Fresh Water Tank Not Lasting

[Ace]

So I purchased a reflection bhs311. We put water in the water tanks and the sensor says full but it doesn't even last a day. We only used it maybe to wash our hands and flush the toliet conservatively. No showers or anything. We are not even getting a full day before I have to fill it up again....I don't know what's going on. I looked for leaks I don't see anything. Even the first time I filled it I over flowed it by accident it was coming out the over flow...still I would imagine it to be full but the same thing happened...? Any suggestions. We are using Dry camping setting because our Rv park has low water pressure

[TucsonJim]

Hi Ace - Welcome to the forum!

Depending on the model year, you should have 74 gallons of fresh water capacity. I confirmed that you have a 74 gallon fresh tank by examining the drawing. For the record, your fresh water tank part number is 992002. There are a few things that may be going on here. I'm going to list them in what I consider most to least likely:

1. Inaccurate Gauge. The gauges for tanks are notoriosly inaccurate. You may be using a very small percentage of your fresh tank capacity and the gauge shows empty. But you probably still have a significant quantity of water left. How can you test this?
A. Fill the fresh water tank until it just starts to overflow.
B. Obtain a 5 gallon bucket.
C. Use the outside shower to fill the five gallon bucket until the gauge shows the tank is empty. Empty the five gallon bucket and keep track of how much water it takes before the gauge shows empty.
D. After the gauge shows empty, continue to run water out of the system into the five gallon bucket and keep track of how much water is left.
E. Once the water system runs empty, calculate how much water was pumped between step C and step D. This should hopefully be near the 74 gallons.

2. A tank siphon problem. Many of us have found that once we fill up our rig, fresh water starts to run out of the overflow and will not stop until the tank has lost a significant amount of water. This is easy to check. Just look at the overflow to make sure that the water flow stops after filling is complete.

3. A water leak in the fresh system. This is probably unlikely if you're not hearing the pump turn on and you're not seeing any water run out on the ground. But if there is evidence of this, futher investigation is needed.

Please let us know what you find out.

Jim

[Ace]

Thank you I will test using 5 gallons. Also my water pump is coming on to run the water. However the water pressure drops to not producing any water then I check and it says E..so I then fill it again. But thank you I will try this and let you know soon

[Ace]

2021 year sorry and thank you for welcoming me

[acoleman43]

OK, I'm guessing a gauge issue. I'm with Jim....keep filling until you see/hear water coming out the overflow (blue pex pipe sticking out through the coroplast at the bottom of the trailer). Then use the 5 gallon bucket trick

[Country Campers]

You could place the bucket under the fresh tank drain instead of using the outside shower, will save usage of your pump as well. This is the large white gate valve located near the blue overflow line. Do you have one or two blue overflow lines?

Brian

[JBill9694]

Maybe before filling the tank again, Ace, it would be worthwhile to check and see if water is leaking from the tank. Any unexplained wet or damp areas under the trailer (water may travel aways from the tank before finding an exit)? Any bulging of the corrugated plastic? Can you easily push up on the corplas in the area around the tank?

Also, before measuring how much water you get out of the tank, you might want to measure how much water you put into the tank. Drain the tank and then refill with a flow meter in line. Most of the big box stores will have one. There may still be some residual water in the tank from previous filling, and the over-flow may be an inch or more down from the top, so you probably won't get the full 74-gallons going in, but it should be close.

You say that your pressure drops and the pump stops pumping water. Typically, when the water level at the pump inlet drops too low, the pump will start sucking air. Are you getting any spitting out of the faucets as air is pumped through the water lines? If not, and all your getting is low flow with no spitting then I would suspect something is blocking the intake. There have been reported cases of the disk cut out of the black and grey tanks for pipe connections being left in the tanks, but I don't recall seeing anything about this on freshwater tanks, you may be the first.

[TucsonJim]

You could place the bucket under the fresh tank drain instead of using the outside shower, will save usage of your pump as well. This is the large white gate valve located near the blue overflow line. Do you have one or two blue overflow lines?

Brian

Agreed this would be much faster and easier on the pump.

Jim

[GreggGDMomentum]

Typically most campers have a pickup line from the pump down into the tank that won't get all the water out, but it will get most assuming it stayed straight after install and didn't curl up. You should notice when your pump stops picking up the water and then go outside and drain the rest with a 5 gallon bucket or something and see how much is left. You don't need to fill the tank and like Jim said quicker on the pump.

I hope GD does a permanent plumbed connection on the exterior of the water housing at the bottom, but I have not been there yet. That would save waste.

[Cate&Rob]

Grand Design typically uses a water tank with a small well at the bottom for the connection to the pump (and this same line is used for pressure filling the tank). Thus, virtually all of the water in the tank can be drawn out by the on board pump.

Rob

[lmlayfield]

Hi Ace -

Your issue may be caused by a situation similar to mine.

I have a 2021 Momentum 21g. This unit is listed as having a freshwater capacity of 100 gallons. This capacity is actually from two tanks hooked together to one line to the pump inlet. My problem is that I cannot access the last 25 gallons in my tanks. The problem arises because these tanks are supported by the shoulders only. There is no rigid support underneath the tanks. There are three flimsy metal straps that do not even touch the bottom the tanks when they are empty. These straps are screwed to the cross frame members and under stress they can stretch and the screw holes elongate. The tanks are 60” wide (left to right in the frame) 42” long (front to back) and the depth varies from about 4” on the passenger side to about 7” on the driver side. The tank bottom slopes towards the tank outlets on the deeper driver side. Can you imagine a plastic bottom with these dimensions supporting the weight of nearly 50 gallons of water? Even if the metal straps were once tight, they have long since stretched, along with the tank bottom. Both my tanks now have a “belly” that sags below the water outlet. Thus 25 gallons are not reachable by the pump. Even worse, most of this unreachable belly water is not able to be dumped by the dump valves. In short, everything works fine with the water system as long as there is more than 25 gallons on board. With 25 gallons left it is all sputter and no water pressure.

This problem was not noticeable when my unit was new. It developed over time as I traveled with water in my tank. The 21g being a toy hauler with a generator, it is reasonable for Grand Design to expect owners of these units to travel with full tanks to use their toys in boondock type camp locations. Hauling with water weight caused this problem to occur. I did notify GD before my 1 year warranty was over, but I am still facing challenges. This is not a case of something breaking on my rig. If you replace my water tanks with brand new ones of the same design, these new ones will fail too. I have been to three dealers and a mobile tech so far. The first one replaced the water pump. The second one ordered one new water tank. It was backordered so after sitting for three months I pulled my unit and told GD I was going to get a mobile tech since I did not believe it was a water tank issue. The mobile tech and I pulled the coroplast and discovered this issue. When I informed GD they did not believe me and told me a dealer had to repair this issue. The third dealer agreed with my diagnosis of the problem and used plywood and 2x4s to support the tank bottoms using the same flimsy metal straps. I have rejected this repair as insufficient. I agree it will work for a short time, but the straps will stretch again and the untreated wood will get soft and rot and the problem returns. Now GD wants me to take it to a dealer they recommend in Indiana (I’m in Alabama).

Your Reflection may have a shoulder type tank(s) thus your issue may be similar to mine. You should drop the coroplast so you can visually see the water outlet and bottom of your tank(s). I think many of the owners are likely not even aware of this issue. Their problem may not have progressed as far as ours, maybe they use water hookups for much of their camping, or maybe they just don’t keep track of their water usage and assume the tank is empty. Not only do these unsuspecting owners have potentially a couple hundred pounds of water they are unaware of, they may not know there are gallons of fetid water or bleach water sitting in the fresh water tank that cannot be dumped. Whether you just cleaned your fresh water system or you thought you dumped the water out after your trip 2 weeks ago, you are adding fresh water to drink to a tank that maybe you shouldn’t be drinking from.

I have heard some Imagine owners are having similar issues. I personally believe GD is aware of this issue and relying on the one year warranty to foreclose claims on the problem. If I am correct, this is not a warranty claim, it is a design issue with potential a health / safety hazard that is outside the warranty.

[howson]

Your issue may be caused by a situation similar to mine. ...

First--welcome to the forum and also for the informative post. By any chance were there pictures taken of the issue? If so, can you please post them?

Thanks!

Howard

P.S. Hope you'll take a moment to read the Welcome Letter, fill out your signature line, and continue to contribute to this owners-helping-owners forum.

[lmlayfield]

Hope these help. The painted black wood is the attempted solution.

[howson]

lmlayfield -- I assume at some point you'll take a peak under there after a few tows to do an inspection on this addition? When (if) you do, please follow-up with how it went. Of course we'll want to know if it solved the water issue, too.

Howard

[GreggGDMomentum]

Grand Design typically uses a water tank with a small well at the bottom for the connection to the pump (and this same line is used for pressure filling the tank). Thus, virtually all of the water in the tank can be drawn out by the on board pump.

Rob

Thanks for the photo, the last camper I had with 2 water tanks basically had holes drilled in the side about 1"-2" from the bottom so you could never get all the water out when using the pump. I can't see how mine is actually built because it is covered of course and I hope I don't need to get in there soon so I can't see for myself and who knows what was available when mine was actually built. The build date is 2/22. I hope mine uses a molded connector like the one in the photo. We used ours RV for the first time last week and we took a shower and cleaned the dishes while it was on empty so we had to use 15 gallons on empty, that's a good sign. It never ran out that time, but I'm curious once the pump starts to gurgle how much water comes out the drains after the pump starts to gurgle. A test for the next trip possibly for some extra knowledge...

The tanks on my old double tank on the Weekend Warrior just hung there and when full dropped badly with age and when full. It looked possible when the tank was full that the axle would push up on the front tank while driving if the suspension would even come close to bottoming. It was a couple years old at that point and was heavily used, but would be nice if they would have better bottom support.