RV Toilet, Sink and Shower Repair in Yorba Linda

The ball or blade seal is worn, dried or fouled. On a Dometic style toilet a rubber ball rotates to open the passage to the tank and seals against a seat when closed. On Thetford designs a blade slides across. Either way, that seal keeps a small amount of water in the bowl, and that water is the odour barrier.

Seals fail three ways. They dry out and take a set when the coach sits unused, they get cut or held open by debris and mineral scale, and the seal material perishes from harsh chemicals. That last one is worth stating plainly: many aggressive tank treatments attack the seal, so the product bought to fix the smell is frequently the reason the smell exists.

The repair is a seal kit and it is a modest job. What gets expensive is ignoring it, because a toilet that does not hold water lets tank gas into the coach continuously and lets the flange seal dry, and eventually the leak moves from vapour to liquid and into the floor around the flange.

Flex, almost always. An RV shower pan is a thin moulded acrylic or ABS component that relies entirely on the floor beneath it for support. Where the pan was bedded properly on a solid floor it will last the life of the coach. Where it was set on an uneven or inadequately supported floor, or where the floor beneath has softened from a leak, the pan flexes with every step and fatigue cracks appear at the corners and around the drain.

That is why we investigate underneath before quoting a pan. A cracked pan on a soft floor is a floor repair with a pan replacement attached, and quoting only the visible part is how owners end up paying twice.

Replacement is labor intensive because the pan is usually installed before the walls. Getting the old one out and a new one in often means removing wall panels, the shower door frame, and sometimes adjacent cabinetry. That is why shower, tub and pan replacement is published at $750 to $5,500 across 4 to 25 labor hours.

• Cracks radiating from the drain or from a corner
• A pan that visibly deflects when stepped on
• Soft or spongy floor immediately outside the shower
• Water staining on the ceiling of the bay below
• Loose or moving shower door frame indicating structure movement

Three usual causes, none of which involve the tanks being full. First, the toilet seal has failed and is letting tank gas through continuously. Second, a P trap somewhere has dried out, which happens quickly in storage, and that opens a direct path from the gray tank to the coach. Third, the vent stack is blocked, so pressure pushes gas back through the fixtures instead of out the roof.

The dried trap case is worth knowing because it is free to fix. Pouring water down each drain, including the shower and any rarely used sink, restores the seal. On coaches that sit for months, adding a small amount of mineral oil on top of the water slows evaporation.

What does not work is masking. Deodorizing products are sold heavily to owners chasing this symptom, and they treat a smell whose cause is mechanical. We check seals, traps and the vent stack first because those three account for nearly all of it.