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Smelly toilet help please


Northcountrygirl

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ELSAN BLUE it was what it was invented for, nearly 90 years ago. Nothing beats it, forget all the "modern speak", go for a product that does what it says on the bottle.

 

The only trouble is the I think it is the formaldehyde in the blue which kills all the good bugs in both the tank and if you have a pump out somewhere with a natural septic tank/system it mucks that up to. Also if any of it gets into the canal it does damage to the canal life. All it does is preserve the stuff in the tank as it was when you put it there. Hate the stuff, but others may love it :)

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If I rigged up a small pump to pump air into my poo tank below the liquid level, what would the result be?

Would it stink more or less? Would it froth & overflow?

I'm underemployed at the moment, can you tell?

 

I think that it would do two things both should be good once it settle, agitate the stuff in the tank and help break it down and mix with the microbes and help keep the level of oxygen up on the liquid. But in my mind it would want several inlet points in the tank; the ideal in my mind would be a pair of pipes diagonally corner to corner with holes in the pipes to let the air out. But I suspect that two or three pipes dropped to the bottom of the tank from the top could work as well. I suspect it would need to run 24/7 while cruising. Just some thoughts

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We don't really want to go down the blue route. I think we're going to switch to Brewers yeast tablets (about £10 for 500) when we can get somewhere to buy them. Also going to flush more clean water through the system when we do a pump-out as we've discovered that our shower hose will reach the toilet bowl. I'll let you know how it goes and thanks for all your advice and time taken to write it. It's been interesting reading and please feel free to carry on the discussion - it's all useful information ... even bizzard's which made me smile :-)

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When we had a dump through loo on the shared boat we filled a couple of pails with canal water before the pump, out started then tipped them down the loo which the tank was nearly empty. If you are quick enough, you can get another couple of pailfuls down before the time is up. Also, as the pump out was being done, we rocked the boat from side to side and this with the flushing water helped stir up the contents lying on the bottom of the tank. We seldom had a smell from the loo.

haggis

That is what Diana does, stand poised in the loo with a row of buckets of best canal water ready to throw down.

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I believe that pump-out tank owners go 'nose-blind' after a while.

 

You can walk past boats in our marina and tell which ones are pump-out and which are not, you can also get to know when they are ready for the pump-out as the volume of 'perfume' increase tremendously.

 

I am not suggesting that cassettes do not smell I am just suggesting that when you live with a smell every day, it gets so that you don't notice it.

 

Think when you visit a friend's house and it reeks of 'dog', or cigarette smoke / dirty ashtrays.

I was worried about it being our "nose blindness" in the first months (in fact probably first two years) in view of our not adding anything to the tank as previous post. So much so that we frequently asked others for their opinion. Nobody of the boaters and non boaters we asked ever reported any smell at all.

It seems completely wrong but I can assure you that for us, for eleven years, adding nothing at all to the tank worked.

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It seems completely wrong but I can assure you that for us, for eleven years, adding nothing at all to the tank worked.

 

I think you are supposed to shit and piss in it.sick.gif

Edited by Bill
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Northcountrygirl, on 13 Sept 2016 - 6:55 PM, said:

We don't really want to go down the blue route. I think we're going to switch to Brewers yeast tablets (about £10 for 500) when we can get somewhere to buy them. Also going to flush more clean water through the system when we do a pump-out as we've discovered that our shower hose will reach the toilet bowl. I'll let you know how it goes and thanks for all your advice and time taken to write it. It's been interesting reading and please feel free to carry on the discussion - it's all useful information ... even bizzard's which made me smile :-)

 

 

ditchcrawler, on 13 Sept 2016 - 6:57 PM, said:

That is what Diana does, stand poised in the loo with a row of buckets of best canal water ready to throw down.

 

 

All the LeeSan units in my neck of the woods have a dedicated flush hose near to the pumpout hose

And

a pause button - which suspends the charge time while you flush.

 

Is this not the case on CaRT's waters (what an uncivilised lot....)

 

Certainly the BCM kit had that arrangement last year.

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We've only ever used Marina pump outs and encountered 3 different types - pause button but counter keeps going, no pause button, pause button and counter stops. All have had a fresh water supply and hose nearby.

 

The problem we have is that we have no separate water opening to the waste tank and have to stop pumping in order to add water. Using the shower hose we can do both at the same time, once were down to the sludge.

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This year our tank seems to have been stinky, not been much of a problem before. I had already added an air pump and I think it does help but we only run it occasionally. Anyway it was particularly bad on our recent trip so I thought I'd try some bakers yeast granules (the proper yeast stuff, not the stuff you put in a bread machine). I put a teaspoonful of it in a cup of warm slightly sugary water, left for 15 mins to froth and then tipped it down the loo. This was just before we went to bed. We woke up the next morning and there was no stink. Amazing! By the time we left the boat several days later it had started to reappear a bit but that teaspoonful gave us several days stink-free. OK so maybe there were other factors but next time I'll try it again and if I get the same result I'll be sure it really was effective - and cheap.

 

I am quite keen to try this too but Gillie is concerned in case it makes the contents of the tank rise.

Let us know if it works when you try it next time please.

 

.................Dave

We've only ever used Marina pump outs and encountered 3 different types - pause button but counter keeps going, no pause button, pause button and counter stops. All have had a fresh water supply and hose nearby.

 

The problem we have is that we have no separate water opening to the waste tank and have to stop pumping in order to add water. Using the shower hose we can do both at the same time, once were down to the sludge.

 

I think putting water down the bog itself is much better than using a rinse out fitting anyway. The rinse out inlet is invariably right next to the suckout pipe, whilst putting water down the bog pushes the contents towards the suck out.

 

..............Dave

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All the LeeSan units in my neck of the woods have a dedicated flush hose near to the pumpout hose

And

a pause button - which suspends the charge time while you flush.

 

Is this not the case on CaRT's waters (what an uncivilised lot....)

 

Certainly the BCM kit had that arrangement last year.

With a dump through toilet a couple of buckets of water dumped straight down do much more good than a hose in the rinse pipe. It hits it where it counts.

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You will end up ripping it out.

 

This is what we did twice, on two boats.

I went though all and everything including a new S/S tank, all new pipes ( 3 times ) etc etc .

 

Changed it for a ceramic Thetford cassette, problem gone.

I ripped my P/O out. The "stainless" tank started leaking at a seam, I got a welder to do a temporary repair for me but it was about to go around a corner that would have made it inaccessible so I had the whole caboose ripped out and replaced it with a cassette. Big improvement! The old thank was never intended for my boat, and it ended up being cut and shut to fit. There was a problem with one of the baffles in the tank and so as often as not it wouldn't empty properly. It was a big disappointment to pay £15 to £20 for a pump out only to find most of the marmite was still there.

 

At some stage (hopefully early next year) I'm going to fit a composting loo.

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I think putting water down the bog itself is much better than using a rinse out fitting anyway. The rinse out inlet is invariably right next to the suckout pipe, whilst putting water down the bog pushes the contents towards the suck out.

 

..............Dave

Unless you have a Braidbar, where the rinse out point is at the forward end of the tank. Still a good idea to rock the boat whilst flushing though.

 

We had dump throughs on our share boats and rinsing through the toilet bowl was always the best strategy, not an option with macerator so, obviously.

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1. On your next pumpout thoroughly rinse - and that means almost filling up the tank with clean water, put a stick down the 'hole' and stir it about. Repeat if time allows.

2. Don't use Blue or Odorlos (it isn't any more). I doubted it but I am now using some bio clothes washing liquid as recommended in another thread. WORKS for ME Another thread suggested a granular oxy-powder from Tesco. Can't recall the name, but we'll try that later.

 

We used to use Odorlos and bakers' yeast, but neither were effective for very long.

 

Found it -

 

IDShot_225x225.jpg

Zoom

 

 

Know this might be off topic as we've got Thetford Cassettes, I'm just giving another vote for the oxi-powder, tho' I'm using Morrison's own brand. A scoopful has broken everything down, inc paper, so it's just like tipping dirty water down the 'hole' at the elsan point. There's absolutely no smell at all, especially that horrid elsan smell. Thank you forum members for this recommendation!

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We don't really want to go down the blue route. I think we're going to switch to Brewers yeast tablets (about £10 for 500) when we can get somewhere to buy them. Also going to flush more clean water through the system when we do a pump-out as we've discovered that our shower hose will reach the toilet bowl. I'll let you know how it goes and thanks for all your advice and time taken to write it. It's been interesting reading and please feel free to carry on the discussion - it's all useful information ... even bizzard's which made me smile :-)

Just leave it alone and don't put anything in there.

 

It will take a week or two for the tank to settle down but after that there will be no smell and no cost.

 

Adding chemicals and potions just makes matters worse.

I was worried about it being our "nose blindness" in the first months (in fact probably first two years) in view of our not adding anything to the tank as previous post. So much so that we frequently asked others for their opinion. Nobody of the boaters and non boaters we asked ever reported any smell at all.

It seems completely wrong but I can assure you that for us, for eleven years, adding nothing at all to the tank worked.

Same here, although for 8 years going on 9.

 

I have never understood why people spend loads on chemicals to add to the tank when all they do is make the smell worse.

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Mate of mine works for Severn Trent on the 'dirty water' side of the operation. I've visited sewage works with him and seen huge tanks of mucky brown stuff doing its thing and I was really surprised that there wasn't a whiff of anything unpleasant. When I mentioned that to him he told me "If it smells, something's gone wrong!"

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Mate of mine works for Severn Trent on the 'dirty water' side of the operation. I've visited sewage works with him and seen huge tanks of mucky brown stuff doing its thing and I was really surprised that there wasn't a whiff of anything unpleasant. When I mentioned that to him he told me "If it smells, something's gone wrong!"

 

Ah - Happy Days !!

 

When I was doing my ONC (remember them ?) in Electrical Engineering we had a trip to the Sewage works as they were producing electricity (from the methane) and feeding it into the grid (this was quite revolutionary 50 years ago).

 

As we approached the sewage works there was a sign at the gate "Tomatoes for Sale", on asking the 'operator' about them he revealed that tomato seeds pass straight thru the human body, and when the sewage works put the 'cake' out on the fields to dry they had an excellent crop of tomatoes - similarly with Honey Dew Melons but they got less of them.

 

After the tour - his summary line was :

 

"It maybe shit to you, but to me it is bread and butter"

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We don't really want to go down the blue route. I think we're going to switch to Brewers yeast tablets (about £10 for 500) when we can get somewhere to buy them. Also going to flush more clean water through the system when we do a pump-out as we've discovered that our shower hose will reach the toilet bowl. I'll let you know how it goes and thanks for all your advice and time taken to write it. It's been interesting reading and please feel free to carry on the discussion - it's all useful information ... even bizzard's which made me smile :-)

 

Just to clarify.

 

The New Blue Loo Company (http://www.newblueloo.com/ product I mentioned looks like conventional blue and has very similar perfumes but does not have the nasty formaldehyde in it. Its available online and Calcutt sell it. I have not found it elsewhere but Norbury Junction had another of their products. Very few chandlers north of Coventry seem to stock biological toilet products that actually contain bacteria it seems.

 

Yeast is probably cheaper as long as it works and I may try the Tesco stuff as well. Extra oxygen can only help the aerobic bacteria and make life difficult for the anaerobic ones.

 

 

 

 

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1. On your next pumpout thoroughly rinse - and that means almost filling up the tank with clean water, put a stick down the 'hole' and stir it about. Repeat if time allows.

2. Don't use Blue or Odorlos (it isn't any more). I doubted it but I am now using some bio clothes washing liquid as recommended in another thread. WORKS for ME Another thread suggested a granular oxy-powder from Tesco. Can't recall the name, but we'll try that later.

 

We used to use Odorlos and bakers' yeast, but neither were effective for very long.

 

Found it -

 

IDShot_225x225.jpg

Stupid question alert..........do you put this or the washing powder in the tank after a pump out or down the toilet at regular intervals?

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Racasan toilet blue is-was the powerful one. I believe that airliners, trains and coaches used it in their toilets Don't know if its still available. I used to get some cheap from a coach driver as I found that the Thetford Elsan blue seemed to be getting weaker and weaker and dearer and dearer. I don't use any stuff in my cassette anymore at all, not for years now, only pongs when I empty it, but I keep a clothes peg on a string around my neck, like a lucky charm, which I pop onto my hooter for that duty.

Sanitary stations should keep a peg on a string handy for this purpose.

Edited by bizzard
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But, referring to my earlier post about gorging on loads of eggs. By doing this they should bung you up plenty long enough to get to pubs, garage, sanitary stations toilets ect so you don't have to use the boats toilet.

Readers may have noticed while reading children's books, like Enid Blyton, Arthur Ransome ect, there was never any mention of toilets at all in them or anyone bursting to go, you know, hopping about cross legged, even if they were all trapped in a cave for ages and ages. That was, again because of eggs, bunged up with em they must have been. In all those books the children were forever buying eggs, eggs from farms, dozens and dozens of em at a time and, boiling, frying, scrambling, and then wolfing them down.

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The best pump outs we used to get on our share boat were when we were based at Blue Lias, Stockton. The chap who did the pumpouts used a Karcher pressure washer down the dump through hole in the bowl. And he used to take his time doing this as the pumpout was not on a timer.

Edited by davem399
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But, referring to my earlier post about gorging on loads of eggs. By doing this they should bung you up plenty long enough to get to pubs, garage, sanitary stations toilets ect so you don't have to use the boats toilet.

Readers may have noticed while reading children's books, like Enid Blyton, Arthur Ransome ect, there was never any mention of toilets at all in them or anyone bursting to go, you know, hopping about cross legged, even if they were all trapped in a cave for ages and ages. That was, again because of eggs, bunged up with em they must have been. In all those books the children were forever buying eggs, eggs from farms, dozens and dozens of em at a time and, boiling, frying, scrambling, and then wolfing them down.

You made me titter out loud. Now I've wet meself and need the loo!

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