Air Vs. anti-freeze for winterization

[BobM]

When using compressed air, make sure you have a filter in the line to trap oil and water from the air tank. You don’t want oil in your water lines. Even if you use an oil free compressor, there can be particulates in the line.

[Mark7]

Air first, then pink. I want to get as much water out of lines as possible to prevent diluting the antifreeze.

Be sure to bypass water heater. Pink is hard to get out of there when it warms up.

Nothing in fresh tank… just be sure it is drained.

Pink in traps. Used to remove them, but too much work and sometimes don’t reseal correctly.

I always dump enough pink in the toilet to cover the seal to keep it wet. Worried about it drying out.

When warm WX returns, I just flush it all out and I’m back in business.

A little extra thing I do… before putting WH into bypass, I have the air ready to connect with regulator set at 45 PSI. I take the anode rod out of the WH and quickly hook up the air. It will shoot water out of the fitting probably 15’! I have it in my head that this will discharge any sediment that may have collected over the season.

[dirtyweed]

Originally Posted by DQDick

I've always used air/antifreeze combo. Do the whole rig with air and then put some antifreeze in the washer and run it on spin so water isn't left in the pump housing. Never had an ice maker, but some folks have a seperate drain for the ice maker line.

Thanks for your thoughts on putting the anti-freeze in the washer and using spin. I also let water out of the bottom drain (Danby combo unit) and drained my H/C hoses.

[Rondo]

Besides turning on the water pump, don't forget to blowout the black tank flush and the freshwater tank line. I also blow out the water heater by removing the anode rod, turning it to fill and holding my hand over the outlet hole. I do stand back when letting go of the hold because it will blow water out of the bottom of the heater over 4 ft or more. I do this about 5-6 times and then turn the tank fill off and put the anode rod back in. No matter what one does you will never be able to get ALL the water out of the black and gray tanks. There is about an 1 1/2" to 2" gap between the bottom of the tanks and the outlets. I do put some pink stuff down into the tanks but really it is not needed since there is plenty of space for expansion of any freezing liquids in an empty tank. As others have stated I also put the pink stuff down the drains to fill the p-traps and about 3/4" of it in the toilet bowl to keep the gasket moist and soft.

[Chief Brown]

I like what someone said, just go find warmer weather!!

[Bill and Lisa]

Originally Posted by jimcol

Another vote for air. I also let the pump run a while as I'm clearing the lines with air. My thought is it clears the pump of any water.

I "bump" the pump after the fresh water tank is drained and air running in the lines to get out any water that may be trapped between the pump impellers, since that water would be "confined". The water may force it's way past the impeller blades as it freezes - might not get trapped enough to burst the pump housing but your pump may not work as well if the vanes get inelastically deformed.

[jjwhite368]

I used pink stuff for 25 years. On our previous camper (Outlook) I started blowing out lines instead because we were storing it in SC rather than towing it home to VA. After 2nd winter when we opened it up in spring, we discovered water leaking from the toilet flush valve. It had been damaged by ice from a few drops of water that stowed away in the line to the toilet. After a visit from the local mobile tech, we have gone back to blow and pink method, making sure it gets into every line/outlet/tank. Problems solved.