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I am not sure if all of the Grand Design Fifth Wheels are plumbed this way but mine was. There was no way to drain the water heater fully. To explain that we do have the outside plug on the water heater for draining purposes, this did not completely drain the water heater, so I found out today. While replacing all of the soft hose on the back side of the Nautilus panel I realized that I could add a drain line while replacing the feed line to the water heater with PEX tubing. In the pictures below you can see the new PEX feed line attached to the the input side of the water heater. I added a 2" long brass !/2" pipe nipple to accommodate the new PEX fitting. From there to the Nautilus panel I added a "T" to facilitate the drain and continuing to the Nautilus panel. When I removed the factory feed line and lowered the the end that was attached to the Nautilus panel about 1 gallon of water drained from the water heater tank. This was after opening the drain on the front of the tank which was done after our last trip last year. That is how I how learned that the front plug drain does not actually completely drain the water heater tank. The new drain in place should completely drain the tank and I can leave it open while traveling and utilize the sloshing to get the tank fully drained. This was a pretty easy mod but you have to make sure that you can complete all PEX clamps, I had to do this in sections.
Hope this provides others with another project to add to their list.
Brian
Hope this provides others with another project to add to their list.
Brian
. I did add a 3rd low point drain associated with how I plumbed my added accumulator tank. I will look into adding a 4th following your lead. This would be an easier way to drain the water heater than the drain plug behind the outside water heater cover.
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