DW recently bought an Add-A-Room for our 5th and I guess, dumping waste tanks (my chore) now requires either a longer knock-down/set up time, to haul the trailer to the dump station (on extended camp-outs) or the purchase of a mobile honey wagon.
I’ve seen other campers dragging these, wheeled tanks on their lower hitch balls, back and forth to the dump station and wondered ????
1) The sites we stay at, have 4”/6” speed bumps on the paved access roads. How do these tanks behave over speed bumps? Are some brands better for towing than others? ( I understand slow speed may be essential to keeping fellow campers healthy and happy )
2) Our holding tanks are each about 35/40 gal. Do you buy a wagon large enough to hold the majority of the waste or make multiple trips?
3) What brands/sizes to stay away from?
4) As my ignorance on this subject is total. Any other thoughts would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks in advance for comment’s, Don
Sorry if this post seems long, I lacked the time to make it shorter.
almost quote from S.L. Clemens
Don & Linda
1st RV UL EMS 4s Dome
2nd RV 21' AMF Scamper TT PV D300 Dodge
3rd RV National Seabreeze 133LX w/Demco Dolly
4th RV Jayco 2450 5TH PV Ford F-250 SD
I've never trusted towing one (saw someone else's loose a wheel and make a HUGE mess once), due to the bad roads and soetimes long distances to the dump stations. Instead, I put the tank in the bed of the truck, and pump my waste to it using a macarator pump. When I get to the dump station, I connect a discharge "stink slinky" and tip the tank up, draining by gravity, and taking advantage of the extra bed height.
Since I can go more than a week with my black tank, its almost always just gray water that I'm hauling in this manner.
Even with a smaller tow behind we've found that replacing the plastic wheels with rubber tired wheels makes a huge difference.
And here's a story this thread reminded me of.
Back in IIRC 1976 I was camping next to my FIL and about 6 sites worth of extended camping families. They used the onboard toilets, and we just used the vault toilets. The males would get together every Saturday morning to make the Poop runs.
My FIL use to put his portable (IIRC25 gallon) tank on the tail gate of his Ford Galaxie wagon. The one with the two side facing seats in the back. He made the mistake of a "panic stop" and needless to say the tank slid forward flipped and emptied it's contents into the foot well between the seats. Ruined a shop vac pumping the resulting mess out and again IIRC it took several gallons of Lysol and several gallons of bleach, not to mention throwing out the rear seats, before you could ride in the car even with the windows down.
We use ours from time to time and it's very handy at those times when there's no sewer hookup. We have a 32 gal Barker. IMO,buy the biggest one you can afford. You tow them very slowly, maybe 3-5 mph so speed bumps are never an issue. In the end, you have 2 choices, break down and go dump, or pull your tote. Really comes down to personal preference IMO. Also, the harbor freight pneumatic tire conversion mod is very popular and I might do that some day.
The same unit is available at CW for about $170.00, but S/H charges are not shown until you fill out a 20 line query, requiring c/c info and such. Not wanting to share that much info for just S/H pricing, I went elsewhere.
Thanks to all posters for sharing their thoughts on this subject. Don
I bought a 42 gallon blue boy. Our holding 3 holding tanks are 40 gallons each so no mess. Be prepaired to replace the wheels and hose. Right out of the box the hosed resembled a soaker hose. They put the cheapest hose on they could find. I went to Harbor Freight tools and replaced the back tires with air tires like you would find on a wheel barrow. I then put six inch air tires on the front to replace the plastic ones that we already desintagrating after a few uses. Those were ordered from a company in Chicago that I found out about on this forum. All of the upgrades were about thirty five dollars. Our snowbird trip this year we used it quite a bit. It is easy and saves you from having to move the trailer and re-setup again. I think its the cat meow.
)
Offline
