[Public-List] Head questions ...

[darcyhaldeman at cs.com]

Thanks Kris.  Great info.  





-----Original Message-----
From: Kris Coward <kris at melon.org>
To: Alberg 30 Public List -- open to all <public-list at lists.alberg30.org>
Sent: Thu, Mar 10, 2011 6:47 pm
Subject: Re: [Public-List] Head questions ...


On Thu, Mar 10, 2011 at 02:36:03PM -0500, darcyhaldeman at cs.com wrote:
 Kris, could you post details about your switch to a composting toilet?  It's 
n my list of things to do.
Well the first thing I did was ask Richard and Margaret (on Into The
lue) which toilet they'd gotten, and if they were still happy with
heirs (AirHead, and yes).
Installation involved drilling 2 small holes in the liner where the
oilet rests (Candy Cane is #583, so well into the liner era), and
idening the dorade vent hole to the diameter of the included fan (I
sed a small piece of scrap plywood as a template to do this
idening--still used a hole saw, but the guide in the middle isn't
uch use when there's already a hole).
With the head suitably prepared, installation consisted of screwing the
upports for the toilet into the holes in the liner, attaching the
rovided fan to the widened dorade hole, connecting the fan to the
erminal block that was already in the head for the forward and mast
lectrics, running the vent hose from the toilet to the fan, and tossing
n some peat moss. I'd estimate the job having taken no more than a
otal of 5h (uncluding trips to the store for electrical connectors and
VC cement).
I have had a problem with the toilet, in that some guests have
ccasionally deposited their TP into the toilet in such a way that it
ot pressed into the liquids collection area and clogged the spout down
o the liquids container. Because this overflowed into the solids
ontainer, the fix was pretty much to keep adding peat moss to the
olids container and agitating until the solids were, well, solid again
oh and to remove the clog from the spout, which was just a matter of
aking the bottle off, sticking a bunch of paper towel under the spout,
reaking off the encrusted TP with a piece of wire--actually I used a
roken bicycle spoke--and then reaching into the liquids collection area
nd pulling the TP back to the solids container). That said, the
isgustingness of fixing this problem is a far cry from the problems
ith flush toilets (though apparently it's still enough to make most
andlubbers squeamish).
The liquids bottle lasts for about 1 person-week before needing to be
mptied, and the solids container lasts about half a person-year, based
n full-time use. I typically have to travel on business at least once
very 3 months for a week or so, and after getting back, the material is
omposted enough that I feel quite comfortable scooping it into a heavy
aper bag, and adding it to the municipal compost stream (which already
ccepts diapers, so I don't have to worry about being personally
esponsible for making the resulting compost vegetable-garden-unsafe).
I've left the holding tank and hoses in place (though I plan to remove
he hoses upon receipt of one of them round tuits), because the tank
ooks to be integral to the liner, I don't have any immediate plans for
he space, and I'll gladly stick a flush toilet back in, hook it up, and
ake off with the composting toilet if I end up selling the boat to some
amned fool who actually prefers to deal with clogged hoses, pumpouts,
olding tank chemicals, etc.
Cheers,
ris
-- 
ris Coward					http://unripe.melon.org/
PG Fingerprint: 2BF3 957D 310A FEEC 4733  830E 21A4 05C7 1FEB 12B3
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