This is hard to believe, but the Reich twin pump that we installed only 14 months ago has failed. This is dreadful. These Reich submersible pumps are not cheap and should last much longer than 14 months, we are not using the Reich pump every day, most of the time it sits in the motorhome unused.

Of course we carry a spare pump, so when the water flow reduced I recognised the signs and sure enough a couple of days later there was no water in the kitchen or bathroom. The replacement is quite quick but that’s not the point, the pump should be better made. 

When the last pump failed I proposed replacing it with a ‘proper’ diaphragm type pump, but found that there was a problem finding suitable adaptors to attach the pipes to the pump because it had American threads that are not used a lot in the UK. I am now revisiting the design and have a different solution that I will show when the job has been successfully completed.

Watch this space . . . 

Later note: I’ve just finished installing a diaphragm pump, what a difference! The old Reich Twin pump is rated at 19 litres per minute with a pressure of 1.4 bar ( 21 psi), our new pump is a Seaflo rated at 15 litres per minute with a pressure of 3.6 bar (55 psi). Water flow is more that twice as much and it makes no difference whether I measure the flow into the bathroom sink or with the shower head in the raised position. I will prepare a page with further information in case anyone else wants to replace their Reich submersible pump with a diaphragm pump.

The pump actually has BSP (British Standard Pipe) threads, so I was about to purchase hose connectors that screwed into the pump and then use plastic hose. In the event the pressure generated by the new diaphragm pump was so high that some water escaped via the pressure relief valve of the Hymer heater. I solved this by fitting a low cost pressure reduction valve. To the non-technical readers this probably sounds like a lot of trouble, but it’s worth doing to save the inconvenience of having NO water.