DIY Solar Shower Ideas

Lets make no mistake about it people energy costs are on the rise, however there ways to cut your energy costs drastically. There are several DIY Solar Showers out today. 14% of your annual electric bill is from your water heating system, so by using solar showers you will cut your energy bill down.

One of the most popular DIY solar shower out today is the solar shower bag. A solar shower bag is a heavy duty black 5 gallon bag. You fill it up with 5 gallons and hang the bag in the sun. When it’s full it will weigh around 42 pounds. It comes with a flexible water hose and on/off spigot. It usually takes around 3 hours to heat the water up to 140 degrees in the sun and is a fun way to take an out door shower. Used by many campers and can be bought for around $10. Some campers even make there own out of black garbage bags to save even more money!

Another popular DIY solar shower is an outdoor stand up shower. This is similar to the shower bag but instead of the shower hose you use pvc black pipe up a home made frame and attach a shower head. Use black pipe since black conducts more energy from the sun. People use these by the pool side and out by the gardens. You can purchase these different types of solar showers on ebay from $60 to over $150. However with a little research you can find the perfect plan for you and build it yourself for way cheaper.

All you need to build a simple diy solar shower is a garden hose, a bag or hard plastic black container to store your water in, pvc pipe and some different pvc fittings. Plus you’ll need some wood to build your frame. All of this can be purchased for well under $50 at your local hardware stores. Remember it doesn’t have to look pretty, it just has to work!

Here is one plan to a diy solar shower I built last year. This is real basic and simple to build and it works! I took a 55 gallon plastic drum I had laying a round. It was blue so I painted it black and cleaned it out really good. If you don’t have a 55 gallon drum you can find them or smaller 30 gallon plastic drums at hardware stores or online for under $100 dollars. I bought mine from bay tech containers for $20, they will even add a water faucet built in for under $10.

I built a frame out of old 2x4’s I had laying around. I then built a frame on my small pump house roof and installed the water drum on its side to the frame. I made sure it was in a location where I could get my water hose to and where it would get proper sunlight. I then installed a water shower head in to the drum. I drilled a 5/8 hole on top of the water drum so I could fill the container. I putted a 5/8 screen over the hole so nothing would get into the drum and contaminate the water. This also allows air to get into the drum for a faster water flow.

I filled the water drum and then after just 3 hours in the sun I had warm water! When it’s just 80 degrees outside the roof is at 130 degrees so you see it doesn’t take long for the water to heat up. Sometimes it was to hot so I had to run an extra water hose line into the shower head to adjust the water temp. This was fairly easy I simply took the shower head off and installed a pvc pipe with a T fitting and ran two lines, one from the water drum and the other from the cold water hose. After about 1 hour of labor I had built my own DIY solar shower.

There are many ways of doing this and many idea’s on the internet today. With a little research and creative thinking on your part you to can GO GREEN and start saving money today!