Navy Shower Water Use?

[sailing_gal]

During my trans-Atlantic crossing with 3 of us on-board, we found that it took 1 liter of water going through the hoses before the hot water got into the shower from the hot water tank. We took to collecting that and recycling it. Just waiting on the hot water wastes a lot of water. Also, I always use a "soap-up" valve as mentioned above. Wet yourself down, turn switch the valve, soap up, then open the valve and rinse off. Best contraption to have because you don't have to balance the hot and cold again.

[dannc]

As mentioned above, it is all about the shower head. Get one with restricted flow and a head that allows one to select different spray patterns. This uses far less water and is more than adequate. Some shower heads also have a way to turn off the water which makes a Navy shower easier.

We have used restricted flow shower heads in our houses for years to save money/water. When we lived in the city, water rates were expensive and that was decades ago. Don't wanna know what they are today. We put in restricted flow water heads to save water/money. When we moved to our house in the country, I put back the regular shower heads in the city house and took the hand held ones with us. I took a shower with the regular shower head and was shocked at how much water was used/wasted. We would not run out of hot water with the restricted shower heads but I could tell we would if we had been using the regular shower heads.

We are now on a well so water is sorta kinda free. It really is not since we have to pay for power to get the water, and at some point, we will need a new well pump. So we minimize our water usage.

I have measured our shower head water usage and it is less than 1 GPM with the spray pattern that uses the most water. Don't really use that pattern for very long. My guess is that a 10 minute shower would be 5-10 gallons and I don't take a 10 minute shower.

A few years ago we spent two weeks on a boat and with fresh water toilets and three people taking showers we were using 250 gallons of water every 4-5 days. I was really shocked at how much water the shower heads were using.

Later,
Dan

[Clivevon]

Just found out what a navy shower is. Having a caravan (RV) & a boat I got used to showering that way years ago & got to prefer it - you can work up a proper lather with the soap before it gets washed away. Now I always shower that way at home too. I am not a fan of water restricted shower heads though - I like a thorough rinse to get rid of the soap - you either do it quick with a good flow or slowly with a weak one - IMHO the restricted shower heads are a fallacy & a pain to use.
I keep meaning to fit an on/off shower tap on the boat but you get used to resetting the hot/cold taps quickly.
Saving the initial cold water through the shower head is a good idea but is it still fit to drink then??

[joelhemington]

Originally Posted by er9

removing 44gal holding tank from my v-berth and considering replacing it with a fresh water tank. while at a dock i would plumb it directly to the shower and use it just for that, at sea it would be a secondary backup freshwater tank.

im trying to downsize from the giant 44gal tank so i can get some of the space back for sail storage. im trying to determine what size i should make it. it be nice if i could get four or five 'Navy showers' from it before having to re-fill it.

Anyone care to guestimate how much water a single quick shower uses? I'm guessing no more than 5 gallons. If i could get away with a 20gal tank that would probably be ideal size.

Your typical household shower uses three gallons a minute depending on the spray head. Not sure how you intend to pressurize this - higher pressure systems use less water for the same effect. Without some sort of pressurization all you're going to get is a slow drizzle which could eat a lot of water.

[Clivevon]

I'm guessing the fresh water toilets used more water than the showers? What is it with fresh water toilets anyway? Don't understand. I know you get a smell when you first use a seawater loo after a while but that soon goes away - open a porthole & close the door?
Actually using your (limited) fresh water to flush the loo on a boat seems an extreme solution to a very minor issue??

[stormalong]

On our last major ocean crossing, New Zealand to British Columbia we had three long passages. I wanted reserve water so I recycled about 100 2 liter pop bottles. We were able to do cockpit showers with about 1 liter. This was all warm weather so heating the water was unnecessary.

[Hudson Force]

We bathed while cruising with the use of Joy detergent which lathers well in salt water. We had unlimited buckets of sea water for bathing and rinsing followed by a quart of fresh water for rinsing away the salt water. Rinsing with the hair first while standing allows for a full body rinse with less than a quart for a near bald man like me and no more than a quart with my wife's full head of longer hair. We sometimes extended our use of 200 gallons of fresh water to last a full month for ourselves and two children.

[SaltyMetals]

I know exactly how much we use for a shower since i have a water counter system as original equipment on my boat.

A reasonable shower (wet, OFF, soap & wash, ON & rinse) will use 12 litres (2 1/2 galls). The record on my boat is 10 litres (2 galls) but that might be bec a record holder gets an extra beer! Visitors who might not be so well practised will use 15-20 ltres (3 - 4 1/2 galls). Ladies will typically use 25 litres (6 galls). Usually the excuse being to have to rinse long hair or conditioner.

The other way to save water is to use Sea Shampoo which will lather in salt water so the only thing afterwards is a quick rinse with the transom shower. (?5 litres? 1 gall?)
Hope that helps
Andrew

[Hardhead]

Originally Posted by skyhawk

...
The shower head makes a huge difference!
I have an oxygenics head in my RV, uses 1.8 GPM (by specification) and it blasts out with a strong flow.
I needed a lot more water for a shower when using the garbage shower head the factory put in.... I think it was a similar flow rate, just a weak flow velocity and took a lot longer to rinse

I can highly recommend the Oxygenics head as well. It shoots a higher pressure spray pattern - that really does the job getting soap out, etc. We use them at home, being on a well.

Visiting relatives who have regular shower heads, it's shocking how much water is coming down, but yet, with less pressure, how dang long it takes to rinse shampoo out etc. Water hardness is the same, in both locations. I strongly prefer the Oxygenics head, and the reduced flow is not even noticeable, at all, to me.

[Mike OReilly]

The shower head I fitted to our garden sprayer shower is a simple gun-type nozzle found at most kitchen sinks. It's a very low-flow nozzle that is easy to control and direct. And with the pressure shower, you get lots of power, so you use very little water.

[noelex 77]

The quality of the water delivery makes a huge difference to the amount of water needed for an adequate shower.

Ideally the water needs to be the perfect temperature from the start. The direction and amount of water needs to be adjustable by the user.

If you have the details correct, a warm water shower with 5l (a little over a gallon) is quite comfortable. Less than this is certainly OK if you are in water saver mode. Our first cruising yacht (many yeons ago ) had a very limited water supply so we have plenty of experience designing the perfect system. The plumbing needs to be capable of delivering the water at the right temperature with the right volume. Unfortunately, few boat showers fulfil these basic requirements. Most boat showers are terrible.

Our current boat has basically an unlimited water supply as we have an efficient rainwater collection in a high rainfall environment. So while we currently enjoy much longer showers, the basic plumbing is still constructed to meet the above requirements. This helps provide a luxurious shower no matter the water available, but if the water supply is compromised the hardware allows for comfortable shower with only low water consumption.

[Paul Howard]

Though we had a standard shower installation on our catamaran and reasonable tankage (400litres or about 100gallons), when long distance sailing in isolated areas, we did the following:
If in isolated area, warm weather, at anchor we did cockpit showers by heating about a quart of water to boiling point, pour into bucket and mix in fresh water from tank until correct temperature ( doubling or so the volume) use a plastic cup or container to pour water over your head to wet down, soap up, more water over the head to strip off the soap, and use final amount to rinse.
For colder weather in shower stall, I did as above for heating and putting in bucket, then had added a second shower head (a hand wand with wall bracket to easily direct spray) with very fine mist connected to an inexpensive Whale immersion pump and wired up an on/off waterproof toggle switch. To shower, put the bucket of warm water in the shower stall, drop in the pump, wet, soap and rinse. The last remaining bit in the bucket the pump did not get got dumped over my head for a final rinse.
Very economical on water and a satisfying warm shower. Even the wife was happy with the above.

It saves the wasted water waiting for warm water to get to the shower head and the mixing of temperature. Also, with limited warm water, one is very careful to rinse before running out and you can see the level.
Whale Submersible Water Pump 12V d.c. GP1652)

[a64pilot]

Our IP came with a sprayer handle in the cockpit that looked like one used in a kitchen sink.
I removed it and installed this https://www.defender.com/product.jsp...272&id=1359824 the key to conserving water is the trigger on the shower head, you need an easy and quick on and off valve and a trigger is just that.
Coincidentally it’s just above the water heater so maybe 2 ft of hose to the heater so hot water is immediately available, that wasn’t planned, just lucked out.
A powerful spray of water will actually save water, I know that doesn’t seem correct but a strong spray will rinse you quickly and use less water. Our water pump is a 5 GPM pump, now nothing will flow 5 GPM, but it takes a big pump to hold pressure.

The deal with fresh water flush is its simply much cleaner, when your up a river where there is no vis, a raw water head looks like it needs flushing when it has “clean” water in it, plus fresh water just never smells and needs cleaning much less often, and a bidet is easier to fit, but you can fit a bidet on a raw water head too of course, just run the line.

But from a quality of life perspective, a high output watermaker is a very nice thing to have, and ours I believe paid for itself as it enables a washing machine and fresh water rinse of the anchor and gear and keeping salt off of stuff seems to help make it last longer, plus you can flush the dinghy motor etc., and well everything including yourself can be kept cleaner if there is an abundance of clean fresh water, and even in the Bahama’s the available water isn’t as good as you’d like it to be, often isn’t cheap, and you have to either jug it in a dinghy or go into a Marina. Not having to do either is nice.

Winter in the Caribbean is I believe the dry season, so we never gathered rain, there just wasn’t enough of it to make it worthwhile. I did rig a system to drain it from my boom furling boom as they look like a large gutter and the main if it’s up will collect a surprising amount of water, but it was a back up system that was never used.

[Lepke]

In the old navy, before distillers, sailors got 1 gallon of fresh water a day for all purposes.
And you can take a navy shower with one gallon. Depends on technique. Also, some people take a salt water shower and then rinse with fresh.

[ozdigennaro]

Five gallons is complete luxury.

I've had considerable desert experience, under dirty dusty conditions.

One gallon is enough for a navy shower: wet, turn water off, soap, water on, water off, rinse, water on, water off, rinse; done.

And the crew loved it, loved it, that we had showers on the last day as well as the first day.

Sunshower gear works well.

And having a shower partner is even more fun.