I will never do business with them again. The sales manager admitted that they should replace my water heater but he had no power to do the right thing.
Great video sir, well done and you are correct, those manuals are wrong. I have a winterizing business here in Montana. That Furrion tankless heater is the only one that has ever given me problems. I'm not sure if you left the filter and drain plug removed but I would recommend leaving them out. Also, there is a mixing ball in the rear of the unit. It helps regulate hot water when another appliance is turned on. So when the wife is in the shower and you turn the kitchen sink on, there is minimal temp change for the shower. There is no drain on the mixing ball. RV antifreeze will start turning into slush at around 0 degrees F which will build pressure. This mixing ball is extremely fragile. It will break because it is filled up 100% with antifreeze. All it takes is access to the rear of the water heat and a 3/4" wrench. Place a towel under the ball and crack the lower fitting and allow to drain. If you add these steps to your winterization process your outcome will even be better. Once again, great video.
Thank you for watching and big thanks for the tip on the mixing ball. I did test my antifreeze and it does jell like you said. I have heard about that mixing ball breaking but I was not aware of antifreeze being able to break it. Thanks again. Love hearing from people like you that share their experience to help us RV owners. Cheers!
We just went through a damaged mixing ball on ours. It froze and drove the standpipe out of it the bottom of it . BIG LEAK. Had a mobile tech come by, and of course they don't make the part anymore so the option was to buy a new water heater. I had the kid remove the mixing bowl and bypass it and the system works ok. I recently had the bowl repaired and and added a low point drain connection on the ball so I can drain the water out of it when winterizing and can then verify that it has filled with antifreeze.
Great video. You mentioned pressure for blowing out. Every water pump from the factory I've seen are set to 55psi. That is the pressure I blow my system out with. I also go one or two steps farther. After I put antifreeze in the system, I connect the air again and blow all the antifreeze out (you can't freeze what's not there). Another step is PEX can take a lot of pressure but if something freezes like an ounce of water in the line that will build up thousands of pounds of pressure, the line will split at the weakest point not necessarily where the water freezes. If the faucets and drains are left open, there can't be any pressure build up if any water freezes. I had camping world also, they had to replace my fresh water tank 4 times because they don't know how to work with plastic pipe. Good luck. I remember you mentioned lithium batteries. I had one installed in one of my toys. I figured it would be better than lead acid in my shed over the winter. I would need to add water as necessary and charge them during the winter. I read up on lithium, they don't like severe cold. We get winter nights of 20 t0 30 below zero and that can damage a lithium battery so now I bring it in the house after charging
Thank you for taking the time to do this video!. We followed all the steps but didn't catch if we are to leave the low point drain plugs open or closed? We have them closed thinking that there is antifreeze in the lines. Correct?
Yes, you are correct. Keep the low points closed so that the antifreeze will stay in the lines. Thanks for watching my video. Glad you found it helpful.
You can add us to the folks that followed the manual and broke our tankless heater. We didn't find out until 2 months after the warranty expired. Now I'm spending our vacation time bypassing the mixing bowl (poorly designed) so that we can have water to the RV. Not a happy camper at the moment.
I see where the water gets drain and blown out with air but why bother when you can just put the antifreeze in and run it out the faucets until you see pink.?
I have thought about removing the blow out step, but just in case the pink stuff gets thinned with water, I want to be sure it's full strength. I have had freeze damage 4 times in extreme cold so I am overly careful. I have tested some of the pink antifreeze and it does freeze, it just will not expand to bursting. In my mind, a little water may cause damage that I don't want to have the chance for flood damage later. I had a toilet valve break and it caused major cabinet damage. Better to be safe.
Manual on mine said to blow it out with compressed air and then bypass when putting in the pink stuff. When I hooked it up in the Spring it was like a waterfall coming out of the water heater. Fun fact: the manuals are probably all wrong, they don't make any replacement parts for those heaters so you have to replace the entire thing, it'll probably be something like $1500 to $2000, and it's not covered under the replacement insurance because they see it as a user winterizing error. Local dealership told me they had at least 20 of those in their junk pile from early this year alone. If anyone knows of a class action lawsuit, let me know.
I have two questions. Where are you hook in the clean City water to fill up your clean tank do you worry about that line I know I know you shouldn't be worried about the actual tank itself because you drained the tank but the lines going into that tank. My other question I have a brand new electric gas tankless water heater and it seems to not cycle the water through the hot water tank unless I turn the tap on pretty high and there is electricity and propane turned on. It's almost like it skips the hot water tank. Do you think I should turn on the power and propane? I know this stuff smells like vodka is there any chance it's flammable? I just want to be sure I can get all of the water out of that tank.
I have thought about the lines to the fresh water tank as well but I have never had problems so the water must drain well into the tank. I have heard of some people putting a little antifreeze into their fresh tank just to make sure and then draining the tank. I don't turn my hot water heater on when I push anti freeze though it. The pump does a great job getting antifreeze through the piping and faucets.
I see your title indicates on demand water heater, but I would recommend adding maybe the year and Grand Design Reflection in the title, as well as updating your description or a pinned comment to stress that your statements regarding ***"bypass the water heater ... you're not supposed to do that"*** at 0:43 were both on your specific RV, and not only an on demand water heater, but with your specific model Furrion on demand water heater, and ultimately just what you're doing on your own personal RV. Otherwise you run into the same issue that you're complaining about in regards to Camping World and Grand Design in regards to someone potentially blaming you for an issue on their RV. One of my clients watched your video and probably some other videos in an attempt to winterize their own Grand Design ( Solitude ). It doesn't have an on demand water heater. They didn't bypass, and couldn't figure out why after 7 gallons of antifreeze they weren't getting anything pink coming out of the hot water side, only to realize that they've essentially filled their hot water heater with the antifreeze. I understand the intentions were good, and owners should be aware of what equipment they do or do not have, but unfortunately we live in a world where people have to provide so many disclaimers to avoid blame. This comment wasn't meant to bash what you did or anything like that. Just that the title, description, and contents were even a bit too vague for another Grand Design owner, let alone anyone else who might come along the video who maybe doesn't have the nautilus, or that specific on demand water heater, etc.
Thank you for your detailed comments. Very much appreciated. I will update my specific trailer information in the title and description. I did have someone ask a question about tank versus tankless. Definitely 2 very different winterizing steps. Thanks again.
Thanks for the video, GD videos are clear as mud. Ya might have done it but not shown it but did ya do (or do ya not have) the back spray port near the tailights? I hate tryijg to get that hose to connect, such a pain and no rhyme or reason to it that ive found.
I have seen some videos of a "mixing ball" that has frozen and burst because there is no low point drain thereby not emptying the water. Running Antifreeze through should reduce that problem. I will make sure i flush all Antifreeze from the tankless heater BEFORE applying any heat. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE--ivfmwM64ZU.htmlsi=8uSthRYmsx2NUra8
They are just a simple fitting. Male hose thread on one end, and valve stem sized on the other. I picked up a plastic one at Wally-world for a few bucks.
Hmmm first it’s a Grand Illusion……ha. 🤪. They r not the best….they pull great though….yes GD uses the cheapest material they can cough up. As you say…a home inspector would Red card these RV’s because of poor quality components n workmanship, these guys don’t have this $&it in their homes but have no problem putting it a RV, I have a on demand Water htr. I did follow the book and I got anti freeze outta it. No problems. I’m knocking on my head…. Oops. Wood. 😂
It is crazy how the RV industry gets away with the crap they do. It is shocking how many axles and springs fail after just a few thousand miles. At least a water leak will not kill anyone. Knock on wood... Funny stuff, thanks!