Author Archives: Britton

Our Dur-O-matic Shower Water Heater

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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.

Fire in Rincon!

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We had just finished paying the bee removal guy and the plumber was almost finished with his work when I saw and smelled some smoke coming from the lower half of the property.

I got up on the deck of the wood house to get a better view and snapped this picture:

So close you could hear the crackling of the fire and flames and see ashes flying thru the air!

Now the way my brain tends to work, I try to figure out how the fire got started and being a problem solver I try to think of how to put it out.   At this point my brain is trying to figure out how a fire way down below could have started….


The canvas the bee guy used in his bee smoker

Being from Colorado when we have fires, they are usually caused by some careless camper that didn’t extinguish their campfire or from hot embers that rise from campfires.  It’s also the dry season here and I’ve noticed a lot of areas around Rincon have gone crunch dry brown.

My initial thought was, “Oh crap, don’t tell me that the bee guy set the property on fire……”.

It was really pretty far away so I was totally over-reacting but still, once that thought had entered my mind it was lodged there for a while.  We set Rincon on fire!  We’ve all seen the news stories in CA when fires start and people’s houses burn down and huge areas are just consumed by flames.

The plumber saw the flames and called the fire department.  They let him know that they had received several calls already, so I wasn’t the only one concerned.

We went to talk to the neighbor.  He informed us that there is a guy who always sets that field on fire to get rid of the Pica Pica (from what we hear Pica Pica is a bean pod looking ‘weed’ that releases a fuzz that makes you itch) …LOL.  So my fears of having indirectly burnt Rincon to the ground were put to ease.   The neighbor let us know that once the fire reaches the trees, it stops.

We went back home and in about 10 minutes as the flames reached the tree line, they stopped, just as the neighbor had said they would.

It’s hard when you’re in a new place and you don’t know what is normal and what isn’t.  It’s a good exercise for my worry side to learn how to relax and go with the flow.


Hibiscus Flower at our Front Gate

My Birthday in Rincon

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Today is my birthday so we figured we’d go out to dinner. Not so easy. A lot of places are closed on Monday and Tuesday in Rincon.  We ended up making a nice little tour of the town stopping at various restaurants..lol.


Checking to see if Casa Isleña was open…Nope.


Checking to see if the Harbor Resturant was open…..Nope.

We tried Ode to the Elephants too, but they aren’t open till Wed.  So finally we went to Villa Cofresi.  That turned out just fine.  Sun setting over the ocean, live music, good food and even a piece of birthday cheese cake.

I got to thinking about it and I don’t think that I’ve spent a birthday outside of Colorado!  So this was a first for me.  It’s been an interesting life and journey thus far.  I didn’t ever expect to have accomplished half the things that I have!  It’s fun to look back on life and look forward to more and celebrate the opportunity to be alive.  That’s the best gift of all!  Well that and this table to sit at:


This year’s birthday gift (very useful)

We have been making the place a little more comfortable each day.  Today we got a table from Sams.  It’s nice to have a place to sit other than the bed..lol.  Plus it’s an outdoor table so we can use it on the roof/patio too.  We got an electric shower head / heater as well, that I will post more about later on.  Suffice to say it’s more comfortable to have warm water rather than cold swimming pool water in the morning!

Overall it was one of my favorite birthdays!