Fresh Water and Grey Tanks
Airstreams of this era did not come with grey water tanks. I'm not actually sure what they did with drain water from the sinks, or showers. Regardless, times have changed, and grey water plumbing needed to be retrofitted to the trailer which was an interesting challenge since the space between the chassis members is tight to say the least and the cost of a custom tank is high — I did not want to get it wrong.
There are two grey tanks — one front and one rear of the axles for better weight distribution. The front tank serves the kitchen sink, and the rear rank serves the shower and bathroom sink. They are connected with a pipe and a rubber coupling to allow water to flow between them so there can be just one drain point at the rear, re-positioned so it can't be damaged if the rear of the trailer scrapes the ground on an incline.
Each grey tank also features a slight cut out of one corner so a tank level sensor can be used to read how full it is from inside the trailer. The cut out is necessary to move the sensor away from the metal of the chassis that can interfere with its reading.
Each grey water tank is held in place by a pair of u-shaped brackets that attach to the chassis cross members. They are finished with a thick rubber strip to grip the tank and provide impact resistance. When they are eventually in place, they will be insulated, but not heated.
The pipe attachment points for drains and venting are such that the pipes are concealed within the walls of the trailer so there is no unsightly plumbing anywhere, and the freshwater tank is under the bed, directly above the axles, again for weight distribution. CAD is your friend when trying to design this stuff.
It was very satisfying to lower the grey water tanks in for a test fitting and discovering that the fit was millimeter perfect. It's almost embarrassing how much head scratching and agonizing went into the design of the grey water system but hey, it works.
My tanks were made by all-rite.com who were a pleasure to deal with!
