NW Conversions 20 Gallon Wheel Well Water Tank - Right (SP-R-20)

Passenger-side 20 gallon tank that tucks in ahead of the wheel well, where the slider step usually kills the space anyway.

On the passenger side of a Sprinter, the wheel well and the slider step conspire to waste a meter of floor. The SP-R-20 is shaped to take that back: 45" long, sitting forward of the wheel well, low enough to disappear under a bed platform or a bench.

Twenty gallons, about 190 lb full. If your galley is on the driver side and you want the water opposite it for balance, this is the tank that goes there.

Should you buy this tank, or a different one in the range?

• Buy the SP-R-20 if the tank belongs on the passenger side and you want a low, easy-to-hide profile.
• Buy the SP-L-20 for the driver-side equivalent.
• Buy the SP-R-22 if you are short on length — it does 22 gallons in 31 inches.
• Buy the SP-R-33 if you have 20" of wall height and want the capacity.

Confirmed fitment

Manufacturer measurements are 45" long × 16" tall × 12.5" deep; the listed shipping dimension is 45 × 13 × 16 in. Design your cabinet gap around 13".

Specifications

These tanks are not pressure vessels. They must be vented to atmosphere — a sealed tank will balloon on a hot day and collapse inward when the pump draws it down.

What ships to you

• (1) SP-R-20 20 gallon rotomolded tank
• Fittings, hose and mounting hardware sold separately

Installing it: what actually happens

The passenger-side position puts the tank close to the slider door, which is good news for a gravity fill — a short run to an exterior fill port on the passenger flank is about as simple as van plumbing gets.

It is bad news for road spray and salt if you run any lines outside the body. Keep everything inboard of the pinch weld and sleeve anything that crosses metal.

• Short gravity-fill run to a passenger-side exterior port — take advantage of it.
• Draw from the low 1/2" port on the open end for full usable capacity.
• Bench-drill any 1.5" ports; deburr and rinse before threading.
• Continuous support under the 45" length, two straps over the top.

Questions we get asked about this part

Do I have to drill the ports myself?

On the wheel-well tanks the 1/2" NPT ports arrive open and ready to thread. The 1.5" ports are spun closed at the factory so you only open the ones your plumbing actually uses. Open them with a hole saw on the bench, before the tank goes anywhere near the van, and vacuum the shavings out. Plastic chips inside a fresh water tank are a mistake you only make once.

Does the tank need a vent?

Yes. It is designed to run unpressurized. Run a vent line from the top 1.5" port up above the maximum fill level and out through the floor or a body vent. Skip it and the tank will deform on a hot day, then pull its walls in when the pump runs.

How much weight am I adding to the van?

Water weighs roughly 8.34 lb per gallon, so 20 gallons is about 167 lb of payload once full, on top of the dry weight of the tank. Put that number in your build budget before you order rather than after — it is the most commonly forgotten figure in a van conversion.

Can I drink out of it?

The vessel itself is BPA-free food-grade polyethylene, so the tank is potable-rated. What actually determines whether your water is safe to drink is everything downstream of it: the fill port, the hose, the pump and the filtration. We plumb potable systems with NSF-61 rated hose and a carbon block at the tap.

Pairs well with

• Van water tanks and plumbing — the rest of the NW Conversions range

Sold and shipped by Campervan Parts R Us, the parts counter of Noke Van Co. — a working van conversion shop in Roanoke, Virginia. If you are unsure whether this fits your van, email us the year, model and wheelbase and we will check it against a build sheet before you order.