-
Broken Gray Water Valve
Unfortunately my gray water drain valve broke. It is the pull type and still pulls out but does not open the gate any longer.
Fortunately I had already purchased a replacement in anticipation of this one biting the dust.
Unfortunately it looks nearly impossible to get the old one off. One of the bolts is nearly inaccessible and can not be seen at all. The three others that are visible and at least partly accessible are rusted so bad a socket will not grab them. They are so rusted that I may be able to remove them with a couple of good hits with a screw driver or even get a dremel tool on them some way. Any ideas are appreciated.
This picture of the bad 1 1/2″ valve is a little misleading because you can not get your head where the camera is but I wanted to get a picture of the rusted bolts and nuts.
The valve is attatched to a fitting similar to this below. If I used force to remove the bolts and nuts on the small valve I run the risk of damaging this fitting so I will probably have one on hand.
Photo taken from the internet.
There is an electric black tank valve at the big end of the fitting above and I am assuming it is a standard fitting. The end that hooks on to the hose is thetford and if I have to resort to taking this off then I will probably redo it to a standard fitting.
Removing all of that is complicated by this.
This blocks access to everything. It is screwed to the floor but I found that even with the screws removed it is held on by the tabs the thetford fitting attaches to. I will either have to remove those plastic tabs and require complete replacement or some how cut the metal hole larger with out damaging the plastic.
I may be able to get the rusted botls off the 1 1/2″ valve by force without damaging the Y fitting in the picture above but I want to be prepared. How would you go about it?
Fortunately I have a second gray water drain. It is slower, inconvenient and does not rinse the black water hose but it at least prevents this from being an emergency.
Open to ideas. Remember this job takes place out on the road with us living in the coach. We can maybe get by for a few days showering and such some where else but I will need to wrap this job up and roll in a few days.
Thanks,
Davy
-
10 Replies
-
Davy, if you can get in there with a Dremel with a metal cut off wheel, that might be the way to go. Since you have a new valve, you could cut directly into the plastic valve at the bolt to prevent hitting the recess for the ‘o’ ring seal that goes between the flange and the valve. Cutting the bolt almost all of the way through may allow you to get a set of small vice-grips on the nut side and twist the bolt in two. I would probably just continue cutting until I got completely through the bolt. (only a quarter inch) If you decide to cut at the joint (either one) between the valve and flange, err on the side of the valve and not the flange, again so as not to hit the ‘o’ ring channel.
Then when reinstalling, coat the nut and bolt with a good never-sieze compound (purchased with your NAPA card) so you do not have this problem again. While at NAPA, you might want to buy a rubber grommet for that hole that those two wires are going through so that vibration does not abrade the insulation on them shutting down what ever they are attached to.
Just my two sheckles worth. Good luck.
-
use dermil type tool but grind in center of bolts in body of dump valve so you won’t damage the sides that are glued in place
-
Thanks, Jeff, for the Dremel tool suggestion. It worked like a charm.
Monday was a bus project day. I have needed to do this for weeks but the weather has not cooperated until now. I needed a day without rain and I needed to be parked on a solid surface. Monday was perfect.
Thankfully my bus was designed with a second gray tank valve. That’s why I was able to limp along and wait for the perfect time to change the broken valve. Unfortunately the second valve was originally air operated and had been “modified” in the far distant past and had to be rigged to drain properly and because of this I could not rinse the hose after emptying the black tank and it took a long time to drain it.
I had drained the tank overnight but when you remove the valves you still get quite a bit of water. In order to have less spillage I cranked the engine, raised the back end of the bus and lowered the front end. I put jacks under the jacking points in the back so the water that was left in the tank would move toward the front. That helped a lot.
I am pretty sure this valve was original because the bolts and nuts were rusted way beyond removal. I had purchased a Dremel tool at Jeff’s suggestion and a 90 degree adapter and it worked perfectly to cut through the four corners of the valve and cut the bolts in two. Three of them were relatively easy but the bottom one on the back seemed impossible to get in position to cut..
I was finally able to get in the right position by God’s help and I finally got it cut.
This is with the valve removed and the bracket and rubber piece on the tank side removed as well. The rusted screws remained in the bracket holes so I soaked them with WD 40 several times to get them out. That is what made the mess.
This is with both gray valves removed.
One corner on the tank side bracket was busted so I replaced it. I probably could have reused it but it is like a $2 item. Since it is so hard to remove I decided to bite the bullet and spend $2. Of course then I had to buy a small piece of 1 1/2″ pipe and the primer and cement to put the pipe in the bracket.
I also bought a new rubber coupling. The old one looked fine but I figured at 20 years old why take the chance. Vantare put this together with little thought about the guy having to change it but at least they did put the rubber coupling in. It would have been impossible with solid pipe on both sides.
I put wing nuts on the bolts to make it easier to remove next time. I am thinking now that I should have put lock washers on too. I could not get my fingers on the bottom back bolt but my wife got the wing nut started for me.
I also installed the secondary valve properly. I bought a new rubber coupling for it and cut it down to size. Now both valves are working. The main valved drains into the large drain and the secondary drains onto the ground or into an portable tank if needed.
I ran several gallons of water in the gray tank and both valves held without leaking.
Davy
-
Nice job Davy, feels good when it all comes together.
-
Actually it feels twice as good. Davy has not only fixed a problem, but now he knows exactly how things go together, how they come apart and what to do if there is an issue such as he had with the fastener.
Our first coach accumulated a lot of miles running in the snow belt on heavily salted roads so the greatest battle was fighting corrosion. I had a lot of broken bolts, frozen fasteners, and rusted fittings such as hose ends that had to be dealt with. That takes all the fun out of maintenance.
-
Nice job. May I suggest that you replace the 4 bolts and nuts which hold the valve together, the ones that you had to cut to get it apart, with stainless bolts and stainless, elastic locking nuts. They won’t rust, and they won’t loosen.
-
Good suggestion. I went to find stainless bolts when I was gathering materials and could only find them with phillips heads on them. I did use one of them on the bottom front where I could get a screwdriver on it. The rest are hex head and much easier to grab on to. Maybe I will get 20 years use out of this valve too. By then I will have forgotten how hard it was to remove and replace. Lol
Davy
-
If you can’t use or get stainless fasteners at least use a little anti-seize compound. I don’t know if it is good for a decade and a half, but it cannot hurt.
-
Never-seize is great stuff. In a clean, dry enviroment it should last forever. What’t gonna take it off?
On stainless: we have a great Do-It-Best hardware store here. Fastenall is a good source, also. Allen socket bolts are good. Brass is good, too. I’m feelin’ good cause it’s spring! lol
Ted
Log in to reply.