Motor Home Water Repairs by Mark the Plumber

Just like living in a sticks and bricks house, things in a motor home break or need to be replaced. We have an extended warranty that covers the big stuff, but we have learned that it's easier and sometimes even cheaper to fix the little stuff without using that warranty. Denisa is proud that Mark is a handy-man with the skills and talent to fix almost anything!

Our kitchen faucet has been leaking, and he had already done everything possible to tighten and stop the leak. But the hard water deposits over the last several years had taken its toll on the faucet.

So we purchased a new one at Lowe's. We decided to go with brushed stainless steel instead of the oil-rubbed bronze finish. Even though it won't match the cabinet handles, it will match the sink and the refrigerator.

Just for our own information in case we ever have to do this again, we also had to buy adapter pieces to transform this regular sink into our motor home plumbing.

The first step was unloading the amazing amount of stuff that we store under the sink. Now Mark could fit there instead.

He got the old faucet pieces disconnected and removed relatively easily. Then Mark found the first kink in the plan. The holes in our counter top weren't big enough for the new faucet.  The holes would have to be enlarged somehow. The idea of drilling holes in the counter caused Denisa to have the same expression as Mark is displaying.

The good news is that Mark saved his nice set of drill bits, which included a bit specifically made to drill the size hole we would need. 

The bad news is that Mark didn't keep his old (worn-out) drill. But we have found fellow campers to be very friendly, and our neighbor was happy to lend his. Now the problem is the drill bit is designed to drill a hole in a solid piece--not to enlarge a current hole. It needed a solid surface to hold the bit in place. Mark thought a sturdy, but thin piece of wood could be put over the hole to provide a solid surface. That would be no problem in our old house with a shop full of scrap wood. But what would we have on board the motor home? Mark is certainly resourceful! He thought of those sturdy, but thin mouse traps we had bought during our mouse-hunting fiasco.

He used gorilla tape to adhere it to the perfect spot on the counter, and drilled through the wood and counter top layers smoothly.

This was the little donut-shaped piece of counter that was removed to make way for the faucet's larger water lines.

That's a pretty professional job of lining up and making a nice smooth hole! Denisa is feeling much better about this project now.

Mark had to go through the same process to enlarge the sprayer hole a little as well. So this quick project took a little more resourceful handy-man skills than we thought. But the finished project looks and works great, and Denisa is so proud of her plumber!

Those same plumbing skills were also needed in the wet bay of the motor home. The wet bay is the area where all the sewer and water connections come in and out of the RV. 

When we have water hook-ups, there is a water hose connected where it says, "city water connection." That is where the check valve failed. That meant that there was no valve to hold the water in when we were using water out of our holding tanks (when a water hose wasn't attached). Yeah, I know, Denisa doesn't really understand all that either. But it was a big problem those nights of freezing temperatures when we had to disconnect the hose.

So Mark removed the broken piece. This sounds easy enough until you realize that all this took place behind the big white shield that covers all the working parts in that wet bay. Mark slipped his hand and phone behind the panel to see where the pipes and connectors were so he could find them by blind feel. It was a contortion exercise to get the bad piece unscrewed from behind that panel.

A trip to the RV parts store, and some major gyrations to get everything reconnected behind that panel, and we were back in business again. That could have been an expensive repair job--if we could have found a good RV shop that would fit us into their busy schedule.

Two plumbing jobs completed! Denisa can't even express how much she appreciates Mark's ability to determine the problem and then fix it. Those skills served him well in his professional work life, and they're still important in this crazy retirement on the road!