Dirty Little Secrets from the RV Dump Station – RV Dumping Tips + Composting Toilets

When Trailer Life Magazine asked me to write a 2,000 word feature article on RV dump station procedures, including step-by-step RV dumping tips, overall RV dump station etiquette and ideas for how best to empty and manage an RV’s holding tanks, all I could think of were two words:

Don’t Spill !!

Once Mark and I put our heads together, though, we realized it was a perfect opportunity to share the many dirty little secrets from the RV dump station that we’ve learned over the years! Our article quickly filled up with tips, procedures, hints, photos and ideas, and grew to cover seven pages of the May 2014 issue of Trailer Life!!

Holy cow!! I had no idea we’d learned so much about this topic and that we had so many ideas to share with the RVing community. Motorhome Magazine liked the article so much they ran it in their July, 2014 issue!

RV dump station procedures tips and tricks

Dumping the holding tanks is easy. A few short steps and you’re done!

Dumping is a subject that is near and dear to every RVer’s heart (smile). So here is a synopsis of what we think are the most important things to do when visiting an the RV dump station or when you have sewer hookups at an RV park.

Over the years, we’ve received lots of queries about our thoughts on composting toilets and whether we use one or would recommend installing one if you are going to do a lot of boondocking. So there’s a section on that too.

For easy navigation within this post, use the links below:

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A FEW LITTLE TIPS FOR DUMPING THE TANKS

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Keep it Clean - Trailer Life Magazine

Feature article: “Keep it Clean”
Trailer Life Magazine – May 2014

(1) The most important thing at the RV dump station is to protect yourself from any pathogens that may be lurking, and to leave the place clean for the next guy.

Before starting, put on some rubber gloves. We use disposable nitrile gloves.

As you do your work at the dump station, be aware of what you touch, because even though you are wearing rubber gloves, your gloves will still spread bacteria from one item to another.

At the end, when you take the first glove off, peel it back from the wrist to your fingertips so it turns inside out. Then peel the second glove off the same way while holding the fingertips so the second one rolls inside out into the first one in one unit. This keeps your hands from touching the exterior of the gloves. Then dispose of them properly.

(2) We connect a clear plastic elbow to our sewer hose so we can see what is coming out of the tanks. It’s not the prettiest picture, but this way we know the status as we go through the dump process.

(3) Before connecting our fresh water hose to the potable water spigot, we spray the nozzle of the water spigot with Clorox bleach spray.

(4) At the RV park, keep the black and grey tank valves closed. This keeps the liquids in the black tank and prevents the solids from drying out and getting stuck to the bottom and sides of the tank. It also prevents odors from the sewer to creep up into the rig via the sink.

Pouring water down RV toilet

Pour a bucket of water down the toilet
to remove the solids.

(5) When flushing the black tank (about every 4-6 days or so at the RV park, or when at the RV dump), flush it first and flush the grey tank afterwards to clear the sewer pipes and hose of any black tank solids.

(6) At the RV dump, after the black tank is completely empty, we use a five gallon bucket to pour a pail of water directly down the toilet into the holding tank below. This removes any solids that are stuck to the bottom of the tank under the toilet. Usually two buckets is all that’s necessary for the water to run clear, although occasionally we need to dump in a third bucket. If you have a window in your toilet room, you can run a hose through the window rather than lugging buckets of water around.

(7) Once you are finished, hose down the whole area so the dump station is clean for the next RVer that comes along.

(8) In general, be courteous to your RVing friends at the RV dump. We find that popular dump stations often have a line of RVs waiting, especially at the end of a weekend. Try not to dawdle. We’ve heard of people taking showers while at the dump station because there is unlimited water and sewer capacity, but lordy, I would not be happy if I rolled up to a dump station and had to wait around for someone ahead of me to finish their shower!!

And where can you find an RV dump station? They are far more common than you might expect: national, state and municipal/regional parks, interstate rest areas, truck stops and RV parks all have them! The best resources for locating an RV dump station are:

Many RV parks and campgrounds allow RVers to dump their tanks in a site for free, usually about 25% to 50% of the cost of staying for a full night. Many of these places are listed in the above links. Of course, most folks figure that if you’re going to pay $10 to dump the tanks, why not spend $30 and spend the night at the RV park or campground as well!

 

TIPS FOR REMOVING DISPOSABLE RUBBER GLOVES

Thin rubber gloves fit fairly tightly on your hands and they can’t easily be pulled off by the fingers the way ordinary gardening or cold weather gloves can. Also, to be totally sanitary about things, it is best not to touch the outside of the gloves with bare hands after the dirty deed at the dump station is done.

Here’s an easy way to pull the gloves off by peeling one glove most of the way off one hand and then peeling the other off and over the first glove, leaving you with a neat little bundle where all the yucky stuff is on the inside:

Removing disposable rubber gloves 1

Grab one glove by the edge of the cuff and peel it off your hand over your fingers stopping just before the glove is completely removed.

Removing disposable rubber gloves 5

Then peel the other glove off over the first.
Now the first glove is sealed inside the second glove which has been turned inside out.

WHERE TO DISPOSE OF DISPOSABLE RUBBER GLOVES

When we first started RVing, we saw tons of folks at RV dump stations using their bare hands. Fortunately, this article and others have encouraged people to protect themselves against lurking pathogens by using disposable rubber gloves.

However, we’ve begun to notice used disposable gloves lying around dump stations on the ground, in the grate and in the nearby bushes because folks just drop them after taking them off instead of throwing them in an appropriate trash container.

I’m not kidding!

After removing the gloves, please dispose of them properly. There may be a trash can at the RV dump station. If there isn’t, please put them in your own trash rather than throwing them on the ground or in the grate of the dump station!!

Discarded disposable gloves at RV dump station-min

How inconsiderate and unnecessary! This was in an otherwise cute town in Montana!

Happy Camper Holding Tank Treatment

HOLDING TANK TREATMENT PRODUCTS

There are a ton of RV and boat holding tank treatment products on the market, and some of them are extremely damaging to the environment. Many are made with various forms of formaldehyde and other toxic chemicals.

If you remember high school biology class and those gruesome dissections of fetal pigs, dogfish and other critters, you might remember that formaldehyde was the putrid smelling chemical that was used to preserve the carcasses. Formaldehyde isn’t the only toxic chemical used in RV holding tank treatment products. Some products are made with different types of embalming fluids.

RV dump station preparation

Getting ready to do the dirty deed.

The idea behind using preservative and embalming chemicals on dead organic matter is to remove the stinky odor.

But do you really want the contents of your holding tank to be preserved?

It might be okay to preserve that stuff a long long time if it didn’t go anywhere, but what about the sewer system or septic tank that the holding tank’s contents are being transferred into when you dump them?

We have come across RV dump stations that were closed due to poisoning of the septic field and damage to the ground water supply caused by toxic RV holding tank chemicals.

The states of California and Arizona as well as the EPA have issued warnings about the use of those chemicals in RV holding tanks. California has considered banning their use all together.

For reference, here are a few links with more info about the environmental impact of toxic RV and boat holding tank chemicals:

RV Digest-ItAs responsible RVers, I think it is in all of our best interests if we use chemicals that won’t pollute our ground water supply.

We have used a product called RV Digest-It by Unique Natural Products ever since we first saw it at the Quartzsite RV Show in 2007 in our first year of RVing full-time.

The demo was pretty convincing. Two identical glass jars were filled with dog food, balled up toilet paper and water. One was beautifully preserved by a formaldehyde-based holding tank treatment product. The other was reduced to mush by RV Digest-It.

How did that happen?

RV Digest-It is an enzyme and bacteria based solution. The enzymes break down the solids in the tank, and the bacteria eat them up. What’s very cool is that, over time, the bacteria colonize in the holding tanks, and they continue working away, munching on the goodies in the tank and digesting them. They climb the walls and nibble on what’s there, keeping the walls of the tank clean and helping the tank level monitoring system perform better.

Another excellent environmentally friendly product that we use is Happy Campers Toilet Treatment. This is a powder product rather than a liquid. We have had equal success with both products.

The difference between these two products are the following:

RV Digest-It Holding Tank Treatment

RV Digest-It

    RV Digest-It

  • Liquid
  • Nothing on label about danger if ingested
  • Does not work well in very hot or very cold temps

 

Happy Campers Holding Tank Treatment

Happy Campers

 

RV Digest-It and Happy Campers are not the only enzyme-bacteria based holding tank product on the market. They’re just the ones we’ve used in both our trailer and our boat.

Click here for a list of other enzyme-bacteria based holding tank treatment products.

These may be just as good, we just don’t have personal experience with them.
Unfortunately, RV Digest-It and Happy Campers are not carried at many RV or boating supply stores, or Camping World, West Marine or Walmart. When we find one or the other, we stock up. Fortunately, they are available at Amazon.

HOLDING TANK CLOGS

Almost all black tank clogs are due to wadded up toilet paper. Most enzyme-bacteria based holding tank products claim to be able to break down even the thickest toilet papers. If you aren’t sure whether you can trust that claim, one way to avoid toilet paper clogs is to buy special RV (or marine) toilet paper.

We like the plush stuff, and we don’t want to test whether the bacteria like to dine on Quilted Northern, so we have opted, in our little household of two people, not to put our toilet paper down the toilet and into the holding tank. It sounds disgusting, I know. But it would be a lot more disgusting to have to fix a clogged black tank!

In our trailer, we find we have an overabundance of plastic supermarket shopping bags. Rather than toss them out, we put our soiled TP in a bag, sometimes doubled up, and dispose of the bags daily. Every shopping bag gets used, and there is nothing smelly about it.

Obviously, this is a very personal decision, and not one that’s worth debating if you don’t like the idea. However, I put it out there as something to consider. For us, having lived with holding tanks and funky RV and marine toilets for 7 years, it has worked just fine.

When it comes to freeing an RV holding tank clog, many people swear by Happy Campers Extreme Cleaner. We haven’t used it because we haven’t had a clog that bad, but if your tank is clogged up, give it a try!

LEAKY VALVES

Valterra RV holding tank valveValterra T-58 Twist on gate valve for RV sewer systems

Over time, the grey and black tank gate valves may begin to leak a little bit from debris getting caught and preventing the valves from closing completely. When this happens, you get a nasty little surprise at the RV dump when you first take the cap off the sewer line — a small bit black or grey water dribbles out. Having a bucket ready to catch that stuff is helpful, but it’s still messy.

One easy way to deal with this is to install an inexpensive Valterra T-58 twist-on gate valve. This screws onto the sewer opening the same way the sewer hose does and provides a final opening and closing valve to catch the dribble.

Screw on the twist-on valve and keep the valve closed until you are ready to dump the tanks. At the RV dump, start by removing the cap off the twist-on gate valve to attach the sewer hose, then open the gate valve to let the dribble out, and then open the grey or black tank valve to begin the dumping process.

For more RV dump station and holding tank tips, check out these articles:

FRESH WATER and WASTE WATER HOLDING TANK MANAGEMENT

WHAT’S A GIRL TO DO at the RV DUMP STATION? – RV Dump Station Tips for Women

For more RV tips, the following index pages give links to our extensive library of articles:

RV TECH TIPS – RV Upgrades – RV Maintenance Tips + Buying an RV

RV LIFESTYLE TIPS – Costs & Finances, Boondocking, Jobs & Work, RV Repairs, etc.

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IS A COMPOSTING TOILET A GOOD IDEA IN AN RV?

Updated September 30, 2021

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There is a growing interest in using composting toilets in RVs and boats instead of conventionally plumbed flushable RV toilets and marine heads, and we have received lots of inquiries from people who want to live an off-the-grid boondocking lifestyle, like we did, asking us if they should install a compost toilet in their RV.

We lived primarily OFF THE GRID in our RV and sailboat for thirteen years

During those years we spent 4,308 night either boondocking or at anchor in our sailboat.

We were very happy using CONVENTIONALLY PLUMBED RV toilets and periodically visiting RV DUMP STATIONS

In our minds, the expense and hassle of replacing a conventional RV toilet with a composting toilet is NOT REQUIRED AT ALL if you wish to live in an RV off grid. So, if you’re on the fence about whether to jump into this project, save your money and avoid the complications of installation until you have lived off the grid in your RV for a while. At that point you will probably have met several fellow RVers who showed you how theirs worked and you will be able to make an informed hands-on decision rather than relying on internet research.

I used to have a long rant here about the questionable practice of dumping the waste from composting toilets into the trash or out in America’s beautiful public lands. The composting toilets I was familiar with at the time did not compost the feces completely by the time the toilet needed to be emptied. It was gloppy and smelly. Also, the frequent dumping of large quantities of urine on public land seemed like a poor way to treat a National Treasure. Running into public bathrooms every few days to dump containers of pee also seemed like an awkward hassle.

Composting toilets have come a long way since then, and a seasoned RVing friend who has lived off the grid for decades recently showed me how her newly installed composting toilet works. I was astonished to see that the feces were fully composted into soil when it was time to empty the toilet. The urine dumping is still an issue, but if you are kind to the land and don’t repeatedly pour it all in one place, future users of your campsite will appreciate it. I’m still not sure about carrying a bucket of pee into a public bathroom stall on a regular basis…

I took step-by-step photos of my friend showing me how she and her hubby care for their composting toilet, and I noted which products they use for effective composting as well as for the avoidance of bug infestations. I will share those photos and their excellent tips and tricks in this space soon.

For us, we still find that dumping our holding tanks at an RV dump station is effortless and painless, and these days we have a conventional RV toilet in our seasonal-use truck camper.

For more information about living in an RV off the grid, see these links:

RV Boondocking – How To Live Off The Grid in an RV
Finding Boondocking Campsites
RV Solar Power Made Simple

If you’re a gal and your significant other does the dirty deed at the RV dump station, here are a few ideas for how you can help out.

If you ever experience a failure with your conventional RV toilet, here’s what’s involved in replacing it (an hour’s job).

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RV Plumbing Tips – Cleaning RV Faucets, Sink Drains & Shower Wands

The effects of hard water on RV sinks, faucets and drains can be an ongoing problem for RVers. This page describes a few tips for how we remove these pesky mineral deposit buildups from our bathroom and kitchen sinks in our fifth wheel trailer and keep the water flowing smoothly in our shower wand and RV toilet rinse sprayer.

RV plumbing tips for cleaning RV faucets and drains and removing mineral deposits

RV plumbing tips for removing mineral deposits and cleaning RV faucets and drains.

We like the water to flow freely in our RV vanity sink faucet, kitchen sink faucet and in the shower and RV toilet sprayer wands, however, periodically these faucets begin to spray water in weird directions because their inner workings have gotten clogged up by mineral deposits from the hard water.

In our bathroom vanity, our first step is to remove and clean the screen filter in the faucet. Sometimes the faucet tip can be unscrewed by hand, but if we’ve let it go too long, we have to use a pair of pliers to break the faucet tip free due to corrosion that makes it impossible to unscrew.

Remove RV faucet screen with pliers

Remove the RV faucet screen (with pliers if it’s stuck!)

Then we unscrew the entire screen assembly from the faucet.

Disassemble RV faucet

The faucet tip unscrews from the faucet.

Dirty RV faucet screen

Ugh… the screen is pretty dirty. No wonder the water comes out funny!

This time the screen was very corroded. We remove the corrosion and mineral buildup by putting all the pieces in a bath of white vinegar for 20-30 minutes or so.

Prior to putting the pieces in the white vinegar bath, it is a good idea to make note of the order that these parts go into the faucet assembly!

Soak RV faucet parts in white vinegar

After noting how the pieces go together, soak them in white vinegar.

After the bath, the bits of corrosion can be seen in the white vinegar!

RV faucet parts get cleaned with white vinegar

Here are all the pieces. You can see the dirt that came off in the vinegar bath!

Using an old toothbrush, we scrub each piece until it is clean.

Use toothbrush to clean RV faucet screen

Use a toothbrush to get the screen totally clean.

RV faucet cleaning with toothbrush and white vinegar

Scrub all the parts with the toothbrush.

Then we reassemble the pieces in the correct order and orientation.

Reassemble RV faucet after cleaning 2

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Reassemble RV faucet after cleaning 1

Reassemble the pieces.

Put RV faucet together after cleaning it 2

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Put RV faucet together after cleaning it

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To make it easier to remove the faucet tip the next time we do this job, it helps to grease the threads with a marine PTEF lubricant prior to screwing the assembly back onto the faucet.

Lubricate RV faucet with PTEF lubricant grease

Lubricating the threads makes it easier to unscrew next time!

Lubricate RV faucet after cleaning

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Reassemble RV faucet

Screw it back into the faucet.

RV faucet cleaned and lubricated

Ta da! Now the flow will be smooth and full.

Our trailer has white plastic sinks in the bathroom and kitchen, and these sinks often develop a skanky brown ring around the sink drain. For years, we relied on Comet to clean these sinks. We sprinkled it on the entire sink, let it sit for a bit, and then scrubbed.

We recently discovered that Baking Soda is just as effective!! The fantastic thing about Baking Soda is that it is non-toxic. This is wonderful not only for our gray water holding tanks but also for the RV dump stations as well as the septic fields and municipal waste water treatment systems that are downstream from them.

It’s also really cheap!

Tips for cleaning an RV sink drain

White plastic RV sinks are prone to getting ugly stains.

Dirty RV sink drain

Yuck!

We simply sprinkle it on the sink and then scrub the sink with a damp Scotch-Brite scrubbing pad.

RV sink drain cleaning with baking soda

Sprinkle the baking soda in the sink and scrub the stains with a damp scrubby pad.

What a great result — a wonderfully squeaky clean sink!

RV sink drain is sparkling clean

Sparkling!

The drain plug also gets gummy, and we use an old toothbrush to scrub it clean with either baking soda and/or Murphy’s Oil Soap (a handy all around biodegradable cleanser).

In an RV that is used for dry camping a lot, like ours, the bathroom vanity sink drain can get really gross really quickly because in an effort to conserve fresh water not much clean water gets flushed down the drain.

This can result in foul odors in the sink drain, and it’s pretty unsightly too.

So, we do two things.

First, we scrub the inside of the bathroom sink drain with an old toothbrush. To get a longer reach down the drain, we taped our toothbrush to an old tent stake we had lying around. Anything long and narrow will work.

Toothbrush and extension rod to clean RV sink drain

Tape an old toothbrush to a long stick to reach deep down the RV sink drain.

Cleaning an RV sink drain

Scrub inside the sink drain.

We also scrub the sink drain plug.

Second, to keep the RV bathroom sink drain fresh smelling, we use Happy Camper Holding Tank Treatment which we’ve found is a particularly good deodorizer. We put scoop of powder in an old water bottle, fill it up with water and shake it well (the bottle gets warm as the enzymes get activated!), and then pour it down the drain.

Most of it goes into the gray water tank, but a small amount stays in the bathroom sink drain p-trap and does its magic there, killing off the offensive odors.

Use toothbrush to scrub RV sink drain plut

Scrub the sink drain plug with a toothbrush.

To keep our RV shower in tip-top shape, we clean the drain there as well. The biggest problem in our RV shower drain isn’t foul odors, because the shower drain gets flushed with lots of water everyday. Instead, the challenge with the RV shower drain is accumulated hair.

In a house, it’s easy enough to use a powerful cleanser like Drano to clean out any clogs caused by hair, but we don’t want strong chemicals like that sitting in our gray wastewater holding tank. Afterall, we want the enzymes and bacteria in the Happy Camper and Unique RV Digest-It holding tank treatment products we use to thrive and go to work breaking things down!

So, we use a long spring hook (and flashlight) to pull the hair out. It just takes a few minutes and then the drain is clear.

Some RV shower stalls may have drain components that can be removed for cleaning. Ours doesn’t.

Cleaning hair from an RV shower drain

Use a spring hook to pull hair out of the RV shower drain.

Periodically, the RV shower wand gets crudded up with mineral deposits just like our RV sink faucets do. Again, we rely on white vinegar to clean up the deposits clogging the spray holes in the shower nozzle.

First, we pour the white vinegar through the shower wand to let it soak from the inside.

Tips for cleaning an RV shower wand

The RV shower wand can be cleaned with white vinegar.

Then we soak the shower wand’s face in a bath of white vinegar.

Tips for cleaning an RV shower wand

Put the RV shower wand face down in a white vinegar bath to clean all the little holes.

If we’ve let a little too much time pass, we’ll also use a toothpick to clean out each hole in the shower head. We use bamboo toothpicks because they hold up well in water. Ordinary wooden toothpicks tend to disintegrate when they get wet. A scribe also works well.

The before-and-after difference in the flow of water through the shower wand is startling. When half of the little holes are blocked from mineral deposits and the other half have an impeded flow, the water can feel like needles on your skin. After cleaning the wand, it is more like a waterfall.

Clean each hole in an RV shower wand with a toothpick or scribe

Use a toothpick or scribe to clean each hole in the shower wand.

Lots of RVers love the Oxygenics RV shower head. We don’t use it because it doesn’t work well with the low water pressure we use to conserve water since we dry camp every night, but for RVers who get water hookups a lot, these shower heads are extremely popular. Of course, in hard water areas, these shower heads will need periodic cleaning as well.

The RV toilet bowl rinsing wand is also subject to corrosion from mineral deposits, and after a while when we go to rinse the toilet bowl we find the water flow from the sprayer is restricted and funky.

RV toilet sprayer wand cleaning

The RV toilet sprayer wand gets clogged with minerals too.

Again, it’s easy to unscrew the end of the toilet spay wand, put it in a white vinegar for 20-30 minutes, scrub it a bit with a toothbrush, and then put it back on the wand.

RV toilet rinse wand cleaning

Unscrew the tip of the toilet rinsing wand and soak it in white vinegar to clean the holes.

As an aside, if you have energy leftover after cleaning all your RV sinks, faucets, drains and spray nozzles, a spray bottle filled with a water and white vinegar mixture is super for washing the windows. As I wrote this, some flies got in our trailer and Mark started spraying them when they landed on the window next to him using a spray bottle filled with water and white vinegar. Besides slowing them down and killing them, he was really impressed with how clean the window was when he finished!

So, these are a few of the things we do to keep our sinks and drains flowing smoothly in our life on the road in our RV.

We hope they help you too!

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What’s A Girl To Do at the RV Dump Station?

Dumping the RV holding tanks is a nasty little job, but it’s part of the fun of traveling around in an RV, and we’ve all gotta do it. It’s really not all that bad when it’s a shared job, but of course that’s easy for us gals to say, because it’s usually our male partners-in-love-and-life who get to do the bulk of the dirty work.

RV dump station tips for women RVers-2

Despite lots of progress over the years for the types of work women can do, emptying an RV’s waste water holding tanks is a job many women are just as happy to leave to their better half.

Sometimes, when we go to an RV dump station, I am amazed to see a woman remain in the passenger’s seat of her truck or motorhome for the whole duration of the job. I’m not sure how these women have negotiated that arrangement with their significant other, but I figure they must be incredibly good cooks to be able to chat with a friend on the phone or check the latest on Facebook while their hubby is grinding it out with the sewer hose, the splashing water, and all that muck and mire.

RV dump station tips for RVing women

Mark looks like he’s having so much fun. Can I get away with doing nothing?

I wish my skills were so awesome in the kitchen that I could be exempt from doing anything at the RV dump station. But alas, in our marriage, I need to be a participant in this dirtiest of deeds to win brownie points for other aspects of our life together. Nonetheless, it took me a few years to find things to do while we were at the RV dump station that were truly useful and helpful.

We have a full set of “blue” RV dump station procedural tips below — but they don’t say much about the “pink” side of the job:

Dirty Little Secrets from the RV dump station

Too often at the beginning of our RVing lives I found my best efforts to help with setting up the RV sewer hose or screwing in the water hose ended up with me underfoot and in the way of the general flow of things. Mark had his methods, and I couldn’t read his mind as to what came next.

Few people are in truly sunny and radiant moods when they don their rubber gloves at the RV dump, and too often I found that my most valiant attempts to be helpful resulted in tensions rising between us.

RV dump station tips for women RVers

I think he’s trying to tell me something.

Then one day I discovered a way that I can be of significant help and get some important jobs done at the same time.

GIVE THE BLACK TANK A BOOST FLUSH

For starters, I fill two 5-gallon water buckets with water and carry them into the rig to dump them down the toilet after the black tank has been emptied. Even if an RV has a black water flush system like ours does, it is still surprising just how many little bits of gunk and human waste solids get flushed out when two 5-gallon buckets of water are poured down the toilet.

I fill the buckets while Mark gets the sewer hose out and attaches the clear elbow so he can see when the holding tanks are fully drained. Then I can scoot out of the way and carry the buckets around to our RV’s door before he begins attaching the black water flush hose between the rig and the water spigot. This way we don’t end up stepping on each when we first start working at the RV dump station.

RV dump station tips flushing black tank with buckets of water in toilet

We have two buckets and I fill each one with water to give the toilet and sewer pipes an extra flush.

The buckets are heavy to carry around to our trailer’s front door, but I don’t mind a little bit of a shoulder and arm workout, and I take them one at a time. Maneuvering a heavy bucket of water up stairs is excellent exercise for both balance and strength.

I grab the inside of the doorway with my left hand for extra balance, tighten my abs so I don’t throw my back out with the uneven weight distribution of carrying a heavy bucket, and I leverage myself up and set the pails down inside in the kitchen.

RV dump station tip flush black tank with buckets of water in toilet

The buckets are heavy, but I take my time and grab the door frame to keep my balance as I go up the stairs.

For those who can’t carry the buckets, your partner will likely be happy to carry them for you since this really helps ensure the black tank and toilet get a complete flush. Also, filling the buckets only half way or three quarters of the way can help not only lighten the load but keep the water from splashing all over the place and all over you.

CLEAN THE BATHROOM

The other task I tackle is cleaning the toilet room from top to bottom and cleaning the bathroom vanity and kitchen sink. I figure that if my sweet hubby is dealing with the darker side of RVing outside at the RV dump station, I can deal with the same stuff on the inside..

This insures the bathroom gets cleaned on a regular basis and also means that when we arrive at our next campsite not only are the holding tanks empty but our bathroom is sparkling clean and smells fresh.

So, once I get the water buckets inside the rig, I begin assembling the things I will need to clean the toilet and the bathroom. When I hear Mark’s knock on the wall, I know he has finished emptying the black tank and it is time to dump the buckets of water down the toilet.

RV dump station tips flush black tank

I pour one bucket at a time and Mark watches the flow in the sewer hose to make sure the water eventually runs clear.

Since the buckets are just inside the RV door, it takes me a minute to grab one and empty it. Then it takes a few minutes more to go grab the other one and empty it too. Having a few minutes between flushes is helpful because then Mark can monitor whether the water from the second bucket is running clear or is still flushing solids out. If there are still chunks coming out, then, depending on whether anyone is waiting to use the RV dump after us, I’ll fill another bucket or two with water and dump them down the toilet.

Sometimes I have the water pump turned on as I dump the buckets of water down the toilet and sometimes it’s turned off. Having it turned on means even more water flushes down, which is great, but it also uses up water from the fresh water tank. So, whether or not I have the water pump turned on depends on whether there are people waiting behind us at the dump station, as it will take a little longer for us to fill the fresh water tank if we flush a few extra gallons down the toilet as part of the dumping process.

Now that the black tank is completely flushed, Mark begins emptying our kitchen gray tank. We have two gray tanks, one for the kitchen and one for the shower. We empty the kitchen tank first because it is dirtier and has more things in it (like broccoli bits) than the shower gray tank which is just sudsy water.

While he works on emptying the two gray tanks, I get to work cleaning the toilet.

RV dump station tip woman cleans toilet and bathroom

If Mark is mucking around in gross stuff outside, the least I can do is muck around in gross stuff inside. This also gives us a clean bathroom when we set up camp.

Since we have a hatch in the toilet room that we leave open a lot, the toilet lid and the floor often get dusty in just a few days. So I remove everything from the toilet room and clean everything, including the floor.

Over the years we’ve found that the toilet bowl — more so than the black tank itself — can be a big source of foul odors. Unlike household toilets, RV toilet bowls are basically dry except during flushing, so urine can end up drying in the bowl and producing an odor.

Also, the flow of the flushing water doesn’t necessarily rinse every inch of the bowl, so some areas simply don’t get rinsed all that well, even when using the toilet’s spray nozzle. So, I go to town on the inside of the bowl as well as everything else.

We use two enzyme/bacteria based RV holding tank treatment products: Happy Campers RV holding tank treatment has worked best for us in extreme temperatures (very cold and very hot) and for controlling tank odors. RV Digest-It holding tank treatment has worked best for us in moderate temperatures to break down the solids in the tank.

Because these are both basically solutions of living critters, the toilet cleaning products we use can’t be too toxic or the colonies of feces-eating bacteria can’t get established and become self-perpetuating. I’ve been using Murphy’s Oil Soap for the last few years with good results.

This is the soap that is recommended for cleaning the rubber roofs on the tops of RV’s, which is why we had it on hand to try on the toilet a few years ago. In addition to being biodegradable, what we like about it for cleaning the toilet is that it assists in keeping both the seals in the toilet bowl and on the black holding tank valve lubricated. I used white vinegar for cleaning the toilet for a while, and after a few months the black tank valve got really sticky. Since switching to Murphy’s Oil Soap a few years ago, that valve hasn’t gotten gummed up.

Periodically, we’ve found the seals in the toilet bowl have stopped holding water which meant the bowl drained completely dry between flushes. This allowed foul odors to come up from the black water tank. This problem is usually due to mineral and gunk build-ups on the seal.

So, I give that seal a really good cleaning too. The critical areas are on both the top and bottom surfaces of the rubber seal, that is, between the seal and the toilet bowl (the top side) and underneath the seal where the dome flapper (the “waste ball”) closes up against it.

RV toilet assembly and flapper valve installation

A disassembled RV toilet shows what the rubber toilet seal looks like without the toilet bowl sitting on it. To prevent it from leaking and draining the toilet between flushes, I scrub both top and bottom of the rubber seal.

I make sure the water pump is off at this point and hold the toilet flush lever down so I can get at the underside of the seal.

Often, the build-up is due to having hard water in the fresh water tanks which is very common in Arizona and other western states where the fresh water comes from deep, mineral rich aquifers.

RV toilet flapper cleaning tips

The seal needs to be completely free of mineral deposits on both the top and bottom, so I clean the area between the seal and the bowl on the top (red arrow) and below the seal on the bottom (the backside of the seal in this view).

At this point, depending on what Mark is up to outside, I’ll move on to other cleaning projects. If we have nearly emptied our fresh water tanks prior to coming to the RV dump station, it may take 10 minutes to refill them. Also, sometimes the potable water spigot is a little ways beyond the waste water dump area, requiring Mark to move the whole rig a few feet forward.

So, if there is time, I will clean the bathroom vanity sink and then move on to the kitchen sink. Depending on our plans for the next few days and depending on how much time I have at the RV dump, I may also add the holding tank treatment to the black tank, via the toilet, and add it to the gray tanks via the bathroom sink, shower and kitchen sink.

Sometimes, however, I prefer to wait two or three days until those tanks have some liquids in them before adding the holding tank treatment. And sometimes I add just a half tank’s worth of holding tank treatment at the RV dump station and then add the other half a few days later once the holding tanks have become partially full.

Of course, we add a capful of bleach to our fresh water tanks every few months, and that totally obliterates any colonies of anything that have started to grow in any of the holding tanks (including the fresh water tank) as the bleach water works its way through our plumbing system from the fresh water tank to the gray and black waste water tanks.

So, for us, creating fully self-sustaining communities of healthy organisms in any waste water tank is not 100% doable. But by using non-toxic cleansers we can help them along in between bleach blasts.

So, all in all, there is a LOT a girl can do at the RV dump station. We find we are both much happier about the whole process when we each have a set of tasks to do when we get there that are not only similarly grungy but are equally important and that take place in different parts of the RV.

The best part is that when we leave the RV dump station to go set up camp in a new, beautiful location, not only do we have empty waste water tanks but our bathroom is clean and fresh too.

Happy cleaning!!

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