Installed Larger Sink in 2021 400

manyman297

One of the things I’ve always disliked was the tiny sink and low-profile faucet. We do a fair bit of dishes in there and ineveitably I splash water down the front of the kitchen cabinets because of how you have to angle the faucet to clean larger pots. I also disliked the spray from that faucet. It felt like a toy.

I have seen this mod done several times with the exact same sink but no details on how to do it. So here we are.

Removal of the sink couldn’t be easier. Undo the water connections. Just remove the rubber grommets and the screws are right there. Break the caulking seal and pull it out.

The new sink has a larger diameter than the Dometic. I suck at using a jigsaw (and I’m OCD) so I did it the hard way with an MDF template I made. 

Using a template bit I was able to trace the MDF template and make an (almost) perfect circle…you can see where I nicked an edge with the jigsaw cutting out the bulk of the countertop. Remember I said I sucked with a jigsaw.

Here is the circle cut and I used painter’s tape to trace the outline of the sink’s flange. This will come in handy when I got to silicone the sink in place. 

I’d go into detail about how I made sure the sink hole was centered in the circular base cabinet but I didn’t really have a good technique. I just made sure I had equidistant space around it. 

Here you can see how large the new sink is. Much deeper as well. 

The new sink drain luckily falls right in line with where the old one was so this made things easy. Instead of using a hacksaw to cut the pipe I was able to get a PVC pipe cutter around it which made for zero mess. 

With the new drain in place I used a coupler to reconnect the line (sorry, no pic of that).

the faucet hole was straightforward but I would caution that you need to make sure you have clearance behind the faucet if you choose one like I have. The lever rotates front to back. I was fortunate to have just enough room but other faucets may not work (or you’d have to rotate them 90 degrees with the controls facing you).

Below are some final pics. I may lose the sink cover. It’s big and bulky and we really don’t find ourselves needing that as extra counter space. Or I may make a thinner one out of HDPE. I chose this faucet over the pull down ones because I have an undersink water filter installed and the hose for the pull down would just add more clutter down there.  



I know I’m leaving out details on the install so feel free to ask me anything if you decide to do this mod. It’s my favorite mod next to adding the Maxxfan. 

dsfdogs

This is exactly what nuCamp should install!! This is fabulous and so much more functional and good looking too. Good job!

manyman297

@dsfdogs Thanks! Yeah, it’s funny because I was all in maybe $250 and the Dometic stuff is so overpriced. I’d imagine this would be less expensive for Nucamp to install especially when purchased in bulk. 

I also failed to mention the main reason I did this was because the Dometic faucet started leaking. 

Denny16

A very nice professional job manyman297, it came out look grand, and appears a lot more functional.  I want to do something similar down the road.  The space around the sink is not really useable anyway, so might as well put in a larger sink.
 Cheers 

manyman297

Thanks @Denny16. I didn’t originally plan to do it but once that faucet started leaking I figured I might as well. I don’t like to mess with original equipment too much just due to resale but I feel like this could potentially appeal to more people vs. what Nucamp has in place. 

VictoriaP

@manyman297 I think this is a definite upgrade. It looks as though it *could* be stock (and it absolutely should be!) I think you did an excellent job with this project, and it won’t be an issue at resale, that’s for sure.

manyman297

@VictoriaP Thank you! We’ve only used it once so the jury is out but so far we love it.

Denny16

What Victoria said, it should only enhance the trailer’s resale value, as it looks like an OEM job.

Horigan

I did a similar upgrade.  Looks great.  When sanitizing your water system, be sure to rinse the chlorine from the sink thoroughly as I found that sink is more prone to corrosion from chlorine.  It was easy enough to clean it with steel wool.

Oinfront

@manyman297 Looks great! This is something I want to do as well. Did you have to reposition the top hinge on the left door by chance?

manyman297

Horigan said:

I did a similar upgrade.  Looks great.  When sanitizing your water system, be sure to rinse the chlorine from the sink thoroughly as I found that sink is more prone to corrosion from chlorine.  It was easy enough to clean it with steel wool.

Thanks for the heads up!

manyman297

Oinfront said:

@manyman297 Looks great! This is something I want to do as well. Did you have to reposition the top hinge on the left door by chance?

Yeah. Sorry, completely skipped that whole part. Honestly it wasn’t that big of a deal. Instead of trying to scribe around the base of the sink I just cut straight angled cuts and moved the hinge down. You can use a forstner bit or dedicated hinge drilling jig to do this. 

Richard_R

@manyman297: Really nice job — thanks for posting. This is a modification that is definitely in my future. 

I’m curious about the “undersink filter” system you’ve installed. As newbies, this is something we’re struggling with. It seems kind of silly to have a sink that produces suspect water, so I’ve been trying to figure out the best way to filter it. What system are you using? Had you thought about installing a filter onto the water pump outlet? This would provide clean water to all of the outlets — kitchen sink, bathroom sink, and shower. I haven’t really started investigating that possibility — it’s only a thought experiment at this point.

Thanks…

manyman297

@Richard_R

Thanks! It's easily my favorite mod so far. 

Regarding filtering...so those Camco ones that go outside at the pump will filter the major stuff from the water but my understanding is that it's not catching much of the smaller-sized particles. The unit I installed filters really well (I have the same filter on my home's kitchen sink). 

Full disclosure: We don't drink cold water from the sink. We bring a cooler with ice in it for shorter trips. Bottled water for longer trips. BUT we make coffee with this water so taste is a concern. The boiling of the water should kill off any pathogens too.

You can buy one of those huge three-filter systems but we don't RV enough to justify the cost and it's just another thing to store.

Pokey

@Richard_R I installed this filter:
Waterdrop 15UA-UF 0.01 μm Ultra... https://www.amazon.com/dp/B085G3GQFG?ref=ppx_pop_mob_ap_share

Works well, don't notice much difference in the flow. 

Richard_R

Thanks for the info. I ended up replacing the sink and installing an under-sink Epic filter (https://www.epicwaterfilters.com/collections/home-filtration). It did reduce the flow a bit, but the water tasted good and I had no qualms about drinking it.

Alas, we sold our beloved TAB this past year and purchased an Ember 190MSL (https://www.emberrv.com/rvs/overland-series/). The TAB was great, but we needed a little more room for our two dogs.