length of time could stand to have a little bleach run through them).

The magic ratio for sanitizing is 1/4 for every 16 gallons, 24 hour soak, though a stronger ratio gets you shorter soak time. My system takes
60 gallons (measured and verified) for the 54 gal fresh water tank and 6 gal hot water heater, so I pour a generous cup of bleach into my fresh water hose, and then fill the fresh water tank and hot water heater, and then - once the fresh tank is full (to get the mix to the right ratio) - run the pump to get bleachwater into the hot water heater and then out to each and every one of the water outlets. This gives the fresh water hose a little bleach freshening, too.

Hope this helps!

[Reverse_snowbird]

Originally Posted by LucasJ

My Roo is winterized. I am starting to dewinterize and wondering if you can flush out antifreeze with the city water connection? Or should you run water through the fresh water tank and pump? I'm also thinking to leave hot water heater bypassed until all is flushed out?

Yes to flushing the antifreeze out with the city water connection. That is the preferred method. You don't want to get antifreeze in the fresh water tank or the water pump.
After you're done dewinterizing, you can then sanitize the fresh water tank and pump, as above.

[NavyLCDR]

Originally Posted by Reverse_snowbird

Yes to flushing the antifreeze out with the city water connection. That is the preferred method. You don't want to get antifreeze in the fresh water tank or the water pump.
After you're done dewinterizing, you can then sanitize the fresh water tank and pump, as above.

I would disagree. How are you going to get antifreeze into the fresh water tank or the water pump by filling the freshwater water tank with plain water (or water and bleach) and using the pump to pump that plain water into the plumbing system?

If you use the city water connection to dewinterize you are INCREASING the chances of pushing antifreeze into the water pump and, if the check valve is leaking by, into the freshwater tank.

[Chuck_S]

The is no reason to use RV antifreeze to winterize a RV or boat. All that's necessary is to eliminate any water in the water lines and that can be done with compressed air and a little antifreeze for places that can't be blown out like the sink traps. The damage happens when water in the lines freezes and breaks pipes when it tries to expand and there's no room and that needs the lines to be full not with just a tiny bit of water in them.

Water heater and fresh water tank should be drained. Any water remaining in them can freeze harmlessly like ice in an ice tray in the refrigerator at home.

Antifreeze in the drain traps is about it.

If you insist on using antifreeze use compressed air to blow it out right after you put it in. It eliminated any water and did its job. Empty pipes won't freeze.

Antifreeze ruins any water filter in the camper. Makes the water taste funny all next season.

-- Chuck

[Reverse_snowbird]

Originally Posted by NavyLCDR

I would disagree. How are you going to get antifreeze into the fresh water tank or the water pump by filling the freshwater water tank with plain water (or water and bleach) and using the pump to pump that plain water into the plumbing system?
.

Sorry. Guess I misunderstood what you were advising.
You are correct in that they can fill the fresh water tank with water and bleach and then pump the water into the plumbing to flush out the antifreeze. Then once they smell bleach coming out of the faucets, they can wait 12 hours to disinfect the system.