Thetford C402 toilet - travelling with flush water

[everhopeful]

In the instruction manual Thetford says "Important Warning Notice! Please do not travel with water in the flush tank of your toilet. Failure to adhere to this notice may result in water damage to your caravan or motorhome." This is alarming stuff, but the manual falls short of an adequate explanation.

 

In a motorhome it seems crazy to have to empty the flush water every time before moving, but is the water really likely to leak out?

 

I've travelled with the the tank about half full and seen nothing, but where would the water come from and go to if it did leak out?

 

Is this just a get-out clause or should I be worried? 8-)

[mirage]

I read this in manual as well and would also like to know the answer. The advantage of the separate flush tank was always that you could travel with a limited amount of water just for the obvious purpose. My current and previous van flush from the FW Tank.

[Derek Uzzell]

The warning notice seems to be printed in all Thetford cassette-toilet instruction manuals irrespective of model.

 

Presumably there have been cases of 'en route' water leakage from flush-tanks in the past, but I would rate the chances of this happening as minimal. It is possible to envisage situations where leakage could occur (say, if a rough road shook the water-level tube or filler-cap loose on a C2/C4 toilet), but I can't see leakage happening in normal circumstances.

 

Although the advice to empty the flush tank before travelling may be considered best practice - after all, if it's empty then it definitely won't leak - I certainly agree that it's unrealistic to expect motorcaravanners to adhere to it (rather like expecting the 7th Commandment to be universally followed).

 

When I owned a motorhome with a C2 Thetford toilet I was aware of Thetford's caveat, but I never travelled with the flush-tank emptied and I never lost any sleep over doing this (and I never had any leakage problems either). I'm sure that the vast majority of motorcaravanners do likewise.

 

For an explanation for the warning that's more than educated quesswork I think you'll have to ask Thetford themselves. They may be startled to learn that users of their products actually make the effort to read the instruction manuals!

[Derek Uzzell]

After my posting I thought I remembered this subject coming up before on this forum. These are links to two earlier references:

 

http://www.outandaboutlive.co.uk/forums/forums/thread-view.asp?tid=6691&posts=8

 

http://www.outandaboutlive.co.uk/forums/forums/thread-view.asp?tid=2567&posts=15

 

[everhopeful]

Thanks Derek.

 

I'm a little surprised at myself for reading the manual, so Thetford probably would be surprised as you say!

 

Thanks for the links too - I tried searching before my post but couldn't go beyond 12mths without crashing the system. :-|

 

I'll not worry anymore and only travel empty when the toilet won't be needed.

 

Cheers :-D

[dory60]

In reply to the leaking toilet, sadly we have had that problem, we have a c4 thetford toilet, and this year in France we returned to our van and noticed the blue liquid leaking onto the ground, on further investigation we noticed that the toilet must have been leaking for a while because under the vynal and into the cuboard was all stained with blue and the floor was soaking wet when we lifted the vynal, my hubby has tried everything to find out what happened and we have had no sucsess so this was a very helpful article, unforunatley for us expensive, it was a second hand van so no instructions or manuels

[Guest Tracker]

sorry - server error!

[Guest Tracker]

If blue water is leaking it can only be from the waste tank as the flush tank, if you have one, would either be clear or pink (if added).

 

It is not unknown for a waste tank to leak, particularly if it gets too full, and if it does it again after a darned good rinse out to shift any 'debris' that might be causing the seals and/or air vents etc to leak it might well be time to change all the seals and vents - not difficult but a bit messy and time consuming.

 

On the older bench type cassette loo the rinse tank often used to leak due to the water slurping about on the road due to the seal around the inset toilet roll holder recess failing. A new seal or/and stick it in place with silicone generally cures it, but not so stuck that you can't get it out to gain service access in the future.

[dory60]

thankyou tracker for your helpful advice, my hubby says it is the top tank that is leaking as we empty the bottom one every day there is only the two of us and it doesnt get full up, it is a real nusiance, he thinks it might be the filler cap as there is a blue line on it

[Guest Tracker]

dory60 - 2008-09-29 6:14 PM

 

thank you tracker for your helpful advice, my hubby says it is the top tank that is leaking as we empty the bottom one every day there is only the two of us and it doesnt get full up, it is a real nuisance, he thinks it might be the filler cap as there is a blue line on it

 

As water can't flow uphill and the blue is (or should be) only in the lower waste holding tank the only other way that blue water can get into the van is if you spill it when you fill it and then leaking water from the fresh or flushing tank will dilute it and cause a stain and a little blue can go a long way.

 

Does it still leak if you leave the waste tank out when at home - 'cos if it does you will at least know that it ain't the waste tank at fault?