Raritan Elegance Troubles

[s/v Jedi]

Originally Posted by Cpt Mark

I've had mine for 5 years. Replaced joker valves once. semi successful. still allows back flow bubbles a bit. sigh.

I have noticed that it doesn't seem to flush as well as it used to. Haven't changed anything, using fresh water only. It used to swirl and everything went down but now, seems like it's lost it's oomph.

Any ideas?

After 5 years I think it’s time to replace the impeller. It wears out, reducing capacity.

[kusuri]

We replaced it yesterday, but it looked fine. Unfortunately that’s not the issue.

We went to a local store today and found some drain unclogger. We flushed a bit if that down, with Raritan’s blessing. It’s helping but dang if this clog isn’t stubborn.

[peghall]

Is there any chance a guest might have flushed a wet wipe? They clog the macerator--which, btw is just something that resembles the blades in in a blender--in the toilet.


--Peggie

[peghall]

"Marine grade" toilet paper is just the cheapest single ply TP available from any grocery store, just for a much higher price.


--Peggie

[peghall]

Originally Posted by Shrew

IF the hose is more than 10 years old, I would just replace the hose.

Amen! 10 years is the average working life of any hose because rubber and plastics dry out over time, making the hose hard, brittle and prone to cracking and splitting. Old hose connected to an open below-waterline thru-hull is a leading cause of boats sinking in their slips when no one is aboard.


--Peggie

[Pukakai]

I crewed on a 1960 wood trawler that had the last part of its sanitation system inaccessible. The toilet wouldn’t drain and there was no way to remove and replace the hose to the through-hull. As a last resort, I poured a copious amount of CLR (Calcium-Lime-Rust) liquid into the hose, let it sit overnight, and viola! The hose was cleared and the toilet drained perfectly.

[kusuri]

Alright, we finally solved this issue! And it wasn't a clog! After verifying 90% of our plumbing and not finding anything at all, we took apart our motor and found that it was full of water. Also grease. Like every surface coated in some sort of black grease. Not sure why or how, because they don't do that in the factory. Also in the last couple days before it really failed, the toilet had started to trip the breaker, and it's likely because of the water intrusion.

We just had a friend visit us here in the middle of the Pacific, and she flew in with a new motor/pump assembly. We installed that, and here's the kicker, our toilet now works better than it has ever worked the entire time we've owned this boat. I guess we have always had a failing motor.

So now we have a working toilet, and I recommend anyone who has a similar problem to us, take apart your motor and verify it's not had water intrusion.

[Bowdrie]

Originally Posted by kusuri

Alright, we finally solved this issue!
we took apart our motor and found that it was full of water.

Good that you found the issue.
No matter how good/expensive an electric toilet is they all depend upon a relatively simple/inexpensive shaft seal.
A drop here and there getting past the seal,,,, and in not much time, failure.
If you were flushing with salt water the motor failure would probably have occurred much sooner.