Head Upgrades

Shower Mixer

The original shower mixer valve on Sarah was a conventional galley faucet connected to a hand held shower head (picture on left). This was a less than satisfactory arrangement. Adjusting the hot/cold water mix was difficult and time consuming with the separate hot and cold water knobs on the inherited arrangement. Also the arrangement just looked kludgy.

I replaced the faucet mixer with a standard shower mixer valve from Home Depot (picture on right). I replaced the hand-held shower head with one on a sliding track (picture below). Now I should be able to predictably set the shower temperature as well as direct the water flow. I still have to secure the escutcheon for the shower head hose, but the arrangement is essentially functional and a great improvement over the previous installation.

The shower head shown turned out to be a cheap plastic one, which started to leak badly after a few years and was replaced with one of a little better quality.
All components in Sarah's shower assembly are standard household items.

Head Faucet

The faucet in the head was fully functional, although the finish was a little pitted. No real reason to replace it except that it was very low profile, which meant there was little room under the faucet for hands, washrag, toothbrush etc. One weekend over the winter of 2003-2004 I saw a faucet in Home Depot that looked like a natural replacement to I bought it and installed it that weekend. Actually it does work a lot better than the old one.

Wet Locker

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There is a wet locker on Sarah, next to the cockpit companionway in the aft cabin. That is where I chose to mount my navigation PC desk, so access to that locker is awkward - especially if someone is working on the PC. I really needed another place to hang up wet foulies and swim trunks.

What better place than the shower. It is built to be wet and not normally used on overnight or long voyages. So I mounted a couple of plastic hooks on the inboard surface of the shower stall. Dockside the hooks are a convenient place to hang wet towels. At sea the shower is normally used to store sodas and bottled water, but it works well as a place to hang up the foulies.

Composting Head

In 2008 it was apparent that a major re-build of the toilet would be required. The pump frequently became air-locked, the flush water holes in the rim of the bowl needed to be cleared, and the seat was broken and needed to be replace. The LectraSan treatment system was also on it's last legs, and was not even legal in a lot of areas of the U.S. East Coast.
The final straw was having to clear the sewage lines underway on my return to the USA from Europe in 2007.
That last event made me look for an alternative to a holding tank/overboard discharging toilet. The only proven alternative is a composting head. I selected the Airhead Composting Toilet and installed it in Sarah's head in 2008.
I created a separate page on the installation of the Airhead on Sarah.

Shower Stall Light

One thing the shower stall on Sarah always lacked was adequate lighting. There was no light in the stall itself and with the shower curtain drawn only a dim light came in from the toilet area.
Several yeas ago I purchased a Perko exterior dome light specifically for the shower stall. I intended to install it in the overhead and run the wiring behind stall shell.
Finally while I was working on the composting head installation I decided to just get the light done.

Instead of running the light between the shower shell and the trunk cabin sides I mounted the light on the forward bulkhead and ran the wire through the bulkhead into the toilet area and down behind the teak trim pieces. This is a little sloppier than I would like for electrical wiring, but I just got tired of taking a shower in the dark.