Wednesday 18 September 2013

Loo With A View

With the development of a new kitchen and shower area in the yard, we are in need of a toilet too. I put a few ideas together, mostly a mix between an outside toilet I used while helpxing in Asturias, and the existing toilets used by the campers here and came up with the Cerenety volunteer 'Loo with a view'.


 As with all of our projects, we firstly had to see what materials were to hand that we could use. In this case it was a few solid pallets and some roofing wood, which was all in good enough order to build with and already a nice size when pieced together to make a toilet cubicle. With the sterling help of Dazzer, a pallet floor was set out on paving slabs to keep it off the ground and the structure was built up; a pallet wide on all sides and two pallets high. We left the top half of the front wall open to create the view  through the trees in front and out over the fields. 


We decided to have just two posts in the structure to preserve our timber supply and because in the sheltered place that it sits it does not need to be all that well anchored to the ground. These posts sit on the side of the building and form the door frame. The pallets were all fixed to each other and to the posts with screws, coming together nicely, and certainly seemed strong enough for their intended purpose. 

The door was reclaimed from an old shed, we used hinges that were taken off the old cattle trailer back in the spring and the roofing material was a couple of offcuts from another roofing project. Once we fixed all of these in place it was time to consider the toilet itself. For this I employed the help of Jess, another volunteer here well known for her upholstering skills. I painted up an old steel chair frame and fixed on a toilet seat, the back of the chair was upholstered by Jess in a rather majestic yellow and black striped material. This frame would house the composting container in much the same way as the ones used up in the camping field. It turned out to be a comfortable sit.



The finishing touches were a lick of paint to make the whole thing last that bit longer and a toilet roll holder. We also installed a shelf, which amongst other things will hold a pair of binoculars so the user can really make the most of their time answering the call of nature by looking out over the fields to see what wildlife is in the area. 


 

All in all the project took twelve hours to complete - obviously this included a fair few tea breaks. It is always satisfying to start and finish a project in one day, and it could not have been done without the help and advice of Dazzer (master pallet craftsman), Jess (accomplished upholsterer) and Celli (champion roofer).

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

On thing has been left out, most importantly the treatment and disposal of the humanure, please would you give this additional information for every one. Max

Cerenety eco camping said...

It's a very simple method. After each person has been to the toilet, instead of flushing they put one scoop of sawdust into the bucket, therefore layering waste and sawdust. The bucket is then emptied into a compost area when full and covered with a layer of hay. Composting organisms do not like the consistency and high level of nitrogen in human waste but when combined with drier materials that are higher in carbon such as sawdust and hay they are more likely to break it down. Depending on your area, temperature and weather the composting can take up to a year before it can be used for flowers, shrubs and trees.

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