This past camping trip, I noticed the pump would kick on just for a second every few minutes. I did not see any water on the floor or find any leaks but I will run it again and home and double check. Is there anything else that could cause this? During the previous camping trip, I forgot to turn the pump off and it ran dry for about 4 hours until I noticed it when I got home. Could that have screwed something up?
Water pump kicks on for a second every few minutes
- Thread starter jm88
- Start date
joet
Super Active Member
Check valve inside the pump leaking since you cannot see any external leaks
A most common cause is a leaking check valve inside the city water inlet. If you screw on a 3/4" male plug to seal the inlet and the pump stops this intermittent running you know that check valve is leaking, the easiest solution being to replace the check valve itself with one of the same style.
Most of them you can disassemble and re-seat the o-ring..
tfischer
A bad day camping beats a good day at the office
This is what was happening to me when we first got our pup. No visible leaks, as the pressure was "leaking" back into the water tank.
Every pump is different, but on ours the check valves were built into the pump. I disassembled the wet end, cleaned it, and put it back together and all has worked well for 4 or 5 seasons since.
RV water pumps are all the same in that they all have a built in pressure switch and check valve so when connected to a city water feed that water can't back feed into the trailer's fresh water holding tank. However, that's not what I was referring to but rather the check valve inside the city water inlet. If the rubber O ring inside this check valve slips out of position the check valve will leak, creating exactly the issue the OP is asking about. Feeding the city water inlet without using a water pressure regulator is the most common cause of this O ring slipping out of position.
tfischer
A bad day camping beats a good day at the office
On my camper the city water and water pump systems are completely separate. The city water goes to the LH faucet (normally would be the "hot" side but we don't have hot water). The water pump goes to the RH "cold" side. They don't interconnect at all. The issue I had, which had the same symptoms (except mine would cycle every few seconds, not minutes) was due to a dirty check valve within the water pump.
Of course, when popup manufacturers finally started to drop those awful manual pump faucets, replacing it with a dual mixer faucet and a 12 vdc pump, that's how they plumbed those popups that didn't have an optional water heater. The water pump itself is exactly the same regardless of whether the camper has a water heater or not. None of this however has anything at all to do with the OP's issue and as I posted earlier my bet is the check valve in the OP's city water inlet is leaking.
tfischer
A bad day camping beats a good day at the office
Haha as I mentioned, their symptoms were pretty much exactly the same as mine, so I don't think you can rule out my solution
