Grey water tank issue

[Easternshore]

Beneteau Grey water tank issue

Hello and first, Happy Independence Day to all!

We own a 2008 Beneteau Flyer 12 cruiser (Pearl) she was manufactured in France and brought over to the US by a PO. We’re looking for help with the Beneteau grey water system. I usually email France and wait for their reply, still waiting on this one so I’ve decided to go to TF where there is a vast collection of knowledge and problem solving.

The current system in question is a grey water holding tank system which receives water from the sinks, showers, and pumps it out at its leisure. (European law says grey water needs a tank).
The system supposedly will drain the tank when powering on the 12 v system, it also has an internal float switch which should drain the tank when the switch closes the circuit. The pump does work via the manual shower switch in each head but the auto function does not. I replaced the float switch and Scheiber circuit board, there is power at the board but I can’t get the pump to pump out the grey water tank via the auto system. The pump does work, a Whale gusher. Hopefully there are TF owners with a similar system who may be able shed some light on the system’s operation.

With "a picture is worth 1,000 words" please see the attached, I had my a/c guy look at the system as he “was familiar” with Beneteau, not sure if the leads were correctly plugged back.

As mentioned when the boat circuit switch is turned on the auto grey water pump should work pumping the tank for 3 minutes and also work when the float switch closes the circuit in addition to using each head’s shower pump switch. Beneteau says there are 5 drains into the grey water tank, galley sink, port shower & sink, starboard shower and sink for 5. Per the photo I have 6 and I'm still looking for #6. My issue is while we're away #6 is slowly filling the tank with fresh water, fresh being non salt, it looks very clear & no odor and given enough time the water will back up into the showers. Perhaps the a/c condensate is going into the tank though my other mechanic who worked on the condensate drain said no, I'll check it next week but still open to fixing the auto drain system. As we moved Pearl to Jacksonville we're looking for new mechanics.

Many thanks for reading this and open to any and all comments.

 

[Easternshore]

Hello and first, Happy Independence Day to all!

I posted this in other systems thus this is a dupe.
[Mod Edit - posting duplicate posts is against TF Community Rules - the threads will be merged - Thanks for understanding]

 

[Bmarler]

Seems simple enough. You need a voltmeter to check it though. Put the meter on the pump output terminals, jump the float switch terminals with a piece of wire. If no output, the control is bad.
Of course, check for good power at the incoming terminals too.

 

[Bmarler]

Oops, should have read the notes on the dwg. If that sketch comes from the manufacturer they should have labeled the incoming power. We kind of need the entire circuit diagram to diagnose properly, but without that we can guess that terminals 1 and 2 are incoming power.
You might check to see if the wires actually go to the pump from terminals 4 and 5 , or if they go to some other switch that allows the manual override of the float switch.
Or, do the manual switches just power the controller and start the three minute timer?

 

[ranger58sb]

The system supposedly will drain the tank when powering on the 12 v system, it also has an internal float switch which should drain the tank when the switch closes the circuit. The pump does work via the manual shower switch in each head but the auto function does not. I replaced the float switch and Scheiber circuit board, there is power at the board but I can’t get the pump to pump out the grey water tank via the auto system. The pump does work, a Whale gusher.

With "a picture is worth 1,000 words" please see the attached, I had my a/c guy look at the system as he “was familiar” with Beneteau, not sure if the leads were correctly plugged back.

Beneteau says there are 5 drains into the grey water tank, galley sink, port shower & sink, starboard shower and sink for 5. Per the photo I have 6 and I'm still looking for #6. My issue is while we're away #6 is slowly filling the tank with fresh water, fresh being non salt, it looks very clear & no odor and given enough time the water will back up into the showers. Perhaps the a/c condensate is going into the tank though my other mechanic who worked on the condensate drain said no, I'll check it next week but still open to fixing the auto drain system. As we moved Pearl to Jacksonville we're looking for new mechanics.

You might focus on the new float switch. If it's not passing power through, that could explain why the auto feature idn't working.

I see 6 fittings on the top of that tank. Maybe something was added after Beneteau sold the boat? In any case, you could maybe disconnect those and then one at a time sort out which is what. Might not even have to disconnect, if that's an inspection/clean-out access on the top of the tank; maybe just open that and turn on various known sources one at a time.

(FWIW, I'd "guess" that two of the white hoses are from showers, the third is from the galley sink, the two matching darker hoses could be from head sinks.... and the smallest one might be your phantom 6th.)

AC condensate is often plumbed to a shower sump on US-built boats. The shower sump is essentially a mini-version of your "tank" -- float switch and pump inside, etc.

-Chris

 

[rochepoint]

Might I venture a guess that the small hose is a vent for the tank?........

 

[ranger58sb]

Might I venture a guess that the small hose is a vent for the tank?........

Ah. Good point.

And then that would maybe suggest one of the 5 known sources is what's actually gradually filling the tank?

-Chris

 

[C lectric]

Rochepoint beat me to it.
The small black hose at the bottom of the picture may be a vent hose. Otherwise as the tank fills the pressure will build and could cause trouble.
But trace it to be sure.

 

[Bacchus]

Ed
Is one of the top hoses the discharge or is that hidden in the pic?

Also wondering if you can elaborate on the two "T" fittings with hoses pointed down... guessing that is an alternate direct shower discharge via a thru hull & valve but just a guess.

I'm with rochepoint guessing the small hose is a vent.

 

[ranger58sb]

I wonder why EU specifies a gray water tank... if it's automatically pumped out anyway...

Or maybe it's simply to reduce the number of discharge thru-hulls?

There are also two smaller hoses, one each attached to the white hoses on the left side of the pic. If those are instead the head sink discharges, then the two darker hoses on the top (with the blue tracers) could be for something else instead of my earlier postulation...

-Chris