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Continuous running water for bathtub – severe autistic adult

18 points by aaronsworld ↗ HN
I had read Bryan Rasmussen's thread. I too have a severe autistic adult child. He is fascinated with running the tub bathwater continuously. I'm searching for an answer from someone that knows plumbing or is a plumber if continuous flowing water can be obtained without wasting so much water. We live in Minnesota so winter is upon us so outdoor activities with water is a no. Note, a trickle of water is not satisfying enough. Has to be powerful flow. Behavioral comments not needed please. This is mechanical inquiry only. Thanks for any plumbing suggestions.

11 comments

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gus_massa
Swimming pools filter and recirculate water, so a similar system may work for a bathtub. I'm not sure if it's possible to adapt the standard water tubes, but perhaps if the tubes go outside the wall it may be easier.

I also suggest triple checking the floor of the bathroom is perfectly sealed, or the downstairs floor will get a lot of humidity.

iwanttocomment
Does the water need to come out of the bathtub spigot? If not, you could get a pond pump (designed to pull water from a pond and pour it back in to avoid bugs and algae) and use it with the bathtub or a small portable plastic pool. Hook up the pump so it draws water out of the tub or pool, hang the output hose up above it, and you'll have continually flowing water with minimal waste. The higher the gph rating of the pump, the more intense flow you can achieve.

https://www.homedepot.com/b/Outdoors-Garden-Center-Ponds-Pon... https://www.amazon.com/Portable-Swimming-Bathtub-Collapsible...

h2odragon
You could have a submersible pump feed a second faucet; use the tub itself as the water reservoir. This might be doable in a smaller volume than a bathtub; feed/water trough come in 10gal to 100+ gal sizes.

Plumbing wise, something much like the "garden fountain" things, just with a bigger pump and more water capacity.

"powerful flow"? Really? Is it the volume of water, or is it the splash? A wider spout and/or a longer fall might make for a better display if the splash is the pleasing part. If its the impact on the pool, perhaps a narrower nozzle and more force when the stream hits the water would be better. Probably worth experimenting with.

Another thought: You can probably rig this up on a activation / timer switch; so your user can slap a button and have 60sec of splash or whatever. That can be complicated with "only one activation per hour" or whatever other gates you might want to put on it.

elmerfud
Any whirlpool tub with some alterations to the recirculating plumbing should satisfy this. You'd add a diverter from the jets to another outlet that allows the water to fall back in. The flow rate should be more than enough. You'd want to consult with an custom whirlpool tub contractor to ensure its done right.

While I was writing this I was thinking someone probably has though if this. It's not only autistic people that find falling water calming. The sound and visuals of falling water I think is hard wired in to us at a primal level. So a little Google search for waterfall whirlpool tub and I found some options. They're not cheap and they are the big corner fit soaker tubs but they do exist.

evan_
You could achieve this without any permanent alterations or opening the wall by putting a submersible pump in the tub and hooking the output up so the output from the pump goes into the shower head pipe. The water would come out of the tub faucet. You can even hook it up through a diverter used for a hand sprayer and the shower head would still be usable.

You should be able to get the parts to make an adapter for the output of the pump to the shower head at any hardware store. Use a length of PEX tubing to go from the pump to the shower fitting.

Make sure to use teflon tape on all the fittings and plug it in to a GFCI protected outlet. Make sure not to actually turn on the tub while this is hooked up or you could damage the pump.

jklein11
Won't the water get cold fast? Having it run all the time without adding heat seems like the quickest way to get the water to be room temp
evan_
Yes, the water will get cold.
qup
Any fountain technology seems sufficient.

My sister was putting one in over the holidays. Contained system, loses to evaporation, plenty of flow.

shyn3
Reduce the mercury in the body of your rented baby. Most likely a December or April born.
plevexier
Which comment from Bryan Rasmussen are you referring to?
VoodooJuJu
>I too have a severe autistic adult child...

>Behavioral comments not needed please. This is mechanical inquiry only.

That's not how that works. If you didn't want to invite behavioral discussion, then you wouldn't have mentioned the behavioral issue. If you wanted purely plumbing answers, then you would have asked a purely plumbing question and left the autism bit out.

>Quick question - what's a good way to unclog a sink drain? Also I'm trans btw, not sure if that matters. Also, no trans comments please, just plumbing, thanks.

How silly and childish is that? Like, if you don't want to discuss it, then don't mention it.

I have no solutions for you, but I'm curious: when it comes to autistic people, what alternatives exist to appeasement? Running water sounds relatively benign, where water is cheap, and especially if you can rig up a fountain, granted if electricity is also cheap. I'm sure there's some not-so-benign fixations that would be preferably eliminated rather than appeased. How is that dealt with? Is it possible to eliminate the fixation?