We thought we'd seen every PVC project out there, but when we saw this, our jaws dropped. What an awesome way to beat the heat and turn up the neighborhood fun! Setting up this DIY bike/trike wash would definitely make you the coolest parent on the block.
According to Camille of Camille Dawn Photography, this was the best $15 and one hour of labor she spent in her whole parenting history. I'm sure the kids (hers and the neighbors') would agree. Teenagers, kids from across town, people coming home from work, and even her 6-month-old took turns cruising through. Check out more beautiful pics on her website and download a great pdf from instructables.com that details how to contruct your own. It even has instructions for linking several together to make a continuous drive-thru version. We can't wait to make our own!
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So cute....
Pretty sure if I tried this here in my street in Aus, I would be the victim of a drive-by! Just can't justify wasting so much water.
agree with hnhkt. Fun idea, but coming from an area where we are indoctrinated to conserve water, this seems like an unnecessary waste.
Very cool idea!
So cool! And if there are concerns about wasting water, this could easily be put on top of the lawn so the run-off would benefit the grass. Kids might not be able to use the bikes that way, but it would still be loads of fun.
oh i cringed when i saw this. you definately wouldn't be considered a cool mum in our street. parts of our country are drought stricken. we are not permitted to water our garden during the heat of the day let alone spray water on the road. what a waste!
josiejo, that's a good idea, to set it up where watering would be done anyway. the instructions call for misters, which do use less water than traditional sprinklers and soakers - so that helps too.
awesome idea! looks like tons of fun!
How fun! It doesn't look to me like this lady is in a drought stricken area-there is so much greenery in these pictures!
Fun!!!!
Agreed on the conservation front. I've seen a version of this that sits over a large slip & slide that collects the run off and feeds it back into the system with a pump. So, all the water is recycled. (unfortunately, I can't find the pics or plans online anymore). I believe they said they fed the whole thing with two 5 gal buckets. So you'd use about 10-20gal over the course of an afternoon.
As far is this solution goes, I did some quick/dirty google research and made the following comparison to a normal bathroom shower and a kiddie pool (WARNING: non-conclusive, accuracy not guaranteed, just an estimate!!!)
ASSUMPTIONS:
Shower (luxurious style)... we'll assume that you have a large, high-volume shower head (water saving shower heads usually run about 2.0-2.5 gal per min). I found 4 or 5 bathroom remodel websites that said a high volume, pamper-yourself type showerhead will run around 4-5 gal per min. Let's splurge and say 5 gal per min.
Kiddie Pool (average, inexpensive)... google shopping results show that the average hard plastic or inflatable kiddie pool (could hold maybe four kids under 10yrs) has a 100-170gal capacity. We'll assume 150 gal to make the math simple)
Kid Wash (conservation-minded)... we'll assume only 3 mister heads on the kid wash (left, right, center) and that they run at the volume of a low-tech evaporative mister cooling system (mist blows in front of a fan... like at amusement parks). A quick google search for inexpensive mister heads yielded 0.5 gal per min as a common "low-flow" volume. Let's use that... meaning 1.5 gal per min total from the whole mister system. NOTE: this is probably being a bit kind to the Kid Wash since these would truly produce mist (almost fog) where the Kid Wash appears to be more of a spray.
COMPARISON - Kid Wash vs Luxury Shower
The Kid Wash is roughly 3.3 times more efficient than showering in a real water hog. Running the kid wash for an hour works out to about two ten min showers.
COMPARISON - Kid Wash vs Kiddie Pool
The kiddie pool holds 150gal. The kid wash will burn through the same volume of water in 100min. Just over 1.5hrs.
CONCLUSION:
Buy a little lawn pond pump and some PVC and build your kids a super cool fountain for their kiddie pool. A 1/4 cup of bleach and some quick skimming and you can keep the pool fresh and enjoyable for about a week.
I recognize a kiddie pool is not possible in many urban areas, but from the looks of the pics on this DIY and others I found from a quick googling... these kid washes are being built/used primarily on suburban sidewalks anyway.
Michael C. That sounds like a must have, amazing.