Sludge or whatever in fresh water tank 2004 260 DA

[Christopher Holbert]

I have noticed the water pressure getting low when pump is on. So now i go to winterize it and tank was emptied of water i put 4 gallons of rv antifreeze and it was just trickling out. So i seen there is a filter screen on the inlet side of pump. I took it off and was full of nasty slime type sludge in it. Was completely plugged. I washed the screen and put it back together and it worked great for about a minute then plugged again with that sludge. I know there must be a alot of it in the tank. Do i have to pull the tank to clean it? Or is there some other trick someone knows on here to flush it out without pulling the tank? Thanks for the help. Ugh

 

[paulswagelock]

Is it a clear slime, no real odor? I had a SLX 270 that I purchased used that had the exact same issue. Never figured out what it was. But what I did that helped quite a bit, removed the tank outlet/pump inlet line from the water pump, took the cap off the tank, put very hot water in the tank and let it soak for a few minutes, then used my super sized shop vac and sucked full power on the line from the tank. Repeated that a few times. Vac had a bunch of the slime in it and the issue seemed to subside. Really want a strong vacuum with high volume, and make sure you leave the tank cap open for vacuum relief.

 

[Gofirstclass]

Chris, it sounds like you have an accumulation of algae in the tank. I would pour a cup of bleach in your fresh water fill and leave it for a few days. Then remove the filter you mentioned, turn on the pump and a couple of faucets and let them run until the tank is empty. Add about 10-15 gallons of water and 1/2C of bleach. Run each faucet until you can smell the bleach water coming out. Once you've done that with all faucets, let them sit with that bleachy water in the lines for a day or two.

Put some (15 gallons??) water in and run it through each of the faucets until you smell no more bleach coming out.

Now this is where my winterizing procedure differs from many on here--I don't use any of the RV antifreeze. I hate the taste of that in my water system.

I simply hook up an air compressor to the dock side fitting and blow out all the lines, one at a time, making sure I turn on the hot and the cold water sides of the faucets and do that until only a tiny bit of mist comes out. Then repeat and do each faucet again. Don't forget your transom shower and anchor wash down.

Use only about 15-20 pounds of pressure in the outlet side of the compressor so you don't blow out any fittings in your water system.