Erratic Readings for Black Tank on New (2018) Tank Monitor

[elees]

Originally Posted by VP Chianese

Dr. Arnold,

Don't keep the gray closed we keep it opened. Why store gray water if you don't have to? I some time hold some to flush the hose after a black tank dump but that is only if we are getting ready to leave our site.

BTW does your Travel Supreme have electric dump valves? Makes a difference as to when you have to go out side in the rain or not.

I never have mine open while hooked up to the sewer system in a campground. I have been led to believe that the RV does not have a trap in it where a water barrier would keep sewer gases from the campground sewage hookup to enter into the RV septic system.
I stand to be corrected if this is not the case.

[lenny-shawna]

Originally Posted by RMD3819

Three whole cups or caps?



I have that same problem with residue "returning" to the bowl in my 1/2 bath toilet which also has a problem intermittently holding water. Newmar has worked on it twice including replacing the vacuum breaker thingy.

Back to the subject. I have this exact same problem except I have the old system with the yellow (2/3) to red (full) lights without gauges. It is erratic in that it goes from E to yellow to red sometimes within 24 hours, other times it takes a few days but in no case does it reflect actual tank levels. I have an appointment at North Trail next week.

Sorry for the delayed reply but I used three (3) cups in the beginning (excessive possible), now every few months after I clean the tanks I fill them with clean water and put a couple of cups down each tank again. The sloshing around is what I feel is needed to both clean the tanks and coat them as well.

Like I said prior, it does work for me along with a few of my friends who do this now as well.

[VP Chianese]

Originally Posted by elees

I never have mine open while hooked up to the sewer system in a campground. I have been led to believe that the RV does not have a trap in it where a water barrier would keep sewer gases from the campground sewage hookup to enter into the RV septic system.
I stand to be corrected if this is not the case.

Your coach has traps on each drain just like your house. If not your coach would smell just like the inside of the holding tank. Which is not sewer gas but stinks fairly bad.

[RMD3819]

FWIW-

As I posted upthread I have the same problem but with the older system and had North Trail look at it last week.

The moved the black tank sensor and so far it appears to have fixed the problem.

[VP Chianese]

Originally Posted by lenny-shawna

Sorry for the delayed reply but I used three (3) cups in the beginning (excessive possible), now every few months after I clean the tanks I fill them with clean water and put a couple of cups down each tank again. The sloshing around is what I feel is needed to both clean the tanks and coat them as well.

Like I said prior, it does work for me along with a few of my friends who do this now as well.

Len,

Yes that works for the old system on the 2015 of which I never had a problem either to speak of except once and a quick fresh water flush cured it.

This is a different yet similar problem on the 2018's with the new read out from KIB. The two readout systems are totally different. One uses in the tank units the other uses outside the tank readout units. The KIB's are on the outside of the tanks.

This particular problem pertains to 2018's and 2019's only.

I'm still looking for the answer to my question which may be important when I discuss this with Newmar Engineering.

The question is "If you have a 2018 or 2019 and you are having trouble with the KIB tank readouts do you have the added Sani-Con system or not?"

You can answer me direct if you like. vpchianese@gmail.com or 919.368.2659

I'm trying to see if there is any correlation between the failures of the KIB and the Sani-Con system.

I have sent an email to Mr. Stichter head of the engineering department and he has emailed me back. We will be discussing this later this week or the first part of next week. I have found it is best to know everything I can when we discuss things because folks have a tendency to side step the issues with other information. I want to avoid that happening here.

[elees]

Originally Posted by VP Chianese

Your coach has traps on each drain just like your house. If not your coach would smell just like the inside of the holding tank. Which is not sewer gas but stinks fairly bad.

Yes, I agree on the gray water sinks and shower.
I was referring to the black tank and toilet. As far as I know, there is no trap in my coach.

[VP Chianese]

Originally Posted by elees

Yes, I agree on the gray water sinks and shower.
I was referring to the black tank and toilet. As far as I know, there is no trap in my coach.

You really shouldn't ever leave the black tank open for no other reason that the liquid will flow out with each flush and the sediment will get hard on the floor in the black tank that will need a hand grenade to get loose.

Like your house the Toilets retain water and unlike your house they have a valve of some type as either a ball valve or slide valve that seals them off form the holding tank as well. When they are flushed the water rushing out prevents the smell from coming in. They also have an anti siphon back flow preventer as well. When that get stuck, and they can, you will get the smell from the black tank in you coach. They have a spring loaded valve that sometime gets a bit corroded and fails.

So when hooked up gray tank open and black tank closed. Some time especially when we are getting ready to leave I close the gray tank before we do the morning showers and semi fill the gray tank so that when I empty the black for the departure I have gray water to run out the hose to clean it a bit. Gotta admit the Sani-Con hose is a lot cleaner and easier to handle and store than the 3" Anaconda.

[dxg0001]

Originally Posted by VP Chianese

I'm still looking for the answer to my question which may be important when I discuss this with Newmar Engineering.

The question is "If you have a 2018 or 2019 and you are having trouble with the KIB tank readouts do you have the added Sani-Con system or not?"

I'm not Len (I'm the OP). I don't have the Sani-Con system so I don't think it has anything to do with it.

Based on all the comments here and my discussions with Newmar and KIB, I do believe KIB should be able to improve their software. I think their biggest problem is when they developed the system they just work with water. Works great with water. What they need to do is develop with the "real stuff" which in fact they did for one day on my coach. They improved it marginally by adding a special recalibration algorithm. We discussed some sort of autocalibration after the tank is emptied but that's obviously not that simple.


As I mentioned before, not sure if anyone is working on this now so the more people report the problem the sooner we (hopefully) get a solution.

Regards,
Dan

[FLJOE]

Originally Posted by elees

Yes, I agree on the gray water sinks and shower.
I was referring to the black tank and toilet. As far as I know, there is no trap in my coach.

The black holding tanks and toilets don't have "traps" like you would see in a residential system. The tank is of course vented up through the roof. What we have always done is when running the stinky-slinky we make our own trap toward the end. I just feel better not having a CG's sewer gases even coming up into my gate valve area.

[LostDutchman]

I have the same issue with my 2018 DSDP 4018. I am here at Camp Newmar now and via KIB they received approval for and are replacing the sensor strip and monitor as we speak.

I think KIB sold Newmar a bill of goods with this POS system - supposedly uses RF so it reads accurately no matter what. Yet everyone I’ve spoken with lately that has a 2018 is having similar issues. Engineering at Newman must now be well aware of the problem since there were 4 of us here with the same problem within the past couple weeks.

If you are having this issue - speak up and let Newmar know. Maybe they can make KIB make good even if you are out of warranty.

[Canuck53]

Basic design that does not work is not a warranty issue but a recall!

[Pikkleballer]

Originally Posted by Canuck53

Basic design that does not work is not a warranty issue but a recall!

Totally agree!

[redbaron73]

The SEELEVEL system makes a special note in all of the installation documents to NOT USE spade connectors for the signal or ground wires, but to use a crimp or solder connection.

I see that the KIB Tank Montior harness Newmar is using is full of spade connectors.

I wonder if this could be part of the problem?

[hohenwald48]

Originally Posted by FLJOE

The black holding tanks and toilets don't have "traps" like you would see in a residential system. The tank is of course vented up through the roof. What we have always done is when running the stinky-slinky we make our own trap toward the end. I just feel better not having a CG's sewer gases even coming up into my gate valve area.

I agree. If you don't form a trap in the sewer hose you can get sewer gas from the CG venting out the roof tank vent of your RV. When someone down the line dumps 75 gallons in the system it moves a lot of stinky air out the vent stack. I usually just lay a piece of 4x4 under a section of the sewer hose to form a whole RV trap. Easy enough to remove when you need to dump black tank.