Denise Kersting

So it's been a month now and although I'm baffled, the magnets seem to be working. I have had no new brown, hard water buildup in the siphon jet area. So far it's just been a normal scrub to the rest of the bowl that's easily accessible and and it's clean.

Haven't ever had a problem with people using it wrong, but we've only had family there. We have a helpful "reminder" note there to add a cup of peat after poo and turn the drum a full rotation. You could do the same but include the part to look down and make sure you can see into the drum or turn until you do. The clog...well, lets just say I was super thankful we had the huge vent next to it we could open up. In our unit there are 2 drains at the back of the evaporative tray that take excess liquid to a lined pit (which might be a bother if you need to move the trailer). In the course of normal operation you add peat to help the composting and keep the smell down, if you forget to scrape out the lower chamber every so often the stuff that missed the finishing drawer and collected in the corners can clog the drain lines. The liquid backs up and you have a very smelly, messy, issue to deal with. Nature's head has a note that you can improvise a drain tube from the urine collection bottle and then you could plumb it like the Sunmar does to a pit or other options so it would only need the solids emptied about as often as the Sunmar. Here's the manual showing the urine diversion/collection options. But you may need to check your local codes.

I'm curious now that you have a new one if you cleaned out old one if it would act better. I'm running a 2011 Mac and a year ago we had to run several debug software programs and opened it up and cleaned out all the dust that was in the laptop and it started acting normal again. SO had to open his 2012 and clean out all the dust and whatnot and redo the thermal paste that acts as a bridge between the CPU and the heatsink and it started acting normal too. (Both are laptops).

I was the OP on the War against English Ivy, and we basically ended up pulling everything by hand. It was a huge chore. My neighbor had a much smaller patch removed by lawn care pros that said the best way for them was to mow down and cover with 8-12" of mulch and pull the few that manage to come through. I wonder if you could get the same benefit from mowing and laying down several layers of a landscape fabric and leaving alone for a year or 3. I don't know any groundcover that can outcompete the ivy, but I wish you the best of luck! I'm still pulling the few that survived, I really want to save my 100yr old lilac.

We have an old SunMar NE (non-electric) at our cabin. I love not having to go outside to the outhouse. I despise when we have to do a deep clean (i.e., we didn't empty often enough or our "mix" wasn't quite right and the liquid diverter drain clogged.) I can't find an install manual for the mobile so I'm not sure if it has the urine diverter. Ours can develop an odor, but it seems that is only when it isn't being emptied often enough or you have, like in our case, a clog. We have it in an enclosed, attached shed so it isn't a small space space and it is not built very tight so there is air leaks 24/7. We also have an additional large, louvered and screened vent next to it for heavy-use months since ours doesn't have the electric powered vent. It can be messy to clean out, they do not hold a ton so guests may have to take the finishing tray out to dump. They recommend adding peat moss in that needs to be stored and creates a bit of dust when dumped in. All that aside, I do overall recommend them but I'd wait to hear from someone that has used them in a boat or RV. For our off-grid cabin it is just about perfect, but in a tight spot it might not be ideal.

T Blankinship, I hope it works well for you! I've ordered a set of "toilet magnets" that supposedly once the toilet is clean helps to do something to keep the minerals from staining the tank or re-depositing in the bowl. (They get placed into the tank) I don't know if it will work, but it's non-toxic and worth a shot. I'll reply after a month or so once I've received them if they seem to do anything.

So I had a "mic drop" moment cleaning my toilet. I've got hard water that puts brown stains in the bottom front of my "newish" toilets in the siphon jet area (where no normal toilet brush will go) no matter how frequently I clean the toilets. I tried everything: a bottle brush, something similar to toothbrush (but more industrial), scotch-bright pads, nothing fully worked. I got frustrated and searched and found a product that was well-reviewed and realized it's only ingredient in it was citric acid. I have a huge bag of that and it was cheap. The instructions were 8oz in the tank & 8oz in the bowl (with residual water for both). Let sit and then flush ( I left it for an hour or so). My tank was clear from the the rust and the brown mineral deposit at the bottom of the toilet was gone. This isn't going to help anything that is more day-to-day should be scrubbed away, but for mineral deposits it seems to work really well with zero work. The citric acid should only be added to plain water, so if you need to scrub with regular cleaner, do so first and flush that water away.

I am glad you resurrected this post, because I wonder too. I've been putting my citrus peels into the garbage disposal, but would love to compost.

For an older house I would really put water consideration into the decision to paint. (http://www.oldlouisville.com/circa1900/brick-structures.htm, https://www.oldhouseweb.com/how-to-advice/brick-houses.shtml, etc) Old brick homes (I have one) were meant to breathe and get wet, then dry out, when you start putting on paint or waterproofing to the surface, you change how that material was originally intended to function. We had to put serious consideration into even adding insulation to walls we have opened, as the standard method of insulating/vapor barriers could have trapped water in our walls and weakened the mortar. It can be done correctly, but read up on everything you can before you start

You could maybe try to develop a spring box that would fill in even the drier months, and then just filter smaller amounts for use with something like a Berkey filter. At our cabin we use spring water we pump to a 55 gallon drum. Then, for cooking and drinking  I filter first with a prefilter (see later in post) and then using 2 stainless steel stock pots and an inexpensive ceramic filter that I made a into a diy "Berkey" I use the drip filtration. I keep 1-2 large stock pots of that filtered water, and for other applications (that we don't ingest) we just use prefiltered water (run through a fabric filter like felt to remove sediment).