The Shower in My RV Goes From Cold To Hot To Cold Over and Over Again

by Bobbi Meins
(Seattle, WA)

We have a 28 foot Coachman Leprechaun and have hot water in the kitchen and bathroom. When showering the hot water comes on cold, then turns on very hot and then back to cold. There must be a valve shut but I can’t find it.

ANSWER: Greetings Bobbi thanks for submitting your question on our Ask An RV Question Page.

There are several things that could be causing your RV's Shower to cycle between hot and cold water. The first cause could be that you are using the shutoff valve on your RV's shower head to conserve water.

If you use the shutoff valve on the shower head and not the main hot and cold shut off valves the hot and cold water will start recirculating in the plumbing system when the shower head is turned off causing the symptoms you are describing.

You have two choices on how to solve this problem either start using the main shutoff valves on your shower or install check valves on the hot and cold water supply lines to your shower. There is good step by step tutorial on Installing Shower Hot Water Supply Check Valves on modmyrv.com. If this does solve your problem then look at the other suggestions below.

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If you have an outside shower on your RV you might want to check to make sure that main water valves are not turned on and that the shower was not shutoff using the shower head shutoff valve, if it is it could be what is affecting the interior shower of the RV.


Last but not least the water heater bypass valves used to winterize your RV may still be partially set to bypass the water heater. A factory installed water heater bypass valve will normally be a well marked valve in the water compartment of your RV. An Aftermarket Water Heater Bypass Kit is normally installed on the back of the RV Water Heater itself, you need to check these valves.

I hope that one of the suggestions above help you fix your RV's hot water problems.

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