Galley Sink Drain Leak

[Jim28730]

While camping last weekend, I noticed water dripping from under the coach, curbside, in front of the rear wheel well. After removing the plumbing bay inspection door, I could see the bottom of the plumbing bay was covered with water.

Looking, with a flashlight, at both sides of the plumbing bay, no apparent leaks were evident. Through trial & error, I determined it was grey water and only dripped when running the galley water (shower & lav were fine).

Looks like it may be leaking at the soft coupling that connects the 1 1/2" flex hose from the galley drain to the vent stack. I looked under the sink and it doesn't appear, unless I'm Stretch Armstrong, that I can reach the coupling to repalce it.

Is this a remove the LR slide repair?

Thanks in advance for any wisdom....

[EngineerMike]

Jim- remove the lower drawer facing the fridge, and the drawer under the sink. You will see the offending tube running from the far rear lower corner of the slide in a long arc to the offending connection left side of slide (looking rearward in coach) in the out position. I found you can get at it if the slide is part way out, but it isn't my idea of readily accissible. I have AquaHot so the heat exchanger is under the fridge-facing drawer & above the drain line, and it helps to loosen the exchanger (4 screws) and prop it as out of the way as possible.
Mine leaked down on top of the inverter which it did not like (go figure), but inverter got over it once I let it dry out overnight. For the time being I travel w/a fat, fluffy towel over the inverter control panel, and hope to install a splash guard some day soon. Oh yeah, I check the drain connection w/a flashlight each time slide goes in or out. On mine they left a long flap at the bottom on the rubber sheet cover that obscures the space between slide & shower wall; I trimmed that off about 8" off the floor so it was easy to get at repeatedly.

I changed about half the length of that flex pipe (I think it is "spa" pvc pipe) for swimming pool vacuum hose of same diameter (more flexible by quite a bit) and put silicone in the ribs of the vacuum hose where it sets in the connection, and re-secured it more or less how the original had been zip tied to the morass of tubing/electrical that flexes along w/the drain. It pulled out again after several in/outs of the slide. My next attempt will be to fully seat the hose into the fixed elbow inside the diameter-change rubber fitting (coupler) and then to relieve the fixity of the drain hose some by separating drain from the other junque for the first 30" from the coupling. Don't know how that will work out yet; hopefully you'll try it and come up w/a perfect solution.

If you ever broke that fixed elbow, I think you'd have to remove the slide to fix the plumbing. That's why I went to a super-flex drain connection. Now I just have to get the connection to connect w/out pulling apart every so often.
Maybe I should do it like the kid buying his first pack of condoms. He hands the condoms, marked $3, to the pharmacist who says, "that'll be $3.24 please."
Kid asks "what's the 24 cents for?"
Pharmacist says, "Tax."
Kid replies, "Oh yeah, I wondered how you held those things on."

[Rich and Cork]

I've been fighting this issue for the last few years I have looked for more flexible hose to do what Mike suggests, but haven't found the right stuff yet. I put a new coupling on a few months ago and things have been OK, but I look every time I put the slide out. Sure is frustrating. I assume the original hose has gotten stiffer over time and that is what we are fighting. I looked at my pool hose as a possible solution and maybe should look again.

[EngineerMike]

the pool vacuum hose I got @ HD in Lake Havasu City AZ; it may not be available at all locations at home improvement outfits, maybe only those in areas w/a superfluity of pools (Vegas, Realm of Haides, etc.). Might be got @ other outlets (pool supply?).

I didn't fully seat the vacuum hose into the elbow but let the coupling do the sealing and structural attachment. Next attempt will be run the hose fully into the elbow, then slide the coupling over it to do the seal job, & tighten down. A small right-angle nut driver helps tremendously (for this and a multitude of other close-in jobs that can be done w/a 1/4" hex bit tool), Craftsman sells a nifty set of three w/a magnet in the head to hold the 1/4" hex bit, and HD has a Husky unit that holds 1/4" on one end and 5/16 on the other (common head on hose clamps).

[Jim28730]

Thanks for the prompt response gentlemen. It will be next week before I am able to tackle this project.

I like the idea of changing the hose to something more flexible. How about 1 1/2" Shop Vac hose? It's not super heavy-duty, but it sure is flexible.

[EngineerMike]

I think you'll find the shop vac hose to be too wimpy. The vacuum hose is the same OD as the spa pipe, but has ribs to make up the thickness. For a good seal I think you have to fill the ribs where it enters the elbow; I used silicone and it didn't leak till it pulled loose again. I think I just have to figure out how much to zip tie down to keep it from pulling, but that's all theory till I'm a year plus down the road w/out a problem.

[Rich and Cork]

OK, so I cut out about three feet of the original drain hose and replaced with a three foot section of my pool hose (Barracuda if it makes any difference). I clamped on the the hose adapters at the hose ends. I did not use any silicone. The hose ends are fairly rigid pieces.

This hose is fairly wimpy, so it should not stress any of the joints as the slide goes in and out. We will see.

[Refuse1]

I replaced the black hard plastic 90 that the "flexible" white hose connects to with a rubber 90. The original plastic 90 had broken. When the slide is closed, the rubber 90 twists and bends and does not transmit the stress to the fixed plumbing in the floor. So far, this seems to be workable solution.

[EngineerMike]

Here is what I did most recently:
1) Assemble materials- 30" or so of swimming pool vacuum hose (Home Depot), 3M-5200 24hr Cure (there is an all week cure type also, but I didn't have that much time what w/the Mrs. tapping her foot and all), new diameter-change coupler, new 2" no-hub-coupler (w/the stainless band). Here is a photo of my first attempt using silicone sealant on the spiral wound vacuum tubing (this didn't work so hot, so I moved up the high test, white & more expensive 3M schmutz which appears to be working well):


2) apply 3M-5200 to fill 4"+ of the "threads" on one end of the vacuum tubing & 1.5" on the other end
3) saw off the downstream 30" or so of the OEM spa "flex" tubing
4) install no-hub coupler on the newly sawed off end of the spa tubing with the 1.5" sealed end of the blue hose already installed in the coupler
5) route the blue hose thru/with/around the bundle of wire/pex-tubing/propane/etc. that flexes with the slide movement in the best guess config I had for proper movement allowance of the new blue tube
6) push 4.5" sealed end of blue hose into new diam-change-coupler so that the end of blue tube (which end is now white w/the 5200) will bottom neatly into the OEM elbow drain and the coupler will slide over the outside of the elbow to seal well, i.e. as far as it will go over the elbow & still seal.
7) seal all hose clamps on coupler & tighten down no-hub coupler
8) check all, then water test (but first place a large absorbent towel over the inverter if yours is where the leak drains to)
9) figure out how much of the flex "bundle" needs to be zip-tied together to allow the blue hose its needed freedom on the elbow end. On mine that was about 20" un-zip-tied w/the rest of the bundle of wiring/piping zip-tied to itself only
10) run the slide in/out/in/out to see if it all holds together; curse/swear/re-do as needed for the Mrs. to say, "hey thanks."

The blue hose on mine (hers) gets a helluva pinch when the slide is fully in. I don't expect this to last beyond maybe 2-3 years when I'll hafta do it again, so I'm gunna buy about 50 feet of this hose for future de-javu's. When the elbow finally cracks, I'll do what Jeff shows in post#8 above which oughta be a big improvement.

[dgerstel]

I assume that everyone knows what the pipe that WRV used is, but here is a link to some, incase you don't. It is flexible PVC pipe, it does get stiff with age. It should be available at any spa store.

PlumbingSupply.com - Flexible schedule 40 PVC pipe - spa hose

[Rich and Cork]

I did basically what Mike did, but I used one of my pool sweep 3 foot hoses (Barracuda), which has molded fittings on the end. That way you don't have to mess with the RTV, etc. Just another suggestion.

[Jim28730]

Quote:

Originally Posted by dgerstel I assume that everyone knows what the pipe that WRV used is, but here is a link to some, incase you don't. It is flexible PVC pipe, it does get stiff with age. It should be available at any spa store.

I don't know Dale. I"ll admit the spa hose is more flexible that rigid PVC, but that's about all I can say for it's "flexibility".

[Rich and Cork]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jim28730 I don't know Dale. I"ll admit the spa hose is more flexible that rigid PVC, but that's about all I can say for it's "flexibility".

That is why I tried the pool sweep hose. It is nice and "wimpy".

[ernieh]

I had what appears to be a similar problem on my Winnebago Journey. Two repair attempts by WB (one at the factory) failed.

I finally solved the problem by using a "pressure" pvc coupling instead of a DWV coupling. The pressure fitting has much more area to bond. Also, you must use cement that is approved for flex pvc.

Repair has held for 7 years.