How to make a shower in the country with their own hands

28-07-2018
Water supply

After the first spring-summer season of gardening works, any owner of a suburban area can, on his own experience, be convinced that having a summer shower at his summer cottage greatly facilitates heavy manual labor, and helps him stay in good shape for a long time.

This simple device allows you to enjoy the refreshing coolness in the hot summer heat, and to prevent the occurrence of heat stroke, and also makes it possible to rinse your whole body from sweat, dirt and dust after a hard day's work.

Summer summer shower with carrying metal frame.

Independent construction of summer summer dacha

Currently, there are ready-made showers for sale, but the main significant drawback of such products is the unreasonably high price of buying and delivering out of town. To avoid thoughtless waste of money, any owner of a garden plot, with practical skills and certain knowledge, will be able to easily build such a structure with his own hands in a relatively short time.

In order to make it easier for the reader to deal with this issue, this article will provide a step-by-step guide, which describes in detail how to make a shower in the country, using available materials, and the usual set of fitting tools.

The scheme of the summer shower.

Site selection and base preparation

The simplest suburban shower cubicle, designed for seasonal use in the warmer months, is a fairly simple structure that consists of a solid, moisture-resistant base, supporting frame, side walls, and a storage tank for heating and storing water.

At the bottom of the storage tank is usually installed shower with a ball valve, or a special faucet with mixer for the summer shower.

  1. Before you make a shower in the country with your own hands, you need to choose a straight platform with a size of approximately 1.5 x1.5 m located in an open place., on a flat or elevated plot of land near the house or household structures.
  2. The most practical and durable is the foundation of the concrete floor. To do this, on the installation site of the shower cabin, you need to dig a small trench, 150-200 mm deep, pour in a cushion of fine rubble, and then pour a concrete screed with a thickness of at least 40 mm.
The concrete screed is poured into the base of the floor after the installation of a drain.
  1. Alternatively, pavement tiles made of artificial or natural stone can be used.. For this, on top of the small rubble you need to pour a sand pillow on which you should lay the paving slabs.
  2. The cheapest, but less durable option involves the use of a wooden lattice, which can be assembled from a timber section of 60x60, and boards not less than 40 mm thick, and lay on top of the drainage layer of large rubble.
The photo shows the process of making the base of the floor boards.

Tip! Before you make a shower cabin at the dacha, it is necessary to provide a gravitational system for collecting and discharging sewage at the site of its installation, which should have access to an autonomous sewage system or to the nearest ditch located below the suburban area.

The construction of the shower

When calculating the supporting frame and choosing the material for covering the side walls, you should take into account not only the weight of the structure itself, but also take into account the effect of wind load, as well as the effect of a significant weight load from the mass of the filled storage tank, which is installed on the roof of the shower cabin.

On this basis, all materials used must have the necessary rigidity, and the cross section of the support and carrier beams should be selected with a sufficient margin of safety.

  1. In the manufacture of a supporting structure made of metal, for installation of vertical support pillars, a steel profile tube with a cross section of at least 40x40x3 mm should be used, and the horizontal steel beams of the upper and lower crosspieces should be a profile steel tube with a section of 40x20x2 mm
Welded frame made of steel tube.
  1. In the case of installation of a wooden frame, the vertical support posts should be made of a wooden bar with a section of at least 80x80 mm, and the horizontal elements of the transverse trim, of a bar of 60x60 mm, or of boards 40x100 mm.
The supporting structure of the wooden beam.
  1. For arranging the sidewall trimming and fabrication of the entrance door, you should use any moisture-resistant sheet material, such as asbestos cement sheets, moisture-proof plywood, cellular polycarbonate, or a painted profile sheet.
  2. The fastening of the sheet materials of the side plating to the metal elements of the supporting structure should be carried out with galvanized M6 bolts of the required length, and to wooden elements with galvanized roofing screws with a wider washer, at least 6x32 mm in size.
Sheathing of the outer walls painted profile sheet.
  1. As a ceiling of a shower cabin, any rigid roofing material (profile sheet, metal tile, ondulin, etc.) of a suitable size can be used.
  2. In the case of using a special flat storage tank for water, its dimensions should be selected so that it covers the entire area of ​​the shower cabin in the plan, thus being its ceiling.
Plastic storage tank with water-spreading watering can, as the ceiling of the summer shower.

Tip! In the manufacture of the bearing frame of wood, before you make a country dacha with your own hands, all the wooden elements of the structure, for protection against rotting, must be treated twice with an antiseptic antifungal composition.

Water storage tank

In most cases, water heating in such devices is carried out due to the thermal energy of the sun's rays, and accordingly, the shape and size of the storage tank should maximize good heat exchange, throughout the daylight hours.

Many owners of suburban areas use for these purposes a wide variety of containers of a suitable volume, however, in order for the water storage tank to serve for more than one year, it fully fulfills its functional purpose, before making a shower in the country itself you should familiarize yourself with simple rules. and recommendations.

  1. The material of the water tank should have good corrosion resistance; therefore, it is necessary to abandon the use of various barrels of unprotected ferrous metal, and give preference to products made of plastic or stainless steel.
  2. Another important requirement for the material is its thermal conductivity. For example, the value of thermal conductivity of polymeric materials is significantly lower than that of any metals, respectively, the water in the metal barrel will heat up faster from the sun's rays, but at the same time it will also cool quickly after sunset, so the plastic storage tank retains heat longer.
Round metal barrels in black.
  1. The sun is constantly moving in a circle, so for a uniform heating of water it is best to use round or flat square-shaped containers, which will be constantly illuminated by sunlight throughout the daylight hours.
  2. The average rate of water consumption during a shower is between 50 and 100 liters per person, therefore the recommended total volume of the water tank should be between 100 and 300 liters.
Water tank made of plastic barrels.

Tip! In order to speed up the heating of water in the sun, before quickly making a shower in the country, the outer walls of the water tank should be painted with matt black, since the black color absorbs heat well, and for the tank body not to collapse when water freezes, after the onset of cold weather completely drain.

Organization of water supply for the dacha shower

In the process of using a summer shower, water from the storage tank enters the spray head by gravity, under the action of gravity, so this device is completely autonomous, and does not require an electrical connection.

In this case, the filling of the water tank before use can be carried out in two ways:

  1. Manually, with the help of a long hose connected to the home plumbing. To do this, shut off the stopcock inside the shower cabin, remove the spray can, and instead connect the hose from the water supply, after which the stopcock needs to be opened again. This method requires the mandatory participation of the person, moreover, while constantly need to monitor the amount of water in the tank.
  2. It is easy to organize an automatic water supply yourself, if you install a float gate valve in the upper part of the tank before you make a shower in the country itself and connect it with pipes or a hose to the domestic water supply system. Thus, as the hot water is consumed, the shut-off valve will open, and the water tank will be automatically filled to the specified level.
Plastic container for summer shower with built-in electric water heater and shower head with a tap.

Conclusion

In addition to the usual storage tanks for storing and heating water, there are also special metal and plastic tanks for showers that have a built-in electric water heater. Such a technical solution allows using a summer shower cabin not only on hot sunny days, but also in cooler weather.

To get a visual idea of ​​the device of the dacha shower, it is recommended to watch the video in this article, or read similar articles on this site.