purifying water question

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Jay

Jay

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The Mountains
My deep well is on it's last leg so have been collecting rain water off my metal roof into food safe containers. I did run some of it through a sawyers squeeze but that takes a lot of time here at home, so this morning I boiled it. Some say 10 minutes, other say 3, and yet some say as long as one brings it to a boil it is safe to drink. What say the members here? I live in the mountains so I probably don't have the contaminants floating around as one might find near cities.
 
Weedygarden said:
I have a Berkey Water Filter. It does take time to filter the water. My thought is that water for consumption (drinking and used for cooking) could all be filtered, but water for other uses does not have the same need of filtering.
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'I already have a second non food grade barrel set up for all non food purposes. which has no need for filtering
 
We haul our drinking/cooking water, while other systems (rainwater collection, filtering systems) are in various stages of coming online. Of all the systems we experiment with, hauling water has been the easiest and least costly. A tank (IBC) in a heated storage shed, a tank (IBC) to haul with, a pump to transfer ... done. These tanks can be whatever size you can work with, as poly tanks come in all sizes (you can haul with a car or trailer, vs a heavy duty truck).

As a side effect on our homestead, water usage has dropped through the floor. We just don't use as much, which in turn leads to less hauling.

The other systems may eventually replace most of the water being hauled, but they have their own complexity, maintenance, and other issues. We may end up always hauling our drinking water ...

All of this complexity in the other systems correlates to the true system costs of something as simple as water ...
 
A round-about way of saying you might want more investigation into the filtering systems to get "safe" water in the quantity you need. I wouldn't trust any unfiltered water source these days, unless it got some kind of full treatment. Boiling water is only one portion of treatment ...

A Berkey is top of the line, but slow; other filtering systems possibly aren't as good, but move water through faster.
 
For immeadiate needs today or tomorrow...
A Brita or Zero Water filter pitcher or dispenser. Both of these can be purchased at WelMurt or on Amazit.
1) Brita Standard UltraMax Water Filter Dispenser, Gray, Extra Large 18 Cup, 1 Count
2) ZeroWater 20 Cup Ready-Pour Dispenser Water Filter Pitcher, clear

Either of these can be purchased for about $30. This will keep you in drinking water for the next month or two. You'll have to refill them several times a day, while emptying them into jugs for storage. You'll have some water for cooking and plenty to drink.

---------------------------------------------

Next, for long term needs it's going to cost a bit more but with a little creative thinking not as much as you might think. The stainless steel Berky stand-alone water filters cost about $300, even for a 2-filter tank. As you can see below you can get 2 filters for $65. You can then use food grade buckets or other stainless steel or plastic containers of your choice. Make you own tank. 2 Doulton filters can filter 3 gallons of water per hour.

Doulton filters are cleaned by scrubbing off the surface with a green kitchen cleaning pad. I've had 2 of these filters in a Berkfeld tank over 15 years, I've cleaned them twice. They still work great! When the filter starts slowing down I clean them. Doulton W9121200 7" Super Sterasyl Ceramic Filter Candle - Pack of 4

You can buy them from Amazit or other internet retailers.

Doulton filters.jpg





Here is how to build a bucket system... Buckets don't have to stack neatly on top of each other. All you need is 2 food grade buckets. Put a couple pieces of wood on top of the first, set the second buck on top that you mounted 2 filters in.

https://preparednessadvice.com/an-inexpensive-water-filter-the-bucket-berkey/

Where to get food grade buckets or barrels? US Plastic corporation, they make any kind of bucket or barrel you may need and sell to the public.

They sell valves, tubing also.

https://www.usplastic.com/
 
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Also, here is a older thread about Berkey filers... It has good info including DIY systems.

https://www.homesteadingforum.org/threads/berkey-water-filter-system-which-one.4628/
A reliable supply of clean drinking/cooking water buys you time to design or build a permanent arrangement.

Fixing your well is the simplest solution but if that becomes untenable a combination solution might work for you.

Meaning - use a stand-alone filter system for drinking/cooking water and a separate system for all other needs.

A charcoal and sand system might be a viable option. They can provide 100's of gallons of clean water if not pure water. Plans for these simple systems are on the internet.
 
hashbrown said:
If there were anyway possible I would work on the well. Is it the pump or water height what do you think the problem is?
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I totally understand. my op was for a temporary solution.. My well is 350 ft deep, and because of it's location it would have to be pulled by hand which the well company wouldn't do. I'm looking for another company. I don't know the static level, and also don't know if it would be possible to pull it myself. The pipe itself is pvc. going to have to give it more thought, as well as speak to others.
 
Well, I haven't been pilloried in a while so I am overdue. But I cannot remain silent on this.
Many people underestimate the importance of 'water safety'.
Every municipal water supply adds chlorine to the water they send out for a number of important reasons; and it is not for flavor:rolleyes:.
I grew up in rural Alabama and poor-people's water supply came from a non-electric ram pump pulling water out of a creek.
They stayed sick all the time. And now we know why.
The best filters are great, but if they were good enough, there wouldn't be any chlorine in 'city water'.
If birds poop on your roof and you collect the rainwater, the rain dissolves it. You can't filter it out any more than you 'filter out' the salt in seawater.
Simply bathing or showering (which is the majority of our water use), in untreated water is all it takes to have fun with just one of the many 'waterborne' pathogens, like THIS.
Ever heard of areas with a power outage being put under a "boil water" advisory? Guess why.
Let the slings and arrows begin.:archery:
I can take it.
 
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Rig a tripod and get a come-along. Here is an example.
I am going on the assumption that your problem is that you need a new pump. While it is out have the well company clean your well. Put a retrial cord on it near the pump so that next time all you have to do is use a winch on your ATV to pull it up. In the meantime pickup a snatch block for your tripod.
 
I think the time you need to boil water is highly dependent on your altitude, you are boiling it for the temperature not the bubbles....
Now the rest is just me talking, but at sea level I would go with 2 minutes of hard boil, that as you go up in altitude the time increases because the boiling temperature decreased due to the change in air pressure.

Suggestion, if you are above 5,000 feet, use your pressure cooker or canner, bring the pressure up to 10 psi and then turn off the heat.

I would filter the water first, then heat, then use.

The reason cities don't use reverse osmosis filters is they are expensive and require a lot of maintenance.
 
Okay 42 I don't want to have you feel ignored. I'm currently staying in the house I was living in from my teen years. There are four residences on the property, four primary cisterns, one active reserve cistern and two reserve cisterns. Rain catchment is the water supply. We use butterfly filters, 20 micron, that basically filters out large stuff (butterflies). This is to keep dirt and leaves out of the system. Tain ware is distilled. We don't have a problem with birds on our roofs.

At my other home I have a well and an RO filter for drinking and cooking. I had an RO filter on my boat and it did filter the salt out of the water.

Love you though 42.😉
 
UrbanHunter said:
I think the time you need to boil water is highly dependent on your altitude, you are boiling it for the temperature not the bubbles....
Now the rest is just me talking, but at sea level I would go with 2 minutes of hard boil, that as you go up in altitude the time increases because the boiling temperature decreased due to the change in air pressure.

Suggestion, if you are above 5,000 feet, use your pressure cooker or canner, bring the pressure up to 10 psi and then turn off the heat.

I would filter the water first, then heat, then use.

The reason cities don't use reverse osmosis filters is they are expensive and require a lot of maintenance.
Click to expand...
I think 180°F will kill almost every pathogen out there. But if you think about 3 people that need to take a bath with 10 gallons each, you are talking about a LOT of btu's:oops:. It is probably far more cost-effective to toss several 'water purification' tablets into 30 gallons of water.
I just don't want to see people go thru what I saw others go thru.:(
 
I would only boil water for consumption (drinking (including brushing teeth), food preparation, and dishes). When making wash water I would just treat using a gravity filtration system and then throw in some chlorine, for the Toilet I would just use water as is.... or use filtered (different filter) grey water (used wash water)

I know of reverse osmosis systems (large) where they have added chlorine before the filters and burned holes in the filters, resulting in poor performance. If you are using a reverse osmosis system, I would lightly filter the water, then use the reverse osmosis system, and add chlorine after that.

If you need a lot of water you might think about using an RV water pump to push the water through the system.
 
Wouldn't a couple of teaspoons of pool shock work as well?
 
I want to thank @Jay for starting this post, it got me to thinking about water long term. I have the rain water collection system and a little storage, but if I needed to drink it, I would be forced to use my backpacking type filters.

I would like to have all the makings on hand to create a couple of larger gravity filter systems if things ever got serious.

There are a number of things that I would not normally have on hand, for example I don't drink coffee and large coffee filters could be useful.
 
UrbanHunter said:
I want to thank @Jay for starting this post, it got me to thinking about water long term. I have the rain water collection system and a little storage, but if I needed to drink it, I would be forced to use my backpackingB type filters.

I would like to have all the makings on hand to create a couple of larger gravity filter systems if things ever got serious.

There are a number of things that I would not normally have on hand, for example I don't drink coffee and large coffee filters could be useful.
Click to expand...
Already tried coffee filters as a pre filter, didn't work to well. Bandana worked far better for me.
 
I was actually thinking of my pre-filter being (bottom to top), container bottom with several 1/2" holes, a coffee filter that goes all the way to the edge, a layer of fine wire screen, some coarse screen (a couple of layers), a layer of fine screen, a coffee filter going to the edge, a layer of fine screen to hold it down, then a 1" layer of charcoal, a coffee filter, a 1" layer of sand, a coffee filter, and a layer of coarse screen to hold it all down.
 
If just the pump (speaking lightly here) couldn't you order a replacement pump? I don't know but could you gather the equipment to do the install? What would it cost to just have it fixed properly? You don't need to answer but I would be weighting my options.
 
I recommend both replacing your electric and adding in a hand pump. You'll need to know how deep your water is, both the well depth and the depth of the water.
 
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