Unique Travato Mods

[@Twisted_stitches_leather]

Great mods. Love the reverse osmosis system.

[@craignels]

Thanks for your kind comments. That RO system has been a real game changer for us. Eventually I will post a video dedicated to showing the full details.

[@philc.9280]

Love the way you placed an ordinary ladder on the back instead of the stock ladder. More functional and still lightweight.

[@craignels]

It was really necessary to have the stepladder in order to access the cabinets I added to the roof, and yes, we find it very useful around the campground to have a stepladder. Thanks for your comment!

[@valetadunn3616]

Parent the osmosis system and sell it to an RV company !! Genius Idea

[@Smwis1]

I would be interested in more detail on the reverse osmosis system. How often are you changing the filters? How did you connect to the grey tank? Where did you store the system?

[@craignels]

Great questions! The whole system is really quite small. It fits under the bed next to the sink where the van's water pump resides. In the Travato this area has two ways to access it. To get to the grey tank (again from this area) I unscrewed the cleanout in the sink drain pipe (which leads to the grey tank). Then I snaked about 11 feet of stiff poly tubing down the sink's return until the end went into the tank. Occasionally blowing into the tube made it very clear when it finally got into the tank. You can tell when you're blowing bubbles. It went pretty easy with just a bit of twisting and fidgeting towards the end. This grey tap goes to a small screen filter (which keeps hair and dirt out of the pump), then to the pressure pump, then to a large .5 micron cartridge filter, then to a small charcoal filter, then to the RO membrane. The RO water then goes through a UV light filter and connects to the tank fill line which is also conveniently in this area. The screen filter needs cleaning about once a year. The goal was to have the .5 micron filter be the most frequently changed filter, but in the first year, I ended up changing both the .5 micron AND the RO membrane after only a few week long trips. Not horrible since the .5 micron cost about $4 and the RO membrane was about $15, but it was a pain. I finally realized the problem was that after a trip, I was just leaving the system to stagnate and bio growth clogged the prefilter and the membrane. I learned that after a trip if I drained the grey and ran some fresh normally chlorinated tap water into the sink (and therefore into the grey tank) and then ran the system for about 20 minutes, the filters would be flushed and filled with clean city water and then I could store the van for extended periods with no filter problems. Right now the filters I have in haven't been switched out for 6 months and they are still going strong. If I had it to do over I would have oriented the various filters so that they naturally drained dry when the system was turned off. If you drop me an email I can send some photos which make the install much clearer, otherwise I will eventually post a video of how I did it, but I'd guess that's many months away. The system is fabulous. We can go a week showering every morning and never need to add fresh or drain the grey. After a week our black tank fills and at that point we also dump the grey and add fresh water. At that time I actually add about 5 gallons of fresh water to the empty grey tank as this is like adding an extra 5 gallons to the fresh tank. If we ever do run low on fresh, we can just dump any available water down the sink and turn on the system. Don't need to attach a hose.

[@Smwis1]

@@craignels thank you for the feedback. Sounds like to adapted quickly to the new system and came up with some great improvement ideas. I’ll email you shortly. Great job on this unique mod.

[@mikeskaggs3763]

Can I ask where you got those exterior window shades with magnets?

[@craignels]

Hi Mike. I made them myself. I bought marine vinyl fabric from: www.ebay.com/itm/193818862164?var=495414179929 and 25mm x 2mm magnets from: www.ebay.com/itm/311925459917?var=610806153585 Cut the fabric to size and cut out some fabric circles which I used to epoxy down the magnets. I think you can see that in the video. Some of the larger pieces cover two windows at once and needed more magnets. I did something different for the windshield. Thanks for asking!

[@danieldavis8962]

Where did you get the reverse osmosis from?

[@craignels]

Hi Daniel, The actual RO components I bought from Geekpure. I don't want to mislead, this was a one off that I put together myself. You can't buy a turnkey system that just drops in. The whole system includes several filters, a pressure pump, the RO membrane, UV sterilizer, timer, tubing etc. Some day I'll post a video explaining the details, but if you're keen to do it yourself right away, drop me an email and I'll send you some photos and a video script I started so you can see more details. It might easily take me another year to post a KZbin video on my system. Thanks for the question!