How to make a simple solar shower system for offgrid living and homesteading.
It is 120 degrees today in the high desert of California. We are in the middle of an extreme heat advisory by the national weather center. This sunny hot weather we are having is heating up the water for our solar shower system nicely. Almost, too nice. We actually have to let the water jugs cool off before bathing with the water because it's so warm!
The solar shower system we implemented for our off the grid desert casita is extremely simple and inexpensive to make. This would also be good for camping and going to the beach.
We simply bought two 5 gallon jugs at Walmart for approximately $8 each.
For the water pumping shower head system we bought this compact and portable shower system called Pure Clean by Pyle. It is on Amazon.com for $39.99. This shower system is really neat. It has a small pump that you can charge via USB. One charge last 50 mins and that lasts us about two weeks. We do our best to conserve water and energy by being mindful of our consumption.
- We also put together this PVC receptacle for water and to house the pump. We used a 4 in round PVC pipe about 18" tall. A 4" PVC cap and PCV glue sealed the bottom to create a vase like vessel for the solar pump. A 4" PVC pipe is the perfect size for the solar pump to fit into standing straight up. This is important because the water feeds into the pump via "gills" towards the bottom and this allows us to utilize every drop of water in the container. This cost roughly $10 and all the supplies were found at Home Depot.
This solar shower is super effective and easy to set up. We leave the 5 gallon jugs of water outside all day. Then by evening the water is warmed up, cause no one really likes to take a freezing cold shower, unless it's 120 degrees outside- LOL. The jugs of water are brought inside to our bathroom where we have a bathtub/ shower stall. The PVC pipe is filled with the warm water and the Pure Clean shower system pump is placed inside the PVC water vessel. The water vessel holds a good amount of water to rinse off, then soap up, refill the water vessel and rinse again. Once the pump is in water, hang the shower head on the hook provided, and push the on button. Warm bathing water comes out of the shower head with surprisingly strong pressure.
That's it! That's our solar shower in our desert homestead. We really like this system because it was easy and effective. We got great results without much effort. In the future we would like to purchase a small school bus for our road trip travels and implement this system as the onboard shower system. A few bunk beds and toileting system would round this bus out and make it the ultimate simple traveler for us. As a family of 8, the choices get extremely limited for what kind of car we can have that seats all of us. This could also be a bad ass family bus as well!
We hope you liked this post and benefitted from reading how easy, simple, and effective a solar shower can be.
There is power in being self sufficient!
Shining Sun high in the desert sky! We are in Solar Maximus! LOL, doesn't that term sound super funny. We get a big kick out of it. Has anyone ever heard that phrase before. Leave a comment below if you have.
creative idea , nice to read ! thank you.
Thanks!
I just went over to Amazon and bought one. We have one of those camp shower bags but it's such a pain to fill it and hoist it overhead. I like to shower outside in collected rainwater in the summer and let the water soak the grass. We live rurally and the water bill is $150. A month. Anything we can do to conserve water gets done here. I even encourage the males to pee outside! Im trying to think of a solution for the females. I believe outhouses are illegal in most of USA.
I'm so glad this post was of use to you. You will enjoy the water pressure on this as well. Our boys pee outside sometimes here as well. For the ladies we have a. Little outhouse type building, but inside is simp,y a composting toilet. That is essentially a bucket with a toilet box and seat built around it and we fill it with peet moss, for natural order control and composting. That is a crazy high water hill! No well, available where you are at? Maybe you can look at having one installed. Or a water tank.
We have 2 rainwater catchers total 120 gallons. They stopped allowing wells to people on less than3 acres due to the ground water being depleted. We are semi arid and drought is always a concern. We would like to have a cistern put in. We have the advantage of being alongside a dry creek bed. A few times a year we could pump out massive amounts of water.
That fits perfectly to the DIY solar water heater we posted ;)
Really? Well, like the saying goes great minds think alike. Actually we fitted this together because it was easy, cheap, and functional. That was our main goal. Nothing to fancy here. I am happy to show more people that things can be done this way; easy, cheap and functional. I will have to try to find your solar shower and maybe gain some tips from how u did yours. Thanks for the comment.
Good read! Thanks
Thank you! ☺️
I was looking everywhere for a shower head with a pump. Thank you so much. I was just going to buy one of those outdoor shower systems for camping for like a bazzillion dollars like $260 plus TX. LOL but hey you saved the day.
Oh yay! That's awesome. I'm glad that you were able to benefit from this idea. It so easy and cheap!
I lived in the high desert for most of my life and those summers are the worst. What is your plan for the winter months when the freeze comes?
It doesn't really feeeze here in California. It's a little cooler but the sun still shines bright enough that it warms the water and takes out the chill.
Hrmm, in the Antelope Valley it would freeze every winter
Ah, I see. This is Southern cali. 1 mile from mexico border.
haahahha freeze???? haha never freezes here in 32nd parralel
u need some soil from my backyard or just somewhere less sandy to mix into that sand for the cactus to grow!!!! ill give u more succulents t grw out there too so it can be really colorful!!!
Lol. I'm planning a move to Mexico pretty soon. Dunno how much more I want to do here in the desert. I just rent it here. 2 casitas for $500 bucks. Just seeing what the desert is all about. First time living someplace like this I'll make a post about it so people can understand more. It's just I'm not sure how candid I want to be on steemit. Never used social media before so I'm hesitant to put myself all out there
oh it will be an epic post! yes and mexico is cool but u should do ecuador vilcabamba ecuador i already know people MANy peopel who live there like tristan and jes they have kids and had a totallly flordie and chemtrail free family like off the grid outside the US governmemt etc their kids didnt get all the vaccine and blood taken an shit ..they are pure humans born in zion
and anyway vilcabamba u can live for $130 a month ina NICE HOSTEL with ur own room and private bathroom and shower, even cheaper if u just wanna ust have a bed and share bathhroom liek abunk bed, some places eveb let u camp in ur own tent like less than 3 bucks a night or evena whole month for like $50 fora tiny lil garage house with bathroom but AMAZINg vie, like u can get cheap
but foor like $300 a month u can have a MANSION an eco mansion two story huge kitchen hugebalcony with ur own farm its amaziing