Rebuilding Water Bay and Gen Bay on 97 Royal

[Abaco]

I just joined the group and this is my first post. I'm about tear into a long punch list of the Royal we just purchased and since this is my first serious RV I am hoping to learn a lot from the forum. The two main things I'm about to tackle are rebuilding the water and generator bays. The check valve on the water fill had a slow leak that has rotted all the plywood out form under the water access bay. Since I need to tear part of it down to get to the check value I was thinking of just updating the whole thing and making it finished with stainless and doing what ever else I can to update it. I've seen the water bays on Liberty and Marathon and they look much more inviting and user friendly. I'm a pretty good handy man but I'm seeing stuff that is foreign to me like the connection called "Blow Out" but since it has an air compressor fitting on it I'm assuming that is for winterizing. The fittings underneath got dinged form a high center and leak from the black tank connection so another reason just to give this whole area an overhaul. I will need to replace the insulating foam on the underside also (what to use ?).

Can I get suggestions on what I should add (or eliminate) since I'll be redoing this ? A maserator ? A better water tank sensor (found this one https://www.watercounter.com ) . I'm thinking of ditching the filter that clean up the inbound water since I don't drink it anyway and making extra room and simplifying the bay. Are there any experts that have done this that I could PM and ask ? Thanks.

The generator bay has the sound material falling down and I figure since it's been 14 year since it's been out that it would be best to pull it and inspect the connections and see what else I might do to improve it while I'm at it like new air bags and possibly small air compressor to keep the air bags topped off. The plywood on the gen bay walls has some dust and oil residue so I was thinking of putting another layer of something (aluminum flashing, high density foam, more plywood ?) between the interior wall and the new thick foam. It would be great to know what parts others have used and recommend. What about adding any kind of fire suppression system while I'm at it and which is recommended ?

Thanks in advance for any input !

[Jon Wehrenberg]

Welcome to the asylum. With the exception of rebuillding a generator housing I have done everything you are baut to face including replacing a rotted floor due to a small yet invisible leak in a water holding tank.

It seems like a major project, but it you have a good place to work and are willing to take the time and expend the effort you can end up very pleased with the outcome. Obviously the first step is to remove the floor and replace it. I opted to replace the damaged section only and with some properly placed saw cuts I was able to replace it and secure it to the frame members. Because the wood rotted the foam insulation was intact so I bonded the new piece of maring plywood to the foam and then secured the plywood to the frame members with screws. I covered the entire floor with a sheet of laminate that I glued and then I sealed the intersections with the walls using RTV.

I rewelded the entire water tank and pressure tested it before beginning to reassemble the bay. While everything was out I just went over everything and replaced anything questionable. I recently repeated the reconstruction of the water bay on my current coach because I wanted a stainless steel water tank, thermostatic control on the engine coolant going through the tank heat exchanger, and I added a back up water pump and modified the water pressure control on my primary water pump adding a means to run a higher water pressure in the house system as well as having an over pressure system shut off. I modified the piping, added valves to simplify service and while I was in there I replaced every rubber hose section with new hose. My bus is the same age as yours.

On the waste side I modified the macerator discharge so it shares an outlet with the gray water by-pass and I changed how the clean out hose fitting was configured. It sounds like a lot of work, but if you have a few tools, take your time and are careful you will be happy with the results. The simplest part of our coaches is the water bay and to the best of my knowledge none of our coaches have any high tech stuff that requires special skills or tools. Have fun.

Keep in mind most converters really do a great job of applying logic to the systems and the bays. Before you decide on if you need improvements get to know what you have and why the engineers set it up that way. you may find small simple modifcations might be what you really want or need rather than wholesale total redesign. I will let Royale owners speak to the changes they feel necessary.

[truk4u]

Welcome aboard Mark and Tracy, this will be the best 25.00 you ever spent!

My Royale has 3 water filters, one to filter sediment, one whole house filter and finally a filter for the fridge and dedicated drinking faucet. We drink the water, use it often via the fresh water tank. Even if you don't drink yours, I would leave the sediment filter in place. The air fitting you found is for blowing out the lines to winterize.

Sounds like your on the right track to solving your issues and and if I can help you with anything, don't hesitate contact me. Keep us posted on your progress.

[CAPT MOGUL & Sandy]

Welcome Mark & Tracy. We have the 2001 Royale XLII. Ed doesn't do much posting here but I read and keep up with group. If there are any answers I can find out or take pictures of our bus bays, let me know. I am great at Questioning someone to help out others. We have had 2 Royales now and love them! Can't guarentee the answers are always correct though! Warning : Truk learned all about Royales thru me!
Sandy

[johnklopp]

Mark and Tracy,

Welcome to the forum. Nice to have another Royale conversion of the same year on board. You will find a wealth of information available to help with problems and upgrades.

My recommendation for upgrading you tank monitors is see level gages. The upgrade is easy using existing wiring. http://www.rvgauge.com/

Hope you can join us at POG 10 in Austin

[phorner]

Welcome Mark and Tracy!

Sounds like you are embarking on quite a project.

You mentioned the possibility of adding another "layer" of plywood to the generator bay. The only concern that I can think of is that if your generator bay is sealed when closed, there may be a minimum of so many cubic feet of clear space around the generator required for adequate cooling and venting. Just double check this requirement to make sure you don't compromise this value.

Other than that, have fun and enjoy your bus!!

[JIM CHALOUPKA]

Welcome to the group Mark, good projects you are planning. In the advanced search bar near the page top, type; GENERATOR BAY REBUILD and go to the eighth post down and view it first, then go back to the list and read any or all posts that you think pertain or find might be of interest. Actually I would read as many of the POG post as you can stand!

This site is a "thing of the moment" and not a "documented how to" or "question and answer site", what comes to a participants mind that he or she is willing to enter here (at any random point in time) is what you get.

Be careful of your spelling and grammar, you are being watched and evaluated by the silent patrol. :eek:

The more specific and accurate you are with your question, the better your reply will be.

Pictures are appreciated and helpful with both questions and answers.

Try all settings and adjustments on the forum you can't brake anything...(not everything works since we got the newest and greatest V bulletin) so just go with what you have.

There is a lot of CHAIN PULLING HERE so don't take anything personal, unless you want to.

Think of POG as a pie, some days you like the filling and some days you like the crust and yet other days you like the whole thing..........,unless you only like cake?


JIM:)

[phorner]

Be careful of your spelling and grammar, you are being watched and evaluated by the silent patrol. :eek:

The more specific and accurate you are with your question, the better your reply will be.

Pictures are appreciated and helpful with both questions and answers.

Try all settings and adjustments on the forum you can't brake anything...(not everything works since we got the newest and greatest V bulletin) so just go with what you have.

There is a lot of CHAIN PULLING HERE so don't take anything personal, unless you want to.

Think of POG as a pie, some days you like the filling and some days you like the crust and yet other days you like the whole thing..........,unless you only like cake?


JIM:)

Jim,

You've just been caught by the grammar/spelling police... :cool:

[JIM CHALOUPKA]

Paul, it was the silent patrol and you outed yourself.
:D :D :D

JIM :)

[Larry W]

Mark
We are close to 6 years of owning our 2000 Royale. We have had some small issues with the water system in those years but have found the set up makes doing any repairs fairly easy. There seems to have been some thought in the design. The Headhunter pump and toilet plumbing are easy to get too. The blow out is for winterizing. Ours also has a bus wash outlet as well as black and gray tank rinse valves in the water bay. As for the tank sensors I use the sight tube on the fresh tank to monitor the level. I have the levels marked in 1/4 levels. The headhunter monitors for black and gray gave up in the 1st year. Rarely do we fill the fresh tank to full unless we are doing dry camping for a week. 170 gallons of water is more wieght than we want to haul on the road. 1/2 level in the fresh tank will not fill the waste tanks. Our Royale has two filters and a softner in the 3rd bay. One filters the water before it fills the tank. The other is a taste and odorr filter that filters all the house water but not the toilet flush water. Hope the grammer police are not to harsh

[Abaco]

Thanks for all the replies. I'm going to donsome searching on the topic within this forum as suggested.

More later.

[Woody]

Rather than a new thread - when we rebuilt out OTR we had to remove the gen set and all its sound deadening lead foam. On re installation we lost a good bit of its effectiveness.

I really don't want to pull the set again - does anyone have a good idea of what I could install in sheet form over the old foam without removing the set.8601

[gmcbuffalo]

Contact Dick Wright at

http://www.wricointernational.com/

[Abaco]

Thanks for all so far.

There is some talk of Headhundter Toilets which I think are supposed to be the best ones. My 97 has a Microphor which I"m not very happy with. If a redo of the water bay going to provide a good time to upgrade to a Head hunter brand ? I don't konw if I want to go so far as tearing into the holding tanks I'm mainly wanting to update the exterior access bay. I'm ditching all the filtration and levers and cooper that go with that and will put something more usuable like an electric pressure waser pump or a hose reel. My bus doesn't even have a good palce to put the waste hoses. I could make storage for that maybe.
I nicer faucet maybe, stainless trim. I'm in Central Florida. Is there anyone around my parts that would be good to look at what I'm trying to do and help size up a draiwing for me to go work on ? Or am I save just tearing into it and using logic. I don't want to get tripped up accdiently and you guys no so much more about these things. Can I wing this and figure out w/o fear of any pit traps that will get me ?

[jack14r]

Try Donnie Myers RV in Sanford,he works on a variety of Prevost also all of the sponsors that are in Florida could do it also.

[phorner]

Mark,

I'm just down the road in Port Saint Lucie if you want to take a peek at mine.

[Jon Wehrenberg]

Mark,

One thing to remember is that except for the fact that everything you do has to fit in the available space there is probably no limit to what you can do. We have a Headhunter toilet and I like its simplicity and how well it functions. But, in order for that toilet to work well you need to deliver a strong flow at a fairly high pressure, at least no less than 30 PSI and if possible higher. That is not difficult if you do two things. First, make sure you have at least 1" of piping or tubing to the toilet, and to insure a high delivery flow make sure you have an expansion or accumulator tank. They are cheap, but do take up room.

You can get them at Lowes or Home Depot. It is best if you can install a pump capable of delivering a high volume at a higher pressure also. While the standard of the conventional motorhome industry has been the smaller Shurflo water pumps, it is unlikely an unassisted pump is going to prove adequate so you need to operate a pump at a higher pressure such as 60 to 65 PSI, or increase the delivery volume by running parallel pumps simultaneously.

If you can take Paul up on his offer and see how his Headhunter toilet is supplied. I don't think he has an accumulator tank, but he is likely to have a large Headhunter pump. That is a more expensive alternative to smaller pumps and an accumulator tank.

Keep asking questions.

8603

That is a picture of my bay, almost in its present configuration with the water tank removed. The Groco pump is the primary and delivers a lot of water. The Shurflo is my back up, but with the accumulator tank and the system at the pump cut off pressure of 45 PSI I have no problem with a toilet flush.

[johnbrowder]

Headhunter is good stuff. I have had in yachts and 2 Prevosts, including a 2001 Royale. It works well, is reliable, and the support from the manufacturer first rate. However, when you do have a failure, part are expensive. The failures I expierienced were with the tank level monitors. The components are fully encapsulated in epoxy, so if a unit fails replacement is the only choice. $500+ just for the display.

Still, I am very happy with the equipment.

[BenC]

Rather than a new thread - when we rebuilt out OTR we had to remove the gen set and all its sound deadening lead foam. On re installation we lost a good bit of its effectiveness.

I really don't want to pull the set again - does anyone have a good idea of what I could install in sheet form over the old foam without removing the set.8601

To answer your question, to effectively install any new insulation, you will probably have to remove the genset, but if you are agile and small in size, you may get by with installing a product call "Soundcoat" which comes in adhesive-backed blocks, but still needs to have screw and fender washers placed ever so often especially on horizontal surfaces to prevent it from falling down over time of heat exposure. The company offers several different types of insulation, depending on how much heat resistance you need (whether your gen bay is lined with metal to protect against fire). I recommend the Soundmat LFM if the compartment is metal-lined for fire safety, or Soundfoam ML, or they will make you a laminated hydrib of both if desired. I also recommend you get the outer surface with the aluminum sheet covering for protection against water. Hope this helps.

[BrianE]

Mark,
Welcome to POG. If you can stand a little ribbing, this is the place for dedicated wrench-heads.

You might consider giving Royale Phoenix, http://www.royalephoenix.com/ a call. Glenn Berden is a partner at RP and is an electrical engineer who developed many of the original systems at Royale. Glenn has developed a new tank monitor system that he recently installed in our bus. He will customize the system to your requirements and send it to you as a kit. I watched Glenn install ours and it was a very simple installation. You should also consider the SeeLevel gauge http://www.rvgauge.com/. There is reportedly some difficulty in getting this system to stick to the tanks. Andre D. recently installed this system and maybe he will jump in here. As others have mentioned, you might consider not eliminating any water filters. Even if you don't drink the water, others may consider this important in the future.

As to the generator bay, this is a project I have been putting off but is on my short term punch list also. Others on the forum have made some terrific improvements to this area. You might consider not using foam insulation or if you do, using a foil covered material which would be much easier to both install and to keep clean. Good luck with the project and we'd all appreciate it if you could post pics of your progress.

[ajducote]

Mark,

Here is the post I made about my new tank sensors:

http://forum.prevostownersgroup.com/showthread.php?5210-Tank-Monitor-problem-and-rebuild

Welcome to POG.

[CAPT MOGUL & Sandy]

Mark, we had a 97 Royal and now have a 2001 Royal, we use our machine a little different than some and dry camp a lot. Look forward to what you might be doing. If you will want to do some dry camping the Water Waster-Headhunter could run you dry. I know others think it is the greatest, but I wish I had the Microphor now.

Ed

[Abaco]

I haven't checked in for a few days but this is all so great information and pictures. Especially the information on what material to use on the generator buy rebuild. It is not lined with anything but plywood so I will line it with sheet metal or aluminum I suppose.

[Jon Wehrenberg]

Mark, I cannot speak for all converters, but the generator boxes I have seen appear to be insulated against noise or for fire protection or both. The quietest boxes I have seen are typically a box within a box. In other words a complete generator enclosure within the bay itself. Those are also provided with a lining that is usually a foam multi-ply material that has what appears to be different density foam with lead and other materials laminated to form a sheet. This usually makes for very quiet generator operation which as time goes by is more and more appreciated. That is not to say this material is the cat's meow. Some material of this nature eventually deteriorates and has to be replaced, while some shows no signs of wear after a decade or two. I am one of the lucky ones in that my sound deadening material is 15 years old and is holding up very well and the generator is very quiet.

I think if you find the right material you will be happy because while a loud generator is tolerable, after time it gets annoying. A quiet generator is very high on our list of things we must have.