Hello everyone, Im new to this website, seems a fabulous resource, thankyou. I have a Triton 430 gt and it has a Truma bg10 with gas and electric options for 10l of hot water. I have had the van a few years but actually never used the hot water. However i intend to use the van this winter and was checking out the system and wonder why there are two stop cocks, one blue screw one and one yellow lever one. I know the yellow one fills or empties the Truma because the books are clear about that, especially it, the lever, should be horizontal in use.
But what about the blue screw stop cock, should it be screwed down, so shut, or open ? And what exactly does it do?
I would very much appreciate help and advice about the blue stop before making a silly mistake and damaging it in use.
Thank you.

Don’t have the luxury of hot water so know absolutely nothing about this, sorry. Hope you get it sorted and happy travelling this winter. Going anywhere exciting?

Hi Colin , brilliant and a big thank you very much for taking the time to write about my question ... Especially to attach everything too. However I’m not terribly good on plumbing things and sort of freeze when I read about them , especially as in the Truma instructions it appears only to talk about the feed in or out , the yellow lever , not the blue stopcock ( although on page 92 it does say it’s possible to have both stopcocks)

It seems then the yellow feed lever should when in use always be open , ie horizontal and the blue valve screwed down ..have I understood correctly do you think ?

Cheers

Robin

Ps I see we both have the 430 :-)

Hiya Julie and Neil,

Thanks for making contact ,the last two years my wife and I did two Southern Europe trips , one to Croatia via Italy , starting from France and the other to the Basque Country North to South , both in late Spring so we never used the hot water system and always used camping facilities , no COVID , it was easy .

This year we are making a late holiday to North West France , probably Concarneau , and maybe with Northern coast of Spain towards Portugal, so being able to use all the facilities in the Eriba is more important to us, because of COVID and because cold water in spring or summer isn’t too bad but less fun in winter weather .


Best wishes,
Robin

Tom and Margaret

Hi Nibor, we have the same heater as you in our 420. Yes, in use the yellow lever one should be horizontal and the blue one screwed down. They stay like this whether or not you are using the hot water. Open both to drain the water out. I spent a while when we first got ours wondering why they were different and if the lever one lifted to fill the hot water tank. After losing all the water it soon made sense (I could have just saved time and emptied my watering can straight onto the grass !).
One thing I have found. Our switches for the water heater are on the side of the bed frame (420 with twin beds at the rear). It is very easy to accidently switch these on with the back of your legs. This could cause a problem if you haven't filled up with water. I am thinking about making a cover to prevent this.

Hi Steve , thank you very much , that puts my mind completely at ease . It all makes perfect sense now , looking at all the blue stop cocks around the van it’s a bit confusing. Why Eriba don’t label them with descriptions of what they exactly do I don’t know .
Lucky for us the Truma controls are not by the fixed double bed but under the front seat , still they could get switched on easily if a box knocked into the, , I tend when towing to put some stuff up that end . A cover is a great idea.
With the heater question solved , now I move onto new tyres . I fancy all seasons , mine Present tyres are hardly worn look like new but 4 years since manufacturing, so just to be sure a change will make me feel safer , I was surprised to read any Caravan tyres shouldn’t be older than 5 years old, risk of being brittle .
My wife retires in about a month and we are desperate to get away , even if we don’t leave the country, so I am getting everything ready for a comfortable and hopefully trouble free trip.
Best wishes
Robin

One more tip when using your hot water tank. When you fill up, turn the low voltage system on, then open the kitchen tap - hot only - until the water runs free. This fills the hot water boiler. Running the cold water first can sometimes produce an air lock in the hot water system. Took me weeks to figure that one out!

Hi Robin

I like you am no plumbing expert and also find pages of instructions difficult to follow. Being strictly an amateur myself please ignore what I am about to say if everything works OK on your hot water boiler.

When we got our Troll new in 2016 Cameron at AL spent nearly three hours explaining things to us as we were tenters and knew nothing about caravans. Kath & I ended up brain dead by the time we drove away with our shiny new 540GT behind us. We didn't try to use the hot water on our first trip but when we got home I started to play with getting the hot water on. After lots of reading and thinking we managed to get hot water out of the taps and felt quite proud of ourselves.

we went in for a sandwich but when we came out the water was cold again. To cut a long story short this kept happening despite me reading & re-reading the instructions - hot water at first and then cold. I played with all the valves I could see but no success. In the end we stopped trying out of sheer frustration and camped without hot water for half the season.

When we took it for our first service at ALV in Tebay we asked them to sort it. They rang us to say that a non-return valve had not been fitted at the factory and the hot water was draining back into the onboard water tank. They fitted a valve at Hymer's expense and since then the boiler has worked a treat. Despite it being explained to me by the engineer and me nodding, I didn't really understand the issue or how it had been solved, or indeed how something so vital to the system could have been missed.

As I say ignore this totally if your water is hot - if it isn't your van may have had the same Friday afternoon craftsman as us.

Your winter trip should be fun.

MikeT

Hi Mike,

That sounds like it could all happen to me too . Hot water electric seems to work, haven’t tried gas yet.

So looking forward to get away , the winter trip will be fun whatever the weather etc .. have hardly been out since March , except for essential things .. going stir crazy and got that groundhog day feeling .

Best wishes

Robin

hi Robin

That's good news. We only use the electric as we always get an electric hook up. We know the gas for the boiler works but never use it anymore.

We love using the Troll in the colder months and always use our winter awning - a Kampa Popair. Just make sure that you have enough background heat in the van. we use an oil-filled radiator with a thermostat to keep the background heat up. We also use a low voltage quiet fan heater for a burst of extra heat before we go to bed or sometimes in the awning if we are sitting out.

You need to be ready for some condensation forming on the aluminium strip below the Poptop. A good wipe with a paper towel helps. We don't use our gas heater if the temperature really drops as we think it produces more condensation inside. We try to sleep with the ventilation zips on the canvas top slightly open and hunker down under our quilts.

We have just carpeted the Troll floor and are eager to see how much of a difference that makes to the cold rising from under the van.

The first time you wake up with frost on the outside of the van is a strange experience.

I'm sure you will love it.

MikeT

Great tips again ...I’ve got a lot of carpet mats in the Eriba , hope that will help ..R

The floor in our Troll is so much more solid than are old Lunar, it used to flex like crazy and was really cold under foot. Our Troll floor feels solid, we have a set of removable carpets and it was really warm.

We need to try it out when it gets colder, but this van is much warmer than our old one

Hi John

That sounds good news and the carpets should work a treat. The floors are certainly solid underfoot.

Our Troll has the vinyl flooring and we had a collection of floor mats and a runner along the floor - these were just bog basic ones from places like Wilco & the Range.

We have had then a while and the backing was getting to be a bit thin. Lately we had started to notice the cold coming up more which is why we have been exploring a more permanent, more fitted solution. Hopefully this would be warmer in winter but we could remove it in the warmer months.

We think we have found a solution which I will put in a new thread later.

Mike