Besides water, an RV gray tank (or "grey" if you trend more British) takes in lots of greasy, sticky substances. These include food particles & residue from preparing meals and washing dishes, soap, shampoo, toothpaste & even body oils. After a while, it can gum up your holding tank sensors, causing a false reading on your tank monitors.
Cleaning out the gray tank and sensors is a really simple task, since there's a readily available liquid designed to break up all of the crud that can build up in the tank: automatic dishwasher detergent. The gel type is easy to flush down the drain, and goes right to work breaking down and dislodging greasy build-up.
To calibrate the holding tank monitors in your RV, follow the steps outlined in our video:
http://youtu.be/DvVGBFdJ_vo
To clean your gray tank, simply choose a day when you're about to take a long road trip to a full hook-up RV park. Just start off with about a half-full gray tank, pour about one cup of automatic dishwashing detergent gel into one of the sinks, and wash it down the drain with plenty of hot water. Then spend a few hours on the road, allowing the sloshing action in the tank to work with the detergent to break up any nasty gunk that's accumulated. The longer and twistier the road the better, but a few hours of agitation should be plenty.
Once you arrive at your full hook-up campground (a dump station will of course work fine as well), simply pull the gray valve and dump the tank. All of the greasy gunk that was stuck to the tank will get flushed out with the water.
If your "3/4" or "full" light is the one staying on, start your trip with a fuller tank, which will ensure good water agitation on that sensor. But since the heaviest buildup is generally in the lower part of the tank, 1/2 tank or so should provide a good combination of water and empty space for strong agitation and sloshing as you drive.
If the first try doesn't clear up the problem, just try it again on your next long road trip. It's so easy and inexpensive that another attempt is no big deal. Once your tank is clean, your sensors should work fine and any odors you may have been experiencing should be eliminated or reduced as well (yes, gray tanks can smell too).
The intro music is my own piano performance of Scott Joplin's Maple Leaf Rag from 1899.
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DO YOUR RV SLIDE TOPPERS NEED REPLACING? Tough Top Awnings are thicker and stronger than OEM fabric and cost far less too! Get higher-quality fabric and save at least half the cost by replacing your slide toppers yourself. Watch RVgeeks' Slide Topper Installation Video to see how easy it is - http://youtu.be/7EXgaoRNkYg - and visit http://www.toughtopawnings.com for complete details. Be sure to tell Ray (the owner) "RVgeeks sent me!"
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RV Geeks offers basic DIY (do it yourself) RV service, repair, maintenance and travel tips from full-time RVers who have been handling most of their own maintenance since hitting the road in 2003.
Be sure to confirm that all methods and materials used are compatible with your particular recreational vehicle. Every type of motorhome, motorcoach, fifth wheel, travel trailer, bus conversion, camper and toy hauler is different, so your systems may not be the same as ours.
While we're not RV technicians, we're very mechanically inclined and have learned a lot about RV systems over the years. We handle most of our own minor service, maintenance and repair work on our 2005 43' Newmar Mountain Aire diesel pusher. We also maintained our 2002 39' Fleetwood Bounder Diesel during our first two years on the road.
We meet lots of newer RVers who are eager to learn some basics about maintaining and caring for their rigs. After more than 10 years on the road, we want to share what we've learned (some of it the hard way). ;-)
We hope our experiences can help other RVers go DIY, saving some time, money and effort, while experiencing the satisfaction of a job well done.
We do not pretend to be experts on any particular RV topic, and mostly know about maintaining our own rig. But lots of things are the same on RVs in general, and diesel pushers in particular.
Comments welcome! Thanks for watching!
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