FINALLY A PRODUCT THAT GIVES YOU TRUE MONITOR READINGS
Horst Dynamics Inc has developed new probes for black and gray holding tanks. These probes address a problem that has plagued the RV industry for years.
RVers are familiar with their beautiful control panels in RVs that reveal, at the touch of a button, the exact levels in the fresh, gray and black holding tanks. How frustrating it is, after just having "dumped", to see the monitor panel indicating that the wastewater tanks are still 2/3 full! You know darn well that they are empty!
Practically every RV owner is familiar with this problem. There are many band-aids that temporarily work. These temporary fixes include flushing products, spray wands, chemicals, and the advice that one should drive around on a bumpy road with ice cubes in the tank. Many RVers would like to spend their precious vacation time thinking about things other than their holding tanks.
John Vander Horst is a serial inventor who lives in the Denver area. He retired early and bought an RV. After upgrading from his Lance camper to a fifth wheeler at age 66 he encountered things on his rig that needed improvement. His first invention was a towing mirror that mounts rigidly to the existing mirror surface of the towing vehicle and can therefore use the existing remote control for adjustment. The Tow-N-See mirror (www.townsee.com) has been awarded multiple patents in a variety of countries and is sold in Europe, the US and Canada. In the Netherlands it received 2nd place as "accessory of the year" in 2005.
The Horst Miracle Probe is John's second invention for the RV industry. The Horst Miracle Probe replaces the existing sensors in the black and gray tanks. The probes fit the same 3/8" diameter holes and use identical grommets to make a seal. The probes work with the existing monitor and wiring harness making it simple to implement the upgrade. Once installed, the customer experiences a dramatic improvement in accuracy and reliability for the tank monitor. Empty tanks will now indicate as being empty.
The short probe at the right in the picture below is a standard model. The two probes to the left of it are a Horst Miracle Probe for a black wastewater tank in the middle and a Horst Miracle Probe for a gray wastewater tank at the left. All of these probes are installed in the same way. They are pressed into 3/8" holes in the tank wall. The black flanged rubber bushing is then compressed by tightening the nut to create a long-lasting watertight seal.
Normally, after a short time of usage, all parts on the inside of a black or gray water tank, including the probes, get covered with a residue that is somewhat conductive. The conductive head of a standard probe has a rather long line of contact with the rubber bushing and is located close to the tank wall. This makes it easy for electrical current to leak from the probe head to the tank wall and to other problem heads. The conductive residue creates a short circuit. This is the reason why regular probes fail in this environment.
Horst Miracle Probes reduce current leakage through the conductive residue to a bare minimum. They do this by positioning the conductive head much further from the tank wall and by minimizing the amount of conductive residue that can form on the path between the head and the tank wall. The gray water probe (at the left) has a spiral probe point at its end that serves as the conductive head. This head is separated from the tank wall by a narrow shaft covered with Teflon tubing that fits into a small plastic body. The spiral probe point is internally connected to the brass stud while all other portions are completely insulated. To make this probe fail, electricity has to be conducted through gunk that would have to stick to the thin Teflon tubing. Testing has shown that this is for all practical purposes impossible, especially because Teflon is a non wetting material and "self cleaning".
The black water probe (in the middle) uses the same principle but includes a "roof" to prevent tissue and other solids from covering the probe wire. The "roof" can be oriented properly from the outside of the tank by rotating the threaded brass stud so that the milled flat section on the end of the stud is down and the roof part is up.
Packages of 4 probes each are available for black tanks as well as gray tanks to serve the after market. In addition cartons of 100 probes each for black and gray tanks are available for the OEM market. Dealers that sell the probes, create employment for their service department. Many customers do not want to install the probes themselves. For the OEM's the product creates an opportunity to improve the quality of the RV's they manufacture. Every RVer is looking forward to a solution of this problem.
Manufactured by
Horst Dynamics Inc.
Denver, Colorado, USA
