Cardinal RV Club

Has anyone had experience using the "Quick Winterization Kit". This is a siphon hose attached to the water punp. I assume you use it to draw antifreeze out of the jug. Does the antifreeze go into the fresh water tank then into the pipes or does it go directly to the pipes and faucets? I asked Forest River for written directions for use of this feature but was told they did not have any.

It goes straight through the pump into the pipes. Be sure to drain and bypass the water heater first.

O.K. I used the winterization kit and it worked fine. The only problem was that the outside shower leaked antifreeze when the water pump was running. I could not get the valves to completely shut off. I had never noticed water leaking from the hose when hooked to a water supply. I checked the valves to be sure there were washers installed and that was not the problem. I just decided to let it wait until spring then see if there is a leak when I hook up to a water supply. Anybody got an idea as to what caused the leak?

[quote="ODSmith"]O.K. I. I could not get the valves to completely shut off.

I had the same problem with my outside shower valves.........finally figured it out. One valve had to be turned clockwise, the other one counter-clockwise to turn water off to my shower..........maybe your's is the same???

Hey, thanks for the tip. I just bet that was the problem.

The outdoor shower on our 30WB leaks all the time. I think the plastic manifold cracked when we had a bad freeze last winter as there are small cracks just in front of the hose connector now. Don't know if winterizing would have changed things. Yes, the valves do turn different directions and hard to figure out at first.

Don Thanks for the tip. Just wondering, will your setup allow you to drain the water out of the filter and housing? I'm trying to figure out how to drain my filter/housing to avoid using more anti-freeze.

RamMan3500,

I don't know if you can blow out the filter housing with an air compressor by hooking it up to the syphon hose or not. The filter might not let you blow the system out. If you can blow it out you would have to replace the filter when you de-winterize in the spring!

I have only drained my filter by taking the filter housing off with the wrench.


Don

Although I use RV antifreeze you can blow the water out of the filter housing by opening a faucet and blowing air into the fresh water hookup. Wally World and RV shops sell an adapter the goes were you water hose hooks up and you can put your air compressor on it.

As Mike said low pressure air works well to push all the water out the system prior adding RV Antifreeze.
If you don't install valves and a by-pass around the filter your filter housing will fill up with Antifreeze while filling the system.

I installed a drain on the bottom of my filter housing to drain the housing during filter changing but as Mike does I also just fill the housing with RV Antifreeze.

George:

The first time I winterized my camper as a brand new RV'r several years ago I followed the Forest River Owner's manual instructions step by step. Unfortunately the instructions do not tell you to remove your water filter element! That instruction is in the small Water Pur Filter booklet but not in Forest Rivers manual. It does not take long for that pink anti-freeze to ruin a filter! Now I remove the filter element before I do anything else and just let the housing fill up with anti-freeze.