My wife and I have a 2003 Coachmen Aurora Gold. This is our first winter with it and I need to winterize it. I have located what I believe is the water heater by-pass and I think I know how to turn the valves however, I'm not sure where to connect the hose to suck in the anti-freeze. I had a 1998 Fleetwood PaceArrow previously and the anti-freeze input was a coupling right off the water pump. In the case of the Coachmen the water pump is in the unit under the bathroom sink and difficult to get to. The only connections I can find outside in the utility area are the "City water connection" and "Drain outlet". I have configured all the valves outside on the utility to the "winterize" positions however when I connect a hose to the "City water connection", put it in a jug of anti-freeze and turn on the water pump nothing happens (no anti-freeze is sucked in). I'm not 100% sure what I'm doing wrong. Any assistance or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
In the unit itself under the bathroom sink there are two valves one is on what I beleive is the "input" side of the water pump and the other is on what I believe is the cold water inlet to the water heater (lower inlet).
---------O <-- upper inlet to water heater
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----O------O <-- lower inlet to water heater
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Bypass valve?
ross ****ry there is a plug on the rifhthand side of the pannel. You remove this plug and install a short lenght of hose (one came with my coach), then with the valves lined up for winterize you insert this hose in the pink stuff and run the water pump until you get pink stuff out of each sink, the shower and toilet. Hope this works. John
John & Paula P. (USN..retired)
2005 38' Coachmen Cross Country SE (SportsCoach 376DS)
300 Cummins/5 spd Allison
05 Saturn VUE...4 dwn
In ours you hook a small hose attachment to the "drain valve" and suck the antifreeze through the system with the water pump after setting all five valves to the proper "winterize" positions...takes a special size hose (not garden hose type) that was supplied by Coachmen....hope this helps....can PM if you wish more info....good luck
DadD45
2004 Cross Country Coachmen
2001 Wrangler behind
JUST HAVIN' FUN!!!
I am assuming you have the four valve water control panel.
First thing woould be to make sure you have completely dumped your holding tanks.
Now I set the valves to the drain setting and open all faucets, remember the outside shower, commode and commode water hose. This should get rid of your water in line. I leave it like this for several hours. While that is draining, I throw the WH bypass. The direction the valve handle points is the direction of water flow. Take a close look. There may be two bypass valves on your system. After throwing the bypasses, I remove the WH stoppor (outside), set it aside (inside the WH compartment). If you have an under sink or in house water filter, there should be two bypasses. One on each end. Throw those. Remove the filter and order or pick up a replacement. I do this now so I don't forget and have the replacement under the sink when I dewinterize. If you make the mistake of not bypassing the water filter, when you proceed to the next steps, you will not see pink. Don't task how I know. By now you are ready to run pink through your lines. As others said before, on the right side of you water control panel is a small, removable plug. Remove it and attach the small hose that should have come with it. If you do not have that small inlet tube to attach, call your nearest Coachmen dealer or RV parts dealer. Most will know the size. Make sure all faucets are off. Once the inlet tube is attached, set the control valves to the winterize settings, place the inlet tube in a gallon of the pink and turn on your pump. While pump is on, open each faucet, one at a time, until you run some pink down the drains. Don't forget the outside shower, commode and commode water hose. I even throw it back to drain for a second to flush pink into the every piece of the line. This should take just about a gallon of pink. Pour a little pink down the tub drain and commode to make sure there is a bit in the bottom of each holding tank.
You are done!
Me, The Wonderful Wife
and two Spastic Border Collies U.S. Army Retired 2004 Coachmen Aurora, 3480DS 2007 Saturn Outlook, FROG
Kiwi_too wrote: I am assuming you have the four valve water control panel.
First thing woould be to make sure you have completely dumped your holding tanks.
Now I set the valves to the drain setting and open all faucets, remember the outside shower, commode and commode water hose. This should get rid of your water in line. I leave it like this for several hours. While that is draining, I throw the WH bypass. The direction the valve handle points is the direction of water flow. Take a close look. There may be two bypass valves on your system. After throwing the bypasses, I remove the WH stoppor (outside), set it aside (inside the WH compartment). If you have an under sink or in house water filter, there should be two bypasses. One on each end. Throw those. Remove the filter and order or pick up a replacement. I do this now so I don't forget and have the replacement under the sink when I dewinterize. If you make the mistake of not bypassing the water filter, when you proceed to the next steps, you will not see pink. Don't task how I know. By now you are ready to run pink through your lines. As others said before, on the right side of you water control panel is a small, removable plug. Remove it and attach the small hose that should have come with it. If you do not have that small inlet tube to attach, call your nearest Coachmen dealer or RV parts dealer. Most will know the size. Make sure all faucets are off. Once the inlet tube is attached, set the control valves to the winterize settings, place the inlet tube in a gallon of the pink and turn on your pump. While pump is on, open each faucet, one at a time, until you run some pink down the drains. Don't forget the outside shower, commode and commode water hose. I even throw it back to drain for a second to flush pink into the every piece of the line. This should take just about a gallon of pink. Pour a little pink down the tub drain and commode to make sure there is a bit in the bottom of each holding tank.
You are done!
I would had a couple of things to this if you have a washer/dryer combo you need to follow winterizing instructions for that and your ice maker if you have one. But besides that Kiwi has the rest covered.
Randy and Annie FMCA-371966
1996 Coachmen Destiny DP
300 Cummins CTA 8.3
6 spd Allison
Spartan Raised Rail Chassis
FROG 06 Wrangler Rubicon Unltd
Dollied 03 Toyota Corolla
To everyone that responded to this request. Thank you so very much armed with all your information I was able to winterize my unit this weekend. I had to purchase an adapter for the antifreeze hose however, I was able to get everything I needed at Lowe's for $3.35.