Sanicon Macerator fun.

[Vegasdan]

Needed to pump out the holding tanks today with my Sanicon macerator. We are parked at our son's place and he has a sewer cleanout that I can pump into. I bought the Sanicon last spring just for this type of situation, normally at campgrounds I just use the 3" slinky which is quicker. I had only used this unit once before just to try it out and it worked fine. Today I had to pump 125ft. I connected the portable Sanicon to the sewer tank outlet and connected the wiring. Fortunately I remembered to start the pumping with grey water for a short time just in case the pump doesn't start or some other problem (you really don't want to pull the black tank valve unless you know everything is working). I had connected the 2 50ft 3/4" hoses to the Sanicon 25ft hose that came with the pump. The Sanicon has a bell shaped sewer fitting at the end and that plastic fitting connects to the Sanicon black 25ft hose. On the bottom of that bell shaped fitting you find the hose fitting that you can screw extra hose to it. I pulled the Grey tank valve and flipped the switch. The pump whirred to life and immediantly the bell shaped fitting blew off of the black Sanicon hose and the hose promptly pumped several gallons of grey water all over including my jeans. I quickly flipped the switch and even though I was covered with stinky grey water I was thankful it had come off now instead of after I opened the black water valve. I looked at the fitting that came off of the hose and saw that it was threaded. Someone at the factory had just slipped it on and had not screwed it on (my bad for not checking it). I screwed it back on and tried it again and it worked fine.

[Martind4]

As we get older, we get smarter. Looks like it's working for you!

[Sammie]

As long as we're on the good old holding tank dump story. My Dad had a 1968 Islander motorhome back in the early 70's. In those days there wasn't very many nice dump stations that you could go to when needed. Sooo he would sometimes wait until we got home and then back the rig up onto the lawn and "let her fly", if you get my drift. That made for a really green lawn in that one spot. Then one day after dumping and parking the rig we saw our cocker spainel dog come walking around the corner with little pieces of TP sticking all over his back. You know how some dogs just love to roll in anything stinky. Needless to say my Mom gave my Dad Hell for his roll in the part and several weeks later we we're installing a cleanout into the sewer line for future dumps. Ah the good old days!

Sammie

[Vegasdan]

Yea, I can remember back in those days as well. Many rest areas along the interstates would have evidence of black tanks being dumped along the curb. Thankfully things have changed (hopefully) and dump sites are out there. BTW, Love's truck stops now are charging $5.00 for a dump.

[wa8yxm]

I use a Flo-Jet macerator.. It has the hose fitting right on the pump housing.. I screw .. Usually 50 feet of BLACK 3/4" rubber garden hose onto that fitting directly.. Has not.. So far.. Failed.

Note the qualifier ..

Glad you tried it with GRAY first.

Next time try hooking a supply hose up to the rinse fitting and test with that

[Mopar1973Man]

Wow... Tell you the truth I never really had any problems dumping wise but I've always just used the stinky slinky for my previous RV. also always been lucky to have a sewer clean out close to the driveway...

[Vegasdan]

An update: I went to Home Depot and put together some fittings and eliminated that bell shape sewer adapter. Now the factory hose has a male hose thread fitting so I can screw my 3/4" garden hoses on.

[pvrick]

Question on using the sanicon system. If I understand it, you have to hook up incoming fresh water supply into the system as it sprays out the black tank, maserates up the black tank content and pumps it out another hose.

Can you use your white fresh water hose for the input? I thought having a 3 foot washing machine hose hooked up to the water inlet of the sanicon and then hook up the washing machine hose to the fresh water hose would be OK> Any issue with this? Any risk of contamination of the white drinking water hose?

Thanks

Rick

[Vegasdan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by pvrick Question on using the sanicon system. If I understand it, you have to hook up incoming fresh water supply into the system as it sprays out the black tank, maserates up the black tank content and pumps it out another hose. Can you use your white fresh water hose for the input? I thought having a 3 foot washing machine hose hooked up to the water inlet of the sanicon and then hook up the washing machine hose to the fresh water hose would be OK> Any issue with this? Any risk of contamination of the white drinking water hose? Thanks Rick

Rick, you definately do not do this. You pump out the black tank first then the grey. There is no reason to hook up any fresh water to the system and there isn't even a connection to do this. Your black water tank will contain mostly water anyway, urine and flush water, and some solids which will have somewhat broken down. The grey water will clean out the hose. Anyway, you never want to get a drinking hose anywhere near the waste. I've seen people flushing out their slinkys with their white water hose and then reconnect their water hose. They take a chance with contamination.

[wa8yxm]

I use a Flo-Jet and that's one thing that has yet to happen to me.. Mine is a portable so the fitting on the pump is a garden hose fitting.. I hook a 50 foot black rubber garden hose (3/4 inch) to it and at the last park I added my 25 foot Gray hose to that (Since I could only pump out gray there, Long story, not important)

Where I'm at now I have enough 3" but I suspect I'll be using the macerator due to the distance from the pipe on the house to the hole in the ground.. I don't like to use more than 20 feet of 3" even if I have 50 feet (20 20's and a 10) it's about 25-30 feet to the hole in the ground.

[BigSkyBob]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Vegasdan Rick, you definately do not do this. You pump out the black tank first then the grey. There is no reason to hook up any fresh water to the system and there isn't even a connection to do this. Your black water tank will contain mostly water anyway, urine and flush water, and some solids which will have somewhat broken down. The grey water will clean out the hose. Anyway, you never want to get a drinking hose anywhere near the waste. I've seen people flushing out their slinkys with their white water hose and then reconnect their water hose. They take a chance with contamination.

Not completely accurate. If you have a black tank flushing system you have to hook up a fresh water supply in order to flush the solids from the black tank. There is an inlet well marked for this purpose. I use a black 3/4" hose for this and nothing else. That fresh water is then pumped out with the contents of the black tank.

[Techie]

You don't need to use fresh to backflush the black, you do need it to do the tank rinse in order to get everything off of the side of the tank.

When we had the "grinder" we would let the grey fill with showers and/or washer. Then, dump and use the tank rinse. After that we would leavethe black open and open the grey for a few seconds, close the grey, run the grinder again. We would repeat this a few times. What it did was force warm, soapy water into the black to help clear/clean it.

Afterwards, we woulod clsoe the black and then use the grinder to get the rest of the grey out thereby cleaning the grinder and the hose with the rest of the warm, soapy water.

If you didn't have a fresh water hookup at all, the above procedure less the tank rinse would do a pretty good job as well.

We disconnected the grinder after an unfortunate incident where the grinder motor burned out -- not jammed and the blades & impeller were still intact. Getting it off the rig was not a fun job as it was while dumping (at least it was in the tank rinse section) and so I haven't had the desire to replace it yet.

Don't get me wrong, it was great up until then and made hookups/take down fast, easy and clean and the hose storage was wonderful even with an extension hooked up.

[Its Paid For]

I installed an elbow to my black tank drain which allows me to attach a waterhose and spray high preasure water into tank as a rinse after draining. It can put 20-30 gallons of clean water in the tank in a few minutes from the valve. I flush after each drain, nice and clean and easy.

[Vegasdan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by BigSkyBob Not completely accurate. If you have a black tank flushing system you have to hook up a fresh water supply in order to flush the solids from the black tank. There is an inlet well marked for this purpose. I use a black 3/4" hose for this and nothing else. That fresh water is then pumped out with the contents of the black tank.

I have a tank cleanout system also, but I think he's refering to hooking up a water hose to the macerator and running water into it while you pump, can't be done as there isn't a connection on the macerator to do this.