Shower in RV [survey]

[Rick91]

Dear RVer,

I am a student designer, and for my graduation I will be designing a shower (for in the RV). What occurs to me is that time under the shower is very limited, because of the water tank. In some RV's there also seem to be warm water issues because of the boiler/ heating tank's capacity.

If you would take time to fill in this survey, it would greatly help me. It will only take about 2 minutes, and for me is to collect some data on whether or not a more luxurious shower would be beneficial for you (for me it would).

Survey link: survey (control + click should open it in a new window)

Thank you very much

[Bumpyroad]

B vans and tiny C"s have had sinks that swing up out of the way, winnebago, and one B had a sink that slid back into the wall and pulled out over the toilet. a fleetwood had a murphy bed, some treks, etc. had beds that raised to the ceiling.
just depends on what exactly one wants.
bumpy

[Rick91]

Bumpyroad wrote:

Deb and Ed M wrote:
I added this to the comments on the survey - but even if I had all the hot water I could stand - I still need a bigger shower, to be able to bend over and shave my legs on occasion...LOL! .

I hope it was Deb making this post.
bumpy

Haha 🙂

Yes, thanks for pointing that out - it's one point of focus for me aswell (bigger shower). I notice that a lot of RV's have a day and a night layout; basically it allows the bed to become a table and vice versa but that's it. Most RV's I have seen from the inside looked nowhere near space- efficient. A lot of them looked super- luxurious, but they didn't seem practical (there are exceptions).

I wondered why, for example, a sink can't slide upwards towards the ceiling.. Might seem strange, but why not, if it wouldn't be too much of a hassle?

[Bumpyroad]

Deb and Ed M wrote:
I added this to the comments on the survey - but even if I had all the hot water I could stand - I still need a bigger shower, to be able to bend over and shave my legs on occasion...LOL! .

I hope it was Deb making this post.
bumpy

[magnusfide]

mlts22 wrote:

Atwood is supposedly coming out with on demand water heaters which supposedly are easy drop in replacements. However, I've not heard a peep on availability.

It's been out a couple of years and the price is finally dropping. Here's a link
http://www.americanrvcompany.com/Atwood-OD-50-On-Demand-Tankless-Water-Heater-50K-BTU-90205-Camper-T...

I'll put that on my Phoenix Cruiser 2551/52 that I have on my Lottery List.:W

[Deb_and_Ed_M]

I added this to the comments on the survey - but even if I had all the hot water I could stand - I still need a bigger shower, to be able to bend over and shave my legs on occasion...LOL! And in a 28' motorhome, I'm not willing to sacrifice more space to a shower, when I can simply use the campground's facilities. When every square inch counts - my shower is much more valuable being used as a pantry, than a shower.

Granted, if I was a full-timer with a huge Class A - my priorities might be different.

[Fire_Instructor]

My shower is the furthest water use appliance from the water hater. I've insulated all of my hot water pipes from the water heater to the shower, and in the morning, I draw my coffee pot water from the shower hot water to "pull" hot water from the water heater down the line. This way, I waste less water, and fill less gray tank getting hot water to the shower stall...

[mlts22]

There are some advances. When I was looking at an upfitted Sprinter from Sportsmobile, they offered what is called a flat plate heater, which is a heat exchanger that removes heat from the diesel engine's cooling system to heat water. It is on demand heat, and if one is on FHU, it can allow a pretty long shower.

Atwood is supposedly coming out with on demand water heaters which supposedly are easy drop in replacements. However, I've not heard a peep on availability.

[Rick91]

@ qtla9111: thanks. I will report my findings 🙂

@ magnusfide: thanks for the suggestion, and thanks for the site. it's a portable water system, exactly what I'm looking into. I will be looking for options on warm showers when boon-docking aswell, I can assume there is only a limited amount of propane. But there's a sun and maybe other options 🙂

Outdoor showering, if the RV allows for that option, does it happen a lot? I know mainly from RVers with kids that they prefer to use the outdoor shower..

[magnusfide]

tempforce wrote:

a better endeavor would be to design a heat pump system that would take care of all heating and hot water requirements. along with all space cooling and food storage requirements. must be compact and energy efficient. preferably able to run off two golf cart batteries and solar panels.
a super light-thin, insulated structural panel would be another option to research.

carrying resources for comfort and the structure are the two worse energy offenders in a r.v. (weight and size of structure and comfort systems)…

Creating a hyper-efficient hot water delivery system to allow for longer showers is my suggestion. When boon-docking, we used one of those LP outdoor shower options outside the rv because we had more privacy. When in a cg that's not an option (privacy) and waltzing to the shower house is not always convenient. Love the on-demand tankless systems and I hope to see the next gen deliver an even better constant hot water flow. Perhaps you can work on that design. Good luck with your degree. Good to see someone focused on their education.

There's ideas at this website btw. http://www.hotcampshowers.com/

[qtla9111]

Road Runners wrote:
Your survey was one sided. We had to answer your questions which may or may not be the right question. I would suggest you redo the survey and add a section at the end for the one doing the survey to write a comment.

Isn't that what a survey is? I think the OP did a great job. Can he improve it? He'll find out once he has some data to look at and may want to do another.

As a participant in the survey, if it's "your" questions than it's not a survey is it?

OP, keep up the good work and please report back to us with your findings.

[Rick91]

@ Just Jeff and Road Runners: the survey is a bit one sided yes, especially for the "why not?" questions. It kinda assumes people like to take showers for however long they want. I am really happy to see that this thread brings more quantitative answers (which I am actually looking for, except I needed some data on shower- usage time (which I actually should have related more to the amount of water in the boiler and fresh water tank) and on the amount of time it takes for water to heat with a boiler.

@ Just Jeff: It's not for just an A 🙂 thanks for the interest! I actually really see myself living a free as in freedom lifestyle, so I have a personal interest in this project (which is a good motivation for me).

correction: I mean free as in freedom of traveling/ being on the move

[Rick91]

@ Botts: Yes, but that assumes a full hook up site. My concern is that this is not always possible, and that's where I'd like to design for 🙂

@ Handbasket: I've read quite a bit about the navy shower. Turn it on for a minute to get wet, turn it off, use soap and shampoo, turn it on for another minute. Quite effective/ efficient, but it is my challenge to look for more luxurious ways to shower

@ RangerJay: thanks, that are some interesting suggestions. I did not look into the wet/ dry bath issue yet. It's quite a challenge since there are so many different types of RV. Plus, I don't get to design a whole RV (which is unfortunate, but maybe one day I will). I am still exploring if it is possible to build some kind of shower which can be built-in existing RV's.

@ Tempforce: Thanks for the tips, I will definetely look into those systems. The main challenge is indeed the amount of resources available in an RV, therefore I am also exploring options on re-using the already- warm shower water (with a water filter)

Thanks for the replies ! 🙂

[Road_Runners]

Your survey was one sided. We had to answer your questions which may or may not be the right question. I would suggest you redo the survey and add a section at the end for the one doing the survey to write a comment.

[Just_Jeff]

Yeah - sounds like a little more understanding could improve your survey. Here's a summary of the above, with a some added ideas.

- Many RVers camp with full hook-ups, so water supply and waste tank supply is unlimited.
- Even if the hot water heater capacity isn't sufficient (which is rare), there are on-demand water heaters where tank capacity isn't a problem.
- When dry camping, freshwater supply is a limiting factor. In this case, creating a higher-pressure and lower-volume shower head would really improve shower performance for a given level of water use. Check out Oxygenics brand shower heads.
- Also when dry camping, many people just use water to wet themselves down, then they turn off the water to soap up, and turn it back on to rinse. That's a Navy shower, military shower, sea shower, etc...but I think the intent of your study is to have a more comfortable traditional shower with no behavior modification. Still, something to be aware of...some RVers don't care about this, and some would prefer a traditional shower all the time, and that could skew your results.

Hopefully something good will come from your study (better than "just an A")!

[elsique]

You have to be smart about RV showering. Wet yourself down and cut the water off while you shampoo or lather up and then turn water back on to rinse off. This is not how I shower at home but I waste a whole lot more water at the house than I do when in the RV. The RV showering technic is more environmentally considerate but not as fulfilling. It gets the job done!