ForgeCorvus wrote:So, we've got Holomon whos a Nay and Featherstick is an Aye.
Anyone dropped a fiver (£10 gets you both the 'tap' and the 'shower' heads) and bought one ??
For me the jury is out until somebody can give me these answers:
Can you have a good shower, while only using 1 minute of flow time ?
How many times can wash your hands with a flowing litre of water both with and without the 'tap' head ? (Running water is the best way to wash your hands)
How many of these to make up the same weight as an average solar shower ?
They seem to have no moving parts, is this true?
Answers:
No
Dont know unless i actually try it
20 litres
True
ForgeCorvus wrote:What is the dry weight of the units? In other words how much does all the plastic etc weigh.
I know that a Kilogram was defined as the weight of one litre of fresh water (which is defined as 1000 cubic centimetres)
Right, i have been to the mancave and have done the science bit:
A 1L Volvic bottle (thats all i had to hand at the time) weighs in at 27g
My solar shower weighs in at 370g
Bearing in mind that some other makes of 1L bottle may be slightly lighter or heavier depending on construction and the amount of plastic that is used in the manufacturing process.
Then add the few extra grams for the spray head and straw and you may just tip the 30g mark.
Just got back from a week in a mining town in Zimbabwe. Even in the civilised environs of a relatively decent lodge and limited visits to the bush, there were plenty of opportunities to see where this might be useful, so I've ordered the tap and shower kit.
With a good bit of landscaping in the back garden to do, there'll be plenty of opportunity to get properly mucky and then test it out.
I'll also give it to our humanitarian team to have a look at.
So, this arrived last week and I've "field-tested" the shower kit. I was landscaping the back garden on Saturday morning and after 4 hours I was covered in a crust of sweat-and-dust. To answer the questions:
Can you have a good shower, while only using 1 minute of flow time ?
Two litres warmed in the sun wasn't quite enough to get me fully clear, I refilled with another litre from the paddling pool. But the shower attachment worked very well and it saved trekking dust through the house as I was able to shower on the patio.
How many times can wash your hands with a flowing litre of water both with and without the 'tap' head ? (Running water is the best way to wash your hands)
I didn't test this but on the basis of the shower head I'd say you could do it several times with a good thorough clean. I remember being by the side of the road in Central Asia trying to wash our hands from 500ml bottle of water - "catch" a palmful from the bottle someone was tipping, losing most of it, lather the hands up, try to catch another palmful, never quite getting all the dirt or the soap off. The tap head would have made it a lot easier and given a more thorough clean. This is really important
How many of these to make up the same weight as an average solar shower ?
Didn't weigh it but can do this evening.
They seem to have no moving parts, is this true?
Yes, it's made up of the nozzle with the holes, and an air inlet in the side. The inlet is connected to the air tube so water is replaced with air in the up-ended bottle enabling a smooth flow. Simplicity itself.
Some other points:
The nozzle fits very snugly into a standard 2-litre bottle and has 3 o-rings on a taper presumably to fit into larger bottles.
Our Humanitarian adviser liked them, says that 2-liter bottles abound in emergency and disaster situations so it would be simplicity itself to use these.
If these guys are serious about humanitarian/disaster applications they could replace the wordage on the back of the packing with sime simple diagrams.
They are a bit pricey at 13.95 delivered but that is the public retail price, I imagine the big disaster agencies could get the price down.
They make excellent watering cans for seedlings as the flow is very gentle!
The set comes with a bit of cord for hanging a shower but I'd prefer some sort of treadle system which could be used without touching the bottle: tie the bottle up about one third down its body so that it hangs bottom down. Tie another piece of string around the neck so that if pulled it inverts. Tie the other end of that piece to a pivoted batten so that standing on the batten inverts the bottle and starts the water flow. I haven't tried this out yet though.
I'll be off to Kyrgyzstan in a week, so I'll bring it with me for a longer test.
I think it's an excellent idea making a 2-litre bottle more versatile and improving the range of options to help people maintain hygiene and health in challenging situations.
I weighed one nozzle this morning - 21gms, which if memory serves is also the amount of weight the body loses at the moment of death, leading some more metaphysically-inclined people to surmise that this is the weight of the soul.
I digress.
To sum up, I think this is a great piece of kit which could be usefully included in preps, camping trips, humanitarian missions etc. and I'll be keeping mine.
