It was a wet as miserable weekend, as usual, so I was browsing the net looking for cheap water pumps. Our caravan, like many, has a filler cap around half way up the nearside wall, which is used to fill the toilet rinse top tank. I think the tank holds around 10 litres, but filling it isn’t so easy without a watering can or hose. If you run the tank to empty whilst away on a site, and don’t have a tap at the pitch, you need to use the kettle or some other container to pour the water into the filler. It’s a bit of a pain.

I was looking for a cheap pump to drop into the aqua-roll and then pump water up into the fill point for the top tank, when I realised that I had an old Truma Maxi pump in the shed which had been left in our caravan by the previous owner. I was never going to use this as I have a Whale Water Master high flow pump.

I stripped the caravan specific hose and power connector from the pump, which revealed a convenient connector which allowed me to push on a few feet of standard garden hose. I then extended the 12v power cable by a few feet, and connected a car style cigarette lighter plug for power. I used some heat shrink tubing to protect the electrical connection. I gave the pump a quick test and it works a treat, seeing the flow rate from the end of the hose shows that the pump is surprisingly powerful !

The idea is that I will connect the 12v plug to the car cigarette lighter, or to a 12v socket inside the caravan, and then pump water up from the aquaroll into the top tank!  Handy !  I can also connect a standard “hozelock” connector to the length of hose and use a spray nozzle to wash the caravan I guess.