Build your own Compost Toilet

Welcome to our DIY composting toilets page. Here you will find everything you need to build your own dry compost toilet, from step-by-step DIY plans to compost toilet urine separators and examples of other people's homemade composting toilets from all over the world.

Why use our designs?

We have a long history of using composting toilets ourselves (like since we were kids) and over the years have developed a wide range of our own designs, based on personal experience of using them.

Our toilets are easy to use, easy to maintain, and free from unpleasant smells.

The composting toilet designs you'll find here are not only straightforward to construct, but the end results are good looking, attractive wooden toilets that give compost loos a good name.

Whoever thought building your own compost toilet could be so exciting!

 

Urine Separation is the Key

No Matter which design of toilet you choose to build, the key to all well functioning composting toilets is urine separation.

We designed our own urine separator back in 2009 and have since sold more than 15,000 worldwide.

The urine separator sits at the front underneath the toilet seat, and is designed to funnel the urine away from the solids, which fall into either a bucket or a wheelie bin.

Keeping the urine separate is essential for ensuring there are no smells in the poo compost: it's urine that smells; alone, the poo, mixed with sawdust or similar carboniferous material, looses its odour very quickly.

The urine is diverted to either a plastic container or into a soakaway in the ground. The urine separator is supplied with a metal filter that sits over the funnel end and prevents sawdust clogging up the pipe, which is particularly important if the urine is going to a soakaway.

Our urine separator is available in either black or white and are manufactured for us by a vacuuming forming company in Glasgow.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Compost toilet Plans and Accessorises

Below are the plans for some of the toilets that we sell, as well as the urine separator.
We will make the plans for more designs available soon.

 

Compost tolet plans

urine separator uk

Compost Toilet Designs

Essentially there are two types of compost toilet, defined by the size of the poo receptacle.

Bucket Toilets

bucket compost toilet

 

Bucket compost toilets are a great solution when space is really tight, and are popular on boats and in camper-vans, cabins and pre-existing sheds.

Their main feature is the small bucket that is used for collecting the poo, which usually holds 25 litres. The urine container can be anything from an empty Coke bottle to a custom made water tank.

When designing a bucket toilet it is best to start with your bucket and urine collector and build the rest of your toilet around them.

 

 

compact compost toilet
bucket compost toilet

 

This type of bucket toilet can be built from any sort of materials from scrap wood to ply or oak. Below are some variations of this type of toilet.

 

bucket compost toilet
easy loo compost toilet
boat compost toilet

Compost Toilets

Compost Toilets

Wheelie Bin Toilets

 

For these larger toilets we favour using wheelie bins as the receptacle. You might ask why use a wheelie bin? Well if we were to get a team of designers on board to create the perfect receptacle then after years of research they would come back with the wheelie bin design. It's got wheels for movability, its rat and rodent proof and it has a lid which is waterproof.

When designing a toilet using a wheelie bin start with the wheelie bin and build your toilet around this. Ok so you might think that a wheelie bin is quite tall at 1m high. Yes it is but there are ways to lower the overall height of the building. Firstly wheelie bin can be nestled inside the toilet box that you sit on.

 

 

Other ways are to have a internal step inside the toilet, this does not lower the overall height of the building but does lower the ouside step height.

 

wheelie bin compost toilet design

 

Another way is by digging down a counter ramp that is submerged into the ground.