Urgent Water Pump Problem

JohnM20

Are there any common problems with Shurflo water pumps which stop the water running?

A non-caravanning friend has bought a 10 year old caravan which he intends to live in, in his garden, whilst major building work is carried out on his house following a flood. He has just tried out the water pump and can get nothing more than a dribble coming through either the hot taps or the cold. The pump, which I think is a Shurflo from his description, appears to be running, just no water coming through. Unfortunately, do to the current situation, I can't easily get over to have a look to try to determine the problem. Does anyone have any suggestions that my friend (not particularly practically minded) could check?

What has made it worse is that this building job should have been done just before lock-down which is when he bought the caravan and which only had a three month warranty on it. With the delay in getting the rebuilding work started (starts on Monday next week) the caravan dealer is not being at all helpful as the warranty has now expired.

Any suggestions would be most welcome. Thanks in advance

 

 

JVB66

Sounds like an air lock? try putting pump into water  barrel  before plugging into  van  inlet then try, 

JohnM20

Sorry, should have said that the Shurflo pump is a fixed, onboard pump.

ForestR

I assume this is a Shurflo on-board pump not a submersible pump

If it is it could still be an airlock or a failure of the seals on the external connection into the water barrel.

There will probably be an inline filter somewhere near the pump which may be blocked.

It would be unusual  but does it have an on-board water tank?

Even though the pump is running there could still be a fault with the pump such as a split diagram.

Is you search shurflo pump problems on the internet you will get more suggestions and even YouTube videos of fault finding

antirampman

Hi 

Check that the drain tap for the water heater (normally yellow) is closed then it will take several minutes to fill the heater before you get a decent flow from the taps, if this fails try the old engineers trick shut all taps except the shower remove the shower head and open shower tap to cold only, then with the pump running suck like crazy on the hose end, if you hear the pump sound change stop sucking before you get a mouth full. I have used this successfully on many occasions .

Good luck

Impy

Is the small mesh filter on the pump blocked?  We had this problem once when the filter in the barrel "leaked" and some of the carbon was sucked up into the pump.

Kerry Watkins

Have you checked the rubber O rings fitted to the water inlet port on the outside of the caravan? They can wear and allow air into the system. Easy and cheap to replace

JohnM20

Just an update. My friend has now got his pump running OK. It was, as ForestR suggested, an air leak at the end of the inlet pipe from the barrel. It wasn’t quite tight enough. I’ve still not seen it but apparently it is a screw on pipe which the handbook says to screw up “hand tight”. Unfortunately a very subjective instruction.

Thanks all who have offered suggestions, especially ForestR.

Patzi

Any one give me advice to my shurflow mounted water pump stopped working. I shook the water pipes to the shower and it started again and then shortly later stopped. It appears to have what I think an air block. I'm not sure where the air block could be ? I filled the water tank to get it to oveflowring to clear any air and then tried draining main water tank and found it would not completely empty. I am baffled to where to start. Anyone who could advice please 🙏. 

Cornersteady

Sadly I don't but if you are on a club site you could ask the wardens and/or look up a mobile service engineer?

Have you checked the instructions for any help in the problems section? Checked any fuses?

DSB

We also had a problem with our water pump.... but ours is a submersible Whale.  I ended up by cleaning all the terminals (using sandpaper) on the outside (the visable terminals) where the unit fits onto the outside of the van and doing the same with the connections inside the bit that fits on to the caravan.  All works fine now.  Visually, the terminals all looked clean and OK  but sandpaper did the trick...

I know this is not the same problem/ type of pump as JohnM20, but it could be that this might be useful for anyone who comes looking for an answer with a different type of pump.

Glad it's all sorted for John...

David

deryckhogge

Mine is a Whale Submersible as well but we also had a problem a while ago and eventually I found that the pump impellor had stuck. Gently freed it with a screwdriver a quick squirt of WD 40 and it been fine ever since. 

EmilysDad

when you say it's not working, do you mean that the pump is spinning without supplying water or the pump is not actually spinning? (ie is it making a noise?)