The Building Process

We had great plans picked out in advance for our VIPs-Ventilated ImProved latrines but things did not work out that way.  We encountered a number of problems.

The first was that someone else was going to make the cement foundation and they made it to their design specs, not ours.  This picture shows that the base was surrounded by concrete blocks with rebar sticking up in the corners and beside where the door is suppose to go.   This owner wanted blocks all around as water flowed over his location and he wanted to keep it out of the latrine if possible.  There was no vent hole-we would dig under the latrine later to add a ventilation pipe.  The sticker bushes kept the local animals out of the enclosure as well!

This is the same idea but with an opening for the doorway.   We had discussed how we were going to fasten the walls to the cement foundation before we got to the DR.  We had brought a hammer drill and some cement bolts to "fasten down the sill plate."  We were very perplexed when we found the concrete blocks.  We scratched our heads and wondered what to do and when Manuel and "Spider-man" (so called lovingly for his ability to scale the walls of our structure and hammer on the roof pieces) could stand it no longer, showed us their design idea....


The first thing to do is to take the two by four and cut our half of each side that will run together like the picture on the left.  This was done by pre-sawing the ends of the boards half way down to the depth desired and then running more cuts to the end of the board and finally chiseling out the excess wood.  We finally drilled a hole where the rebar would stick up and through the connected boards that were going to act as our sill plates.

We then fixed our upright two by four to the rebar by toe-nailing them to the sill plates and bending nails around the rebar as shown on the right.

We wanted to secure them as strongly as we possibly could and Manuel assured us that this was very common practice in the DR.  We longed for the chance to run to a hardware store and buy some "L" brackets but that was impossible.  We were in a place far from consistent electricity when it was even on and depended upon a generator away from the actual job site to power what tools we had.  The only power tool we were using on site was a craftsman 19.2 screw gun for which we had limited screws that we were reserving for our "finish work" such as the doors and handles.  

We added a lateral support to our uprights and knew it would pull double duty as a "nailer" for our sheets of corrugated tin that would surround our latrine in time.  We also wanted to add another support for the top so that we could not only nail the tin to it but also act as a line for the top of the structure that would allow air flow through the latrine.   The DR gets very hot and if we enclosed the whole structure from floor to ceiling in tin, we would have an easy bake oven that could only be used in the evening!  Our first owner insisted on this and we were all very concerned for venting of the following structures.

The front of the latrine had higher supports which gave the roof a slant.  I believe that there was a six inch differential from front to back.  Lateral supports and nailers were provided for the three pieces of tin that were to act as the roof. 

A serious problem for us was that we did not have a ladder-so difficult to pack in suitcases and the COTN group did not have a ladder either.  We had to make due first with Mischael -Spider Man climbing up and hammering away first for the lateral supports and finally for the tin roof.  In the end, one of the owners of a latrine produced a short stubby ladder that enabled the rest of us to test the heights and hammer for all we were worth.

We had to support the ladder and the person nailing the roof pieces!  It was tenuous at best.

The line of tin once started was difficult to keep on track and level as you can see here.  We were not screwing this down so adjustments were next to impossible.  Once a piece was nailed into place, it was there for the long-term.  You can see the ventilation space at the top of this latrine and a small space at the bottom for some cooler air to come up from the bottom.

Sometimes we were out of materials.  The bracing and roof supports were made out of one by fours and in this case, we "sistered" in a board to extend the length of our roof support.  We had seen it in practically every structure we encountered in the DR and were not happy to be doing it but necessity proved to win the day.

I am pretty sure that I would not hire me to build anything back in the states but our customers seemed very happy and glad to have a motley crew build them these latrines!

And I have to say, that we were very glad to have been able to make them!