Shower and Bathroom possibilities

[fornesto]

In our experience, every decent campground has a nice bathroom and shower building. Even if we had a built-in shower, I'd still want to use the real thing where available. I would ask the question of where you will be camping. If you're truly going to be off the grid, you might want a shower. In my experience, cheap good showers are easy to come by and not worth the effort and expense to replicate in a teardrop. Just a thought.

[Wimperdink]

In our experience, every decent campground has a nice bathroom and shower building. Even if we had a built-in shower, I'd still want to use the real thing where available. I would ask the question of where you will be camping. If you're truly going to be off the grid, you might want a shower. In my experience, cheap good showers are easy to come by and not worth the effort and expense to replicate in a teardrop. Just a thought.

I have to agree wholeheartedly with this. If your truely off the grid, showering outside of the teardrop is ok if your only in front of bears and lizards and birds. If your in a campground, choose those with facilities onsite.

[mikeschn]

Dee Bee,

I'm dreaming about your Standup TD design again. Did you ever figure out a way to make the sides hard sides in the area of the bathroom?

Mike...

To build on earlier ideas. Go to the store and get one of the sprayer heads usually found at your kitchen sink. Nice flow patter and a "dead man's valve". Took the RV type shower head off the shower in our boat and replaced it with one of these. Worked great. Great shower in 2 or three gallowns of water. I still like my pressure cooker water heater (see album) and the pressure cooker pot doubles as a "wash basin" that can be heated up on a burner to keep the water nice and hot while actually doing the dishes.

Cheers,

Gus

I see where y'all are coming from. I'm so lost on what I really want to do now. As I mentioned before, I want it all for nothing.....or so it seems.

I really like the size of the teardrop and even a tad bigger would work. I love the low profile and light weight for towing so if I could just figure out how to get a shower (and can) the wife would approve of (fair amount of HOT water and accompanied holding tanks), I would be happy!

Thanks, guys.

I don't think you can have everything, but you can come close....





http://www.nfdc.net/home/cbdb/Teardrop%20Designs.htm

Dee Bee

[2bits]

I think it is a great concept and would solve the famous "where's the bathroom" question!

[greasywheats]

Llyod Christmas- I don't thiink it has been suggested yet, but you really should consider a shower tent (eg- Cabellas) and Zodi propane hot water heater. Its the setup we use for our TD (see pic) and it is awesome.





You'll be looking at a $249 complete solution and can maintain the integrity and space of your teardrop. With this setup, you can take long, hot showers in privacy. I field tested it in my backyard and used it on a 10-day TD trip on Vancouver Island with the wife and dog. The wife scoffed at it at first, but the first time she used it on our road trip- she was a convert and loved it. Its capacity is only determined by the amount of water and propane you supply (both of which can be fairly significant with some planning)...if you mostly camp in campgrounds with a water hookup, you're set, as the Zodi can be supplied directly from a outside tap. And if you add a portable toilet, you've got yourself a private privy! Check 'em out and good luck!

[jimqpublic]

Here in California few of the federal campgrounds have shower facilities.

Our trailer has a water heater and an outside shower faucet. I have a Paha Que shower tent- which is the best equipped shower setup I've ever used. Normally we fill a "solar shower" water bag from with hot water from the trailer and use that in the shower tent. That lets me put the tent in a convenient spot and also reduces water consumption. My son and I can use less than 2 gallons between us. My daughter and wife require a full 2.5 gallon bag each. Depending on the location we either collect the grey water using Paha-Que's waterproof tub floor and a sump pump or we let it drain.

This is all well and good for extended stays in nice weather. For one-nighters it's a lot of setup, and for cold weather it's... cold! My ideal setup for a small trailer restroom would be a "wet bath" using the Thetford bench style cassette toilet and formed pan such as many of the big popup campers use. The dimension of this setup is 26" x 34". Standing headroom would be nice but not required. For good weather and long stays I would probably keep using the tent. At RV parks or campgrounds with facilities we would use those. The enclosed bathroom would be great for the short stays and winter.

Since the cassette toilets and matching pans are so horribly expensive- around $800 or more and hard to find if you aren't Fleetwood- a good porta potti and normal shower pan would do just fine.