My wife and I have recently purchased a 2011 Jayco Sterling. We picked it up from Brisbane and drove it back to Townsville, after getting a pick run through on the workings of the caravan.
We love it, but I am having trouble trying to work out the water tanks (2) underneath. One for drinking water and the other for every thing else.
There are taps and hoses everywhere under the van and after watching the CD that Jayco gives you, and reading all the booklets and documentation that also comes with the van I have to say I still do not have a clue what I am doing, as there is nothing about this subject.
Even tried searching the Internet with no luck.
Can anyone suggest where I can find out which tank is which and what all the taps are for.
I do have to say this is our first caravan ever, so sorry if this sounds dumb!!
Once we over come this little hiccup and the sun pokes it head out for a while, we look forward to getting on the road.
Take care and hope you are safe and well with all the flooding around.
there is a small tap near front tank should have a sml arrow pointing down if tap is horizontal water is drawn fron both tanks. if pointing forward water is drawn from the front tank, facing the rear water is drawn from rear tank. hope that helps
Have you tried haunting your local caravan parks and/or campsites looking for a similar van - then ask the owner. I learned a lot this way - in fact I still do.
Have you tried haunting your local caravan parks and/or campsites looking for a similar van - then ask the owner. I learned a lot this way - in fact I still do.
there is a small tap near front tank should have a sml arrow pointing down if tap is horizontal water is drawn fron both tanks. if pointing forward water is drawn from the front tank, facing the rear water is drawn from rear tank. hope that helps
Maybe if you put a little water in one tank then check out what works and what doesn't. Drain it, then do the same with the other tank. Sorry if that's no help spooner.
Welcome from me too, enjoy here and out there.
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Yes there is one in Townsville. Hi and welcome Spooner. Both the tanks under my van are linked and are for fresh water only, 120 litres. Some of the vans carry 60 litres of fresh water and the other tank is for grey water. You don't want to drink that. I'd crawl around under there and see what goes in from where, what's linked, and what and where it comes out. Good luck and enjoy your van and the travels you have in it.
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20ft Roma caravan - Mercedes Benz Sprinter - SA-based at the moment. Transport has no borders.
Management makes the decisions, but is not affected by the decisions it makes.
Welcome to the life of caravanning and to this forum.
Get under the caravan, starting from the front tank(near the draw bar) follow the BLACK or CLEAR (See through) 12mm pipe/hose along to where it enters the inside of the van through the floor. Do the same with the rear tank. Both tanks will be connected to the pump via a "T" piece and hopefully with isolating valves/taps. If there are no valves/taps then you will be sucking out of both tanks at once. This is not good, because the tank which has the shortest suction pipe/hose will empty first and you will have extreme trouble getting water to the pump from the other tank because it will be sucking air from the empty tank.
If you are unsure take it to a dealer and have it soughted out.
PS make sure there are not leaks in any of the hoses/pipe and if necessary clean out the tank with Tankcleen.
Hi, Spooner, and welcome to Our Forum. We are two weeks into a two yr trip around the block. Our van dealer told us to go away and stay at a few van parks and then come back and ask about things we don't understand or have trouble with.
I too would suggest contacting the dealer, and have them run through it with you on the phone while you are under the van. Our van has three tanks, so I know how you feel.
Thank you all very much for your great ideas and advice. I think I will crawl underneath the van and have a good look around so I can familiarise myself better with everything under there and then head to our local Jayco dealer.
I know this link is very (like years) old, but it is still a valuable leaning place even today. I recently purchased a 2006 Jayco Destiny, and like most, have had to learn things my myself.
My van also has the two tanks, I did climb underneath and found the a line from each tank that met at a T-piece, before the lines went into the T-piece there was a tap, I was told to turn the tap on to that particular tank, turn the longest part of the tap parallel with the line towards the tank. So, I thought, to turn off that tank you turn the tap in the opposite direction. No No No, to turn off that tank in my van you only turn the tap 90degrees so that the tap handle (like plastic tap handle) is at 90 degrees to the line. I'm a slow learner.
Like many other, wondering how best to clean out the tanks, not that they needed doing, but, on reading about how you can finish up with bad tasting water from not using food grade drinking water hose because the water sitting in the hose takes on the taste of rubber/plastic. I thought, well, it won't be sitting in the hose, I'll flush out the hose before filling up my tanks. So did that. Just recently, I was filling up the chooks (laying hens) water container and noticed all this algea looking crap coming out of the hose. Thought, OMG, I filled up the caravan tanks with this hose. So, to cut to the chase, decided I must do something immediately to rectify this problem or potential problem.
Mind you, since doing this I have purchased 30 metres of QUALITY drinking water hose and made up 3 hoses. Anyway, back to the story, like, living in regional Queensland, we do not have everything on hand, but did manage to pick up a new filter for the undersink water filter, a new inline exterior filter for the hose and 10 litres of Chlorine. ( I needed chlorine for another job as well). Having 2 x 90 litre tanks, tried to find out what strength to mix the chlorine, finished up putting about 1litre of liquid pool chlorine in each tank and filled the tanks with water (using drinking water hose of course) have left the chlorine solution in the tanks for 2 days and will take the van for a run around the block tomorrow before draining and flushing. I want to run some fresh water through the pipes and taps and filter then replace the filter cartridge with the new one. I figure, if I'm going to get a whole lot of crap caught in the water filter, best it be the old one then put in the nice new clean one.
Figure I should drain and flush and wash out both of these tanks and lines very well, just hope I haven't done any harm using so much chlorine, but would love some feedback as to what I have done.
I have also purchased one of those propper towball weight scales, hey, that's a scary move that I highly recommend to anyone towing a caravan. Some people said it wasn't worth spending the $80 odd dollars on because you would only use it one, well, I think they are a great investment and can see myself using it a lot more often than just once. And it really was scary to see just how much weight you can inadvertently be putting on you tow ball. You would be surprised, I know I was. I had recently put in a new 120amp AGM battery which is located towards the front of the van, probably didn't help an awful lot with the weight on the tow ball, so will have to make sure I pack some of the heavier stuff towards the back of the van. But learning how much is made easier with the use of this tow ball scale, so I reckon, for safety sake, $80 was a small price to pay for the comfort of knowing you are doing it correctly. I know some people just do it because they know how to, but unfortunately, I'm not one of them so I reckon, go buy one.
Anyway, back tot he water tanks, I also had fun trying to work out why the taps would not work in the caravan, something to remember. TURN THE SWITCH FOR THE WATER PUMP TO THE ON POSITION. Found that to be really helpful.
One more little piece of trivia which I had not thought about, you know when you are staying at a really lovely clean little camp, and you have your sullage hose stretched out onto the grass (which almost looks like lawn) and you worry about any yukky stuff that might go down the sink and leave a mess on the grass. When we bought our van, the people gave us a heap of chux like cloths that had been doubled over and stitched along the sides to make a little bag to put over the end of your sullage hose and held in place with a rubber band. Very high tech, but also very effective of catching any rubbish that goes down the sink, and every couple of days or when you leave, you simple pull this little chux like bag off the end of your sullage hose and throw it in the bin with all the gunk contained in it, leaving the lawn like park in prestine condition. I just thought that was a brilliant little idea, and I said Chux Like, because I think the very cheap home brand cloths would do just as good.
Anyway, that's enough from me for one evening, and thanks to everyone for the comments on this site that make life a lot more simpler for us newbies.
A comprehensive report on the water tank subject there - thanks for posting. I like the idea of the tow ball weight gadget, have seen so many caravans driving or pulled up in camps, that are so badly packed, they either have the front too high, or the back too low, from weight badly distributed, you wonder sometimes do people ever stop and look at what their van looks like when they are towing.
We have a motorhome, so don't have the ball weight problem, having said that, we now tow a small car behind, and had to be sure of the weights we could tow. The little Nissan Micra (Micky) tows really well on the dolly trailer, and we carry our chairs and tables in it.
As for the water tanks - when travelling we get so many different waters, we now carry 20 or so litres of drinking from a known source, just to be sure.
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jules "Love is good for the human being!!" (Ben, aged 10)
Very interesting read, just before leaving home this trip I was going to flush out my tank with baby bottle cleaner one thing lead to another and I end up just draining it a couple of times, our tank water is good but was doing it as a precaution thing.
I would like myself to have a ball scale but I think I may go one better and buy a hydraulic jack with a scale on it then I can weigh either wheel or tow ball.
I did weigh our gear at first fully loaded and then by chance we had it stripped out to have some repairs done weighed it the second time. Since we did all that we have left so much gear behind down to the odd bit of cutlery, spare cups and I amazed at the lady leaving more at home each time. I thought we did not take much and travelled light.
We do have empty cupboards, I am encouraged to take my toy radio controlled sail boat, next I am hoping to find a kayak I like. Ralph
spooner
