We had some questions from some friends about our electric shower water heater that we installed in our house in Rincon, Puerto Rico, so I thought I’d write a more in-depth post. Please feel free to add anything you may know about these types of heaters or other ways to heat water in the tropics.
To be honest, the first time I saw a Super Ducha I was afraid. The thing you hear all the time in the states is never use electricity and baths / showers. When we were trying to buy the property in Lares, the cabana had a Super Ducha. This thing was anything but to safe: no GFI, no real grounding, it was wrapped with electrical tape and the outlet was really close to the shower head. We hesitated to use it at first, but given the choice between a cold shower or a slightly warm one, we took the risk. Then we slowly became accustomed to it. We stayed and showered there for about two weeks. By the time we left for Colorado, I was pretty comfortable with it.
The Super Ducha at the property in Lares, Puerto Rico
Flash forward to now and our property in Rincon, Puerto Rico. We decided on our last trip that taking a shower shouldn’t be like jumping in a swimming pool. It was ok during the hot and humid summer, we could put up with it, but in January everything cools down by a good 10 degrees and it was pretty chilly to hop in a cold shower.
Here in Colorado every house that I can think of is plumbed for a gas powered hot water heater, but there is no natural gas “utility” that automatically comes with a house in Puerto Rico. So there were only a few options to getting hot water for your shower and elsewhere. Put in an instant-on water heater, put in a tank on the roof (solar heater) or just get an electric shower head.
We were only going to be there for a week and didn’t want to turn the hot water into much of a project. So we opted for the electric shower head. We couldn’t find the Super Ducha brand, but we did find Dur-o-matic. They actually sell them at Home Depot in Mayaguez which is where we ended up going. Home Depot has an easy return policy which worked out well. There are 3 variations of the Dur-o-Matic. Green (15A), blue (22A) and red(25A).
Dur-O-Matic Green Box
The more water pressure you have, the higher you want to go. We started with Green because I wasn’t sure what the circuit breaker was rated for in the cabana. It went fine and the shower was warmer, but it was still pretty cold unless you turned the pressure way down, or ran the water in the bathroom sink while showering (Cassie’s trick). Our circuit breaker is 20A. We took the green one back and tried a blue one. This one was warmer and the circuit breaker still didn’t pop. We might have been able to use a red one, but we didn’t try. They run about $60 and are very simple to install. All you have to do is get some teflon tape, unscrew the shower head, attach the Dur-O-Matic using the tape, and plug it in. It heats the water before it reaches you. It never gets super hot, but it creates a nice warm shower.
Dur-O-Matic Electric Shower Water Heater Installed!
They also sell them at the Do it Best in Rincon. Had I known about this store earlier, I might not have made the trip to Mayaguez. In either case it warms the water up about 30 degrees. It made it much nicer to be able to shower and for Cassie she was able to take more time to wash her long hair. However, it is inherently more dangerous to have an electric anything in the shower, so next trip I’ll try to fit a GFI circuit in for peace of mind. Everything in Puerto Rico is just a little bit different. We’ve learned a lot about what’s really necessary in life, what is just a “want” and all those little in-betweens like a warm shower.