Carly Simon has a version of Coming Around Again that's a medley with Itsy Bitsy Spider. It always makes me smile when the chorus of children start singing the nursery rhyme.
For some reason that song popped into my head while plumbing new drainage for the old Scamp. Let's see how Itsy would fare in my rig. We'll start with the sink. The basins already had 1-1/4" DWV with male thread.
The right coupler switched to 1-1/2" ABS. That's more standard, meaning better availability of fittings. Like a trap and flap vent. Wee! Itsy must feel like riding a roller coaster. Down, turn, dip, down, turn, down, turn, etc. The flapper wasn't cheap but it avoided a hole outside. It's value add.
There's a long run under the couch. It hugs the floor step. Then out the rear corner. Itsy must feel relieved with a calm section after shooting that gaunlet.
Outside there's a 3" gate valve then a final right turn before entering the dreaded stinky slinky. I have a porta potty. No black tank. But dirty gray wash water can smell nasty. Better plug your nose, Itsy, in addition to holding your breath. Will she make it? Oh, the drama!
In travel mode Itsy's out of luck. The way is triple shut to crawl back up this spout. No hose, bayonet capped, and gate valve closed. The elbow tucks up for travel as well. If anything about a dump valve can be clean, that clever design is it.
Now suppose it's still connected, the valve is open, and Itsy miraculously crawls back inside. Just upstream of the valve is one of two steel-collared rubber couplings. The exit end being 3" for compatibility with standard dump hardware. Proceeding upstream the tunnel increases to a cavernous 4 inch diameter. Unheard of in the RV world. Itsy could get lost in there.
I couldn't find any source for such an eccentric coupling. So I made my own. A short length of 3" pipe was glued and clamped against one side of a 4" coupler. Plumbers putty was packed in the gap. It was epoxied on both sides for strength. The putty's entombed now. One less thing for Itsy to smell. The home-made adapter passed QC testing without leaking a drop. Both sizes of pipe meet level on bottom to drain completely. Brilliant.
I know, I cheated with white PVC. I just couldn't justify wasting 95% of an expensive 10' ABS pipe when I just needed a few inches. Whereas Lowe's sold me a 2' length of PVC - much more reasonable. For this application it's fine. I haven't been pulled over by a builder inspector yet.
For a cleanout, a more visible few inches of tattletale white PVC got rattled canned black to hide the shame. Itsy could tell it's still white inside. Maybe. Are spiders color blind? Can they see in the dark? How does she know which direction to crawl? So many questions.
So why that big 4" section? It's almost 6' long. And if 3" ABS is too expensive, isn't 4" worse? Yep. But I happened to have 7' left over from a bathroom remodel at my house. It kept over a decade precisely because it was expensive stuff. I hauled that bulky thing back from MA earlier this summer just for this remodel. So that's how I got it. Still wondering why?
My lil' yeti (that's my old Scamp's new name BTW) doesn't have a gray tank either. Now that oversized section can hold almost 4 gallons (if the math is right). That plus my handy 5-gal blue tote equals 9 gallons. For boondocking that's infinitely more capacity than zilch. Plus it can take advantage of full hookups when available. At volunteer villages, for example. National parks, forests and refuges have lots of spiders.
My remodel is use case driven. Consider this scenario. I'm traveling with that big tube say half full of gray water. What happens when I brake hard? It'll surge forward, that's what. Itsy would think it a tsunami. Cowabunga, dude! Hope she brought a surf board.
With so many turns and the height difference I doubt any waste water could actually reach the sink. Sorry, Itsy, ya still gotta crawl. However, a pressure wave of air could blow some trap water up through the sink drain. Yuck! My solution was a 1-1/2" gate valve. Open to use. Closed for travel. No slosh. Done.
Believe it or not, these things make me happy. Many ideas in lil' yeti have been stuck in my head for a long time. Making them happen is incredibly satisfying. One more reason to smile now while listening to Carly and kids.
