Water tank placement

[billiebob]

How many people, where is your camper entry, an option for bed headroom is with the bed at the back, you'd get more storage under the bed than under a dinette..... and eliminate the massive cab over box.... so many options, explore them all. I love this option.

Tiny dinette but hard to get more compact.

 

[ReluctantTraveler]

yep.... but if you live in a municipality with trucked services the grey/black water tank must be double the fresh water tank capacity...
go figure how you can shower, brush yer teeth, eat and ******** less than the fresh water tank capacity
also, a water delivery was always AFTER the sewage tank was pumped dry

the 2 lites on the house indicate the water tank is full

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I suspect this might be less of a problem in North America, where I’ll be using the rig almost exclusively for now.

But good to know!

 

[ReluctantTraveler]

How many people, where is your camper entry, an option for bed headroom is with the bed at the back, you'd get more storage under the bed than under a dinette..... and eliminate the massive cab over box.... so many options, explore them all. I love this option.

Tiny dinette but hard to get more compact.

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if I was designing a rig for just my wife and I and not a family, this would be far less complicated.

We need to sleep 4, with a strong want for creature comforts and personal space on month-long+ trips.

 

[ReluctantTraveler]

@billiebob thanks for the additional pics of your rig, btw! Nice to see!

 

[1000arms]

I perhaps naively assumed that would be sufficient height. A lot of the campers I've seen have painfully small overheads, so I actually thought I was being generous with 3.5' of internal space (after accounting for the mattress and building material thickness).

Do you have a recommended size?

The taller the vehicle, the more obstacles one might run in to! But, as you plan on having a cabover and are thinking about including a basement under the camper, I suggest you consider a total height of about 12' (before solar panels) rather than the 11' your are currently mentioning. This will allow for a thicker mattress and more room in the cabover, as well as a taller basement for a given camper body height. The extra inches inside the cabover might make things a lot more comfortable.

You might want to consider a cardboard mock-up.

I know you are already avoiding the super-short cabover, but, I suggest you run the numbers for a 12' vehicle height and decide if the extra foot would be beneficial for you and your family.

You might decide that 11' is tall enough, but at least you would have considered it before designing and building a camper that you might wish, down the road, you had made a bit taller.

 

[ReluctantTraveler]

The taller the vehicle, the more obstacles one might run in to! But, as you plan on having a cabover and are thinking about including a basement under the camper, I suggest you consider a total height of about 12' (before solar panels) rather than the 11' your are currently mentioning. This will allow for a thicker mattress and more room in the cabover, as well as a taller basement for a given camper body height. The extra inches inside the cabover might make things a lot more comfortable.

You might want to consider a cardboard mock-up.

I know you are already avoiding the super-short cabover, but, I suggest you run the number for a 12' vehicle height and decide if the extra foot would be beneficial for you and your family.

You might decide that 11' is tall enough, but at least you would have considered it before designing and building a camper that you might wish, down the road, you had made a bit taller.

funny enough, I actually took some additional measurements yesterday, did a little math, and came to more or less the same conclusion that 12 feet might be the better size.

that should give us about 6 1/2 feet of interior height will still allowing for an 18 inch basement.

looks like I need to add some interior steps to the design now. ?

 

[Alloy]

Make sure to use flexible hoses (not pipes) so that vibration won't destroy the connections/tanks.

PEX for pressure.....hose makes water taste off and fail more often.

No issue with pipe. I've used it for years. Everthing has to be clamped/secure.

 

[ReluctantTraveler]

PEX for pressure.....hose makes water taste off and fail more often.

No issue with pipe. I've used it for years. Everthing has to be clamped/secure.

absolutey!

for anyone else who’s reading this, the colors on PEX pipes do matter. The red ones are rated to handle a higher temperature than the blue ones, and should always be used for your hot water.

 

[Alloy]

absolutey!

for anyone else who’s reading this, the colors on pet pipes do matter. The red ones are rated to handle a higher temperature than the blue ones, and should always be used for your hot water.

I use Uponor PEX with blue/red collars.

 

[1000arms]

PEX for pressure.....hose makes water taste off and fail more often.

No issue with pipe. I've used it for years. Everthing has to be clamped/secure.

I edited my post to "flexible material". I had meant flexible instead of rigid, but my original post wasn't clear.

I'm pretty sure there is a least one boat/RV-tank manufacturer that won't warranty their tanks if rigid pipes are connected to their tanks without a flexible section to minimize vibrations.

 

[1000arms]

funny enough, I actually took some additional measurements yesterday, did a little math, and came to more or less the same conclusion that 12 feet might be the better size.

that should give us about 6 1/2 feet of interior height will still allowing for an 18 inch basement.

looks like I need to add some interior steps to the design now. ?

 

[Alloy]

I edited my post to "flexible material". I had meant flexible instead of rigid, but my original post wasn't clear.

I'm pretty sure there is a least one boat/RV-tank manufacturer that won't warranty their tanks if rigid pipes are connected to their tanks without a flexible section to minimize vibrations.

It shouldn't matter becase the plastic tank should flex but if it did then I wouldn't buy the tank(s) because they are probably only 1/8" thick.

 

[ReluctantTraveler]

Flexible pipe is also just infinitely easier to work with than rigid. It’s a no brainer IMO.

 

[1000arms]

I edited my post to "flexible material". I had meant flexible instead of rigid, but my original post wasn't clear.

I'm pretty sure there is a least one boat/RV-tank manufacturer that won't warranty their tanks if rigid pipes are connected to their tanks without a flexible section to minimize vibrations.

It shouldn't matter because the plastic tank should flex but if it did then I wouldn't buy the tank(s) because they are probably only 1/8" thick.

I prefer the thicker tanks too, but I thought I would include the warning as a courtesy to any forum reader who might be unaware.

Flexible pipe is also just infinitely easier to work with than rigid. It’s a no brainer IMO.

... But, what about a tube-bumper water-tank? ...