Raritan Head and Plumbing

[Christian Williams]

When you pump out at a station the huge suction will clear the air vent. You'll hear air going in. As others have said, station pumpout is not ambiguous. Those pumps could suck the chrome off a trailor hitch, to quote Willie Nelson in reference to a rodeo consort. I usually fill the tank with a hose first, maybe some detergent, just for the full colonic massage experience. (Last week when I pumped out nothing happened. Huh? Yeah, I had forgotten to change the valve settings.)

By the way, holding tanks are not for holding. They should be pumped out as soon as possible--a day or two at most after use. Storage of effluent is what makes the permeation and the smell.

Just about everybody adds Odorlos or similar to the holding tank to break down remaining stuff. That requires air, and a functioning vent hose. You're in lake water, but salt water boats find fresh-water flush equally important.

 

[Rocinante33]

Those pumps could suck the chrome off a trailor hitch, to quote Willie Nelson in reference to a rodeo consort.

one of the great lines, of all time!

i once had a rusty (original?) vent fitting cause the tank to not pump out correctly. Some effluent was seen in the clear pump out hose, but most of it remained in the tank. The rust apparently blocked the vent and prevented the pull out of the waste. I had to take off the clamshell vent cover on the hull topsides and stick a screwdriver in and dislodge rust. Then it worked again.

in another instance, I think the vent hose collapsed and caused exactly the same effect. Maybe my vent hose is not proper wire reinforced hose and it will collapse under suction. Not good. I will replace it when I replace the head, sometime in the next few months, I hope.

Collapsing vent hose may be your problem, or some other blockage of the vent like rust, spiders or wasp nests.

 

[Rocinante33]

One time this pump out problem occurred when we were headed out for a three day weekend cruise out to our Channel Islands. We didn’t discover the problem (still having a nearly full holding tank) until we were in a pristine anchorage far from any pump out station! so, how to solve the problem? Crew mutiny was rearing it’s ugly head. Fouling island waters was not an option. So, we went for a day sail, 3 miles offshore to try to pump out. While motoring, nothing would pump out and the thruhull was open. So I thought about it and decided that gravity was my friend. We hoisted sail and put the boat on a port tack. The holding tank is on the port side in my boat. Then, and only then, since the holding tank was raised above waterline by the boat heeling, I was able to manually pump out and empty the tank. Thank you sir Isaac Newton! The trip was saved from:

side note: it is very, very hard to use the manual pump in the cramped head with the boat heeled and the head on the windward side, but it can be done and it was worth it!

 

[lulugrace]

one of the great lines, of all time!

i once had a rusty (original?) vent fitting cause the tank to not pump out correctly. Some effluent was seen in the clear pump out hose, but most of it remained in the tank. The rust apparently blocked the vent and prevented the pull out of the waste. I had to take off the clamshell vent cover on the hull topsides and stick a screwdriver in and dislodge rust. Then it worked again.

in another instance, I think the vent hose collapsed and caused exactly the same effect. Maybe my vent hose is not proper wire reinforced hose and it will collapse under suction. Not good. I will replace it when I replace the head, sometime in the next few months, I hope.

Collapsing vent hose may be your problem, or some other blockage of the vent like rust, spiders or wasp nests.

Thanks Keith, I agree is sure seems like the vent is the culprit. I too will try the screwdriver technique and now will check the vent hose prior to the pump-out.

Thanks again.

 

[lulugrace]

Another vote for the tank being full.

If you can go pump it out yourself, bring a friend who loves you and won't mind standing close by, and give them a pair of gloves. Go through a few cycles of pump -> rinse tank -> pump until the water is pretty clear. Then, hold the pump to the holding tank, and point the hose at the vent fitting. It'll suck in water like a straw, and you'll likely rinse anything that could be in there back into the holding tank. You should do this any time you accidentally overfill the tank and pump out to the vent.

Before you go too far down the rabbit hole of trying to solve a problem in your plumbing that isn't 100% confirmed to be there yet, I would try to go pump it out yourself so you can confirm that the unsuccessful pump out wasn't because of operator error. Head work is not fun, and I wouldn't want to do anything I didn't have to do.

Thanks again Geoff! I did all that and all works fine now. The dock operator confessed that they had some problems with the pump last time I was there. Made sure I operated it myself this time and all is well!