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Headhunter Toilet

Yahoo Message Number: 23612
As you can see from my signature line, I have a 2005 Intrigue LE 42' Ovation Triple Slide. Has any one that has this specific floorplan had problems with the Headhunter Toilet plugging up? I have had problems of this nature since purchase, with the toilet at least partially plugging up approximately every six weeks to two months. According to the lead technician here at Holland Motorhomes (Holland MI location) this is a very poorly designed system. The problem is that the discharge plumbing makes far too many 90-degree turns before entering the black tank.

The discharge plumbing comes out of the back of the toilet, makes one 90-degree turn upward, a second 90-degree turn downward, a third 90-degree turn to the left, a fourth 90-degree turn to the left, and a fifth 90-degree turn downward through the floor into the holding tank.
After taking everything apart, the blockage was found at the fifth and last 90-degree turn. I am now good to go but the lead technician told me that there is a good chance that this will occur again given the poor design of the system.

Also, neither people at the factory or the dealership are sure of the design of the system, so a lot of time was wasted trying to find things that didn't exist. For instance, the CC factory will tell you that there is a one-way check swing valve in the plumbing, but THERE IS NOT! The Headhunter factory in Florida will tell you the same thing!! NOT TRUE!! I'm not even sure the Headhunter people know the toilet is installed in any motorhome.
If you do have a problem, there is a repair fix, but it is difficult and time-consuming. If someone has this problem, contact me and I'll try my best to explain the solution.

Brian Davis
Coach #11901

42' Intrigue LE OVTS

Re: Headhunter Toilet

Reply #1 –
Yahoo Message Number: 23614
The problem is not the Headhunter Toilet. For a Headhunter toilet to work correctly it must have a Headhunter water pump, assuming you have that, a Headhunter toilet or any toilet for that matter cannot flow up then down to work long term. if there is no fall on the pipes of at least a 1/4 inch per foot the liquid will separate from the solids and plug up sooner or later. The toilet should discharge down and make one or 2 turns if needed to get to the holding tank. Sounds like a make it fit installation with no regard for doing it to function.

Mikee

As you can see from my signature line, I have a 2005 Intrigue LE 42' Ovation Triple Slide. Has any one that has this specific floorplan had problems with the Headhunter Toilet plugging up? I have had problems of this nature since purchase, with the toilet at least partially plugging up approximately every six weeks to two months. According to the lead technician here at Holland Motorhomes (Holland MI location) this is a very poorly designed system. The problem is that the discharge plumbing makes far too many 90-degree turns before entering the black tank.

The discharge plumbing comes out of the back of the toilet, makes one 90-degree turn upward, a second 90-degree turn downward, a third 90-degree turn to the left, a fourth 90-degree turn to the left, and a fifth 90-degree turn downward through the floor into the holding tank.
After taking everything apart, the blockage was found at the fifth and last 90-degree turn. I am now good to go but the lead technician told me that there is a good chance that this will occur again given the poor design of the system.

Also, neither people at the factory or the dealership are sure of the design of the system, so a lot of time was wasted trying to find things that didn't exist. For instance, the CC factory will tell you that there is a one-way check swing valve in the plumbing, but THERE IS NOT! The Headhunter factory in Florida will tell you the same thing!! NOT TRUE!! I'm not even sure the Headhunter people know the toilet is installed in any motorhome.
If you do have a problem, there is a repair fix, but it is difficult and time-consuming. If someone has this problem, contact me and I'll try my best to explain the solution.

Brian Davis
Coach #11901

42' Intrigue LE OVTS

Re: Headhunter Toilet

Reply #2 –
Yahoo Message Number: 23622
The secret to usinf the head hunter toilet is to use the cheapest toilet paper that is usually two layers. If you use something like Charmin you are in for nothing but trouble. If it does plug on you, turn off the vlave that supplies water to the ring of the bowl. Obtain a rubber bath tub drain cover and place it over the bottom drain hole in the bowland place a towl over same with quite a bit of down force. Then have someone else push the button for short bursts. It will force the paper through. To be more self reassured raise the bottom carpeted piece of wood inside the sink cabinet to expose the back flow valve. This is where the waist and paper get hung up. You can check the water flow action and clearing and how long to press the magic button. We have found its all in the touch. Don't be afaid to engage the button for a good count of "One thousand one" to assure proper water flow. We had the problem only once at the FMCA rally in redmond in 03, when we were dry campening and being to tight with the water.
WE have grown to like are HH toilet, for we are never have any oddor problems. We still use "echo save" to process the waist in both the grey and black water tanks. Another benefit of the HH system is you don't fowl the tank level indicators and have to flush the tanks all the time. TWI 2004 Intrigue 42' Ovation

Re: Headhunter Toilet

Reply #3 –
Yahoo Message Number: 23624
When did CC start using the Headhunter Toilet? I think I'm going to purchase an '02 Allure...did CC use them in '02?

David

Hurst, Texas

soon to be an Allure owner...I think.

Re: Headhunter Toilet

Reply #4 –
Yahoo Message Number: 23626
Using the toilet paper that you recommend is no foolproof cure. We have been fulltiming for over ten years and have always used only Scott's single-ply paper and have never had any other toilet clog nor have we ever had a problem with fouled tank level indicators. The problem is the design of the plumbing system. When Holland MH finally got mine fixed, they put a large note on the finished work order stating that this was an extremely poor design and they would not guarantee their "fix". They told me that they believed there would be a recurrence of this problem within 12 months regardless of what I did. You mentioned the "back flow valve" in your reply, but as I said in my original message, there WAS NO back flow valve!!! And for that matter, none of us can figure out what possible value such a valve could serve in an RV application. We understand its function in a marine function, but not in an RV.
As I said, the problem is that the discharge stream is passing through a 1 7/8" pipe for approximately seven feet before entering the black tank and in that seven-foot passage the flow makes five (5) 90-degree turns!! I don't care how much pressure you've got coming out of that accumulator tank, by the time it tries to force water through five (5) 90-degree turns, there is no force left.
Having said all of that, I do really like your solution using the bath tub drain cover, towels and repeated flushing. Thanks so much for that tip.
The technician at Holland MH and I thought seriously about installing some sort of drain cleanout similar to what one has in a land-based house and enclosing it in a wooden box. The only way we got the blockage cleared was to remove the toilet, access the black sewer line, run a snake down into the black tank to partially clear the blockage, then make a "part" to attach to the point where we accessed the sewer line, bring a garden hose in through the bathroom window and using a high-pressure spray nozzle, spray into the sewer line for several minutes.
I do agree with you that when it's working the toilet is great. I do dislike the fact that with exactly equal size tanks I could go approximately 3 weeks drycamping in my previous Country Coach and, due to the amount of water used, am lucky to get five days in this coach. I have run this test a number of times and found that beginning with a completely empty black tank, 64 flushes (of the "one thousand one" variety) will completely fill the black tank. On my coach it takes 10 flushes to go from empty until the 1/4 full light on the gauge first illuminates, then 15 flushes until the 1/2 full light on the gauge first illuminates, then another 15 flushes until the 3/4 full light first illuminates, then another 15 flushes until the FULL light first illuminates, then a final 9 flushes until the black tank is completely full.

Thanks for your reply and I'll keep your tip handy.

Brian Davis
Coach #11901

'05 Intrigue LE OVTS

Re: Headhunter Toilet

Reply #5 –
Yahoo Message Number: 23636
I believe they started using the toliet with the inroduction of the FIRST AVENUE Ovation in early 03 at the Pamona preralley. The 38' First Ave Intrigue also used this system. Intrigues with the toilet facing forward toward the sink have the HH toilet in 03, 04, 05. I don't know if the 04 42' Allure that has the same set up also applies.
TWI 2004 Intrigue 11731

Re: Headhunter Toilet

Reply #6 –
Yahoo Message Number: 24181
Earlier this month there was a discussion about the Headhunter toilet. We have a 2004 Intrigue Ovation and have also had a lot of problems with the toilet plugging up. We also called the manufacturer and got nowhere. We did, however, accidentally discover a solution while dry camping in the Yuma desert last winter. The toilet was barely working, almost no pressure at all, when I flushed it and discovered that we were out of water. I heard a loud sucking noise and it flushed completely and was fine after that. Now, whenever it stops working we turn off any city water, empty the fresh water tank, turn on the pump and flush. When we reconnect the water the toilet is good for another few weeks.

Linda

Intrigue 11724
 

Re: Headhunter Toilet

Reply #7 –
Yahoo Message Number: 24189
Linda,

The problem (that you described a solution for) sure sounds like the accumulator tank bladder is leaking. If you change out the tank, you will find it works about 50 times better. I bet a bunch of the tanks were shipped defective and have slow leaks. Ours sure didn't work well at all and we had sewage blockage because of the lack of pressure. But once we installed the new tank it started to work like a jet engine. It macerates the waste and forces it around all of the turns.

We did pressure testing at various sections of the system. The results pointed right back at the tank. Headhunter said that they had not seen many tank failures so they didn't even think it was the problem.

Hope this helps,

Russ and Jean
05 Intrigue LE
11883