PVC Safe for water?

[pete.wilson]

Hey

Can PVC (and it's glue) be used safely for drinking water? I have seen before and don't remember where, someone used like two 6" or 8" pvc pipes with caps about 5' long and added a spigot and used it for water. My thought is to attached one to my rack on my topper (painted black) and use it for my shower water (dishes maybe?) and it would be gravity fed without a problem. Any thoughts?

Pete Wilson

 

[ntsqd]

White PVC pipe is for water, Gray is for electrical. It will get very brittle in cold weather, like freezing and below. As long as that is not a concern or can be dealt with I'd go for it.

 

[DesertBoater]

I've done that for my truck too! I only used it as a shower, and it worked great. Get done with a day of surfing or boating and rinse off the sand and salt before dinner. It worked really really well. I used three pieces of 3" white pvc stacked horizontally on top of each other. the front end was capped, and the back end had a bunch of fittings that funneled down into a ball valve/hose fitting at the bottom. the pieces were about 4 feet long each and the whole thing slid in between the vertical uprights of my Thule Kayak Stackers. The fill was a screw in cap at the top on the rear end and I learned quickly that it is a very good idea to have a small hole drilled through the fill cap to allow for air to enter as the water is being drained. one also needs to be sure that when you park, you're angled slightly up or downhill depending on where your drain fitting is. I found that my rig didn't have enough pressure to use a shower-head type fitting, so i just kept a 4 foot piece of hose and strapped it to the end of my rack with another ball valve on the end to stop the flow without having to climb up on the roof. Here it is in traveling mode:

it looks like it's kinda shoddily strapped on there, but once i figured out a system, i ended up using some perforated metal that bent around each tube and finished flat against the thule bars that were then bolted through on both the front and back ends.

Cheers,
West

 

[DEEZLPWR]

i will be doing a potable water system on my rig with two 6"x 6' sch 20 pvc. it will also be sealed after each fill, self venting and equalizing. it will hold about 40 gallons of water. when i get it done for the expo trip next year ill take pics.

 

[spencyg]

i will be doing a potable water system on my rig with two 6"x 6' sch 20 pvc. it will also be sealed after each fill, self venting and equalizing. it will hold about 40 gallons of water. when i get it done for the expo trip next year ill take pics.

Looks like you'll need a little more than 6' of length to get 40 gal...

(3.14159 * 6 * 6)/4 * 72 = 2035 in^3 volume

231 in^3 / gal

so you have about 8.8 gal per tube for a total of 17.6 gal in the setup described above. Still not bad, but certainly not 40.

Just wanted to make sure you don't build the whole thing and then run out of water 2x faster than you thought! :sombrero:

Spence

 

[DEEZLPWR]

ok the 40 was from an 8"x8' pipe and 2 pipes stacked on each other. I didnt specify that my bad.

its actually 41.8 gallons but if you factor in the venting tubes it might be 42 gallons.

 

[VicHanson]

Great ideas on the PVC water heater, thanks. I was thinking of using copper pipe, but that gets expensive fast, and not much water capacity.

West - Do you know the capacity of your system (yeah I could figure it out but I'm too lazy!)? How long does it take to heat up the water for a shower? What do you do when the water is too hot? Did you use regular grade or heaver, ie schedule 40 or ?

Here in Peru they have a special PVC pipe for hot water, it is a reddish rust color. Anyone have experience with how long regular PVC holds up with hot water?

I'll attach my plans and ideas for my water heater and solar panels to fit on top of a 7 1/2 x 9 foot camper.

 

[Mike S]

You should use plastic pipe rated for potable water if you are going to drink the water. Regular PVC can release chemicals into the water - especially hot water.

 

[robert]

Gravity feed is nice, but why not just add a Schrader style valve so you have pressure? All it would take is a few pounds of pressure to give you a nice shower and the PVC will hold that with no problems as long as you glue it together properly.

There was somebody making something like this commercially a while back but I don't have the link on this computer. It mounted to your existing rack using Yakima brackets IIRC.

Ah, found it. http://www.roadshower.com/ They use acrylic tubes so they heat up better. You can buy the tubing here if you wanted to. http://www.usplastic.com/catalog/item.aspx?itemid=23670&clickid=redirect

 

[Yudda]

Heres another version...though the website is dead.

they still have the Youtube channel up.
http://www.youtube.com/user/showerbomb

definitely something you build in an afternoon.

this version uses a 12vlt pump.


rob

 

[Maximus Ram]

Yep, I drew up a sketch of one for the rack on my XJ after reading about one in another thread.
Definitely something that can be thrown together in a couple of hours and modified to ones needs...


wow 150 bucks for the road shower..:Wow1:

 

[JeepN95YJ]

You should use plastic pipe rated for potable water if you are going to drink the water. Regular PVC can release chemicals into the water - especially hot water.

Not sure what kind of chemicals, but would that really hurt if you were just using it for showers and general clean up? If you aren't planning on using it as your primary drinking water would you be in any danger?

Do they make a plastic pipe rated for potable water? Where would you buy it and what does it cost compared to PVC?

 

[VicHanson]

Thanks for the Road Shower link, Robert. I too was planning on a non-sealed system, to allow air in so the water would flow out OK. Now I see that a pressurized system is much better, to allow the use of a shower head. I always carry a 12v air pump, should be just the thing to put a little pressure in the tubes. I think PVC painted black would heat up the water quicker than clear acrylic, anybody have experience with this? I'm also thinking that smaller pipe would heat the water faster than larger, maybe 4" would be a good compromise between capacity and quicker heating?

 

[RMP&O]

really great ideas and set ups...DesertBoater did a great job on his set up! It is great to see what kind of things people come up with...

PVC is sold in black pipe also. It is ABS pipe used for waste lines. It is thin though, meaning not a lot of strength to it.

I wouldn't drink from a PVC pipe if you can avoid it. As mentioned it gets very brittle in cold climates and it also doesn't fair well if exposed to the sun for long periods of time. For a shower PVC pipe would be fine.

There are lots of pipe that is suitable for potable water. Pex pipe is pretty common these days in new buildings. For my potable water system I am going to use a flex PVC pipe that is suitable for drinking. Same stuff used in soda machines.

Another option would be HDPE fusion polyethylene pipe. It is black and very heavy duty. It is expensive though and requires special tools to weld it up.

 

[Yudda]

What do you all think about the weight ?

Mounting 50-80 pounds of water on one side of the roof, seems like it would affect the vehicle.

Especially in rough terrain. These types of systems are very popular here in Israel, but there are always people swearing they would never mount that much weight up top.

Also IMHO mounting the tank across the vehicle seems like a better place.

thoughts ?

rob