We are hoping to buy an old house that has an old unfinished basement. I wanted to install a tub in the basement b/c the kids splash water all over the place and make a mess of a finished bathroom. Do you think I could use this for a tub for my kids in the basement? or am I missing something?
http://www.tractorsupply.com/tsc/product/oval-galvinized-stock-tank-2-ft-w-x-6-ft-l-x-2-ft-h-169-gal-capacity?cm_vc=IOPDP1
Well, if you’re in a cold climate you might wish to reconsider. Hot water would go instantly cool, I suspect! Kids might not fancy cold water baths. Plus it will use way more water.
haha…that’s true, there isn’t much in the way of insulation. good point.
Taking baths, as a child, in a steel bucket, in an unfinished basement…sounds like a good way to set up kids of a lifetime of not great childhood memories.
I understand they make a mess, but can you just pull the shower curtain shut? That’s what my mom always did and what I did for my kid. Make them cooperate while you give them their bath, then close the curtain and let them splash around for a few minutes.
Don’t get me wrong, your idea is tempting, the idea of setting this up (how are you planning to handle the drain) and letting the kids go nuts sounds like a great idea. I’m just not sure the kids will like taking baths in a cold, dimly light, concrete room.
It’s not unheard of. My grandparents didn’t have indoor plumbing, and bathed in a large metal tub they filled with well water that had been heated on a wood stove. It wasn’t an especially fond memory of my mother’s childhood years, however.
Take another look at the dimensions of that tub, though. With a 169-gallon capacity and no insulation, you’ll use an entire hot water tankfull every time one of the kids gets into the tub.
Good thoughts. It is well water there, so the water costs wouldn’t be high. The heating costs might be high tho. haha!!! oh well. crazy idea. thanks for all the input.
I looked at a house that was for sale once where the owner had used one of the fiberglass versions of a large stock tub as a makeshift hot tub on the back deck. Didn’t look like he ever quite finished that project. He had built the house himself and was quite the redneck MacGyver, and most of his touches were pretty cool. That hot tub though! My wife and I still laugh about that all these years later.
Anyway, the fiberglass ones might not lose the heat as fast?
It´s an amusing idea – all farmers I know of invariably use old bathtubs as cattle troughs. They get to collect them for free everywhere.
When I lived in Montana, my church used a horse trough for a baptistry.
I suppose I could just find an old tub somewhere. Where would I start looking??
May I suggest the Internet? 
Habitat for Humanity stores have 2nd hand tubs and plumbing. Also other used home construction stuff.
Ask at a local home improvement store if there are other such stores in your area.
With old toilet float-valves for self-filling! (Be sure to put boards over it so the cows don’t mangle the float!)
The stock grough was only made for pure water…
The welding of the top edge of the feeding trough looks a bit rough … While it won’t have exposed sharp points, a little persons finger eg the skin or nail, might be small enough to get into a crevice and caught. The joints down at the bottom may have crevice like features too, and the skin on little toes and fingers may squash down into them…
Besides using a lot of water, a large trough might have other problems.
If you think the water is cheap because it’s well-water, what about the power it takes to pump that much water, and the power takes to heat that much. Could get expensive? Is the idea for all the kiddies to bathe together?
A big tub is also a drowning hazard for children. You wouldn’t want to let them bathe in the basement unattended.
How many kids do you have? How about buying some cheap/used towels and just doing a big mop and throwing them outside/in the basement to dry? And making the wipedown part of the kids’ chores?
FFS - Just tell em not to splash.
Another Doper who bathed in a galvanized steel tub when visiting one set of grandparents back in the day.
Yeah, what the others said. Memories but not really great ones.
Look for a wash tub style one. They have sloping sides. Like this, only bigger.
Plumbing issues: How do you fill it, esp. with hot water. (Pots on a wood stove weren’t all that satsifying.) Then: How do you drain it??? Once they get a lot of water in them, they are extremely heavy. We had to make do with just a couple inches of water because of the filling/draining mechanics.
Anywho. If you have a bathroom easily damaged by splashed water, you don’t have a useful bathroom. Something needs to be done about that. Water is going to get into all sorts of places in a bathroom, it needs to be able to handle that.
I told my kids not to splash. Then my MIL would come over and encourage them to make “storms”. It’s amazing how much water two little people can get on the floor. MIL had to be taught not to allow “storms”. :mad:
My vote: no splashing or a lot less water.
I’ve taken a bath in a stock trough before ( filled with cool river water no less). A few points:
Yes it will work, and you can add more or less water just like a conventional tub. My kids usually sit in not much more than 6 inches of water, and my wife insists on it being what I consider barely Luke warm… So you wouldn’t have to boil 150 gallons or anything like that.
However, you’ll notice 2 main drawbacks using a stock tank as a bathing tub: the plumbing issues (filling and draining), and the tank contours and shape.
Some stock tanks have drains near the bottom, others don’t. They’re not designed to be regularly completely drained - even the ones that can be drained have the drain hold on the side near the bottom ( but not on the bottom). This results in most of the water running out but up to 1/2 inch or so remaining… In a big trough that could actually be a gallon of more; they are a pain to completely dry.
Filling is less of a problem if you run even rudimentary plumbing to the tank. But if your filling it by bucket you’ll be miserable and surprised by the amount of effort and time it takes to fill even a little.
Lastly the tank design makes them quite uncomfortable. They typically have much higher and steeper sides than a bath tub. Unless you’re up on your knees all you see are vertical metal/plastic walls; like your in a crevace. Also the flat surfaces and sharp bends the in the seams make laying or scooting Around in them uncomfortable… Bath tubs are actually contoured and rounded quite a bit resulting in them being significantly more comfortable.