Home Made Water Filter
June 24, 2009 by admin
Filed under home improvement
Colhane asked:
I have used this simple water filter for the past eight years in Brazil. It cost about $3 to make. This filter MUST be used with some chemical means of purification or boiling to make the water safe.
Save money today on DIY projects for your home
DIY Solar for Your Home? Read More
I say “PVC” out of ignorance. This was the same water pipe used in my home construction.
Do it yourself home solar heater
You may want to consider using a stainless steel pipe. Use the PVC pipe for an extended period of time and you’ll probably end up with cancer or some other horrible ailment.
Solar Power – DIY – For Your Home
The fiber ball does get mucked up pretty bad but you can rinse it out or carry extra. It weighs next to nothing and packs down tight. I replace the carbon every few trips but you can also use crushed charcoal from a fire if it gets too bad in the field.
I am a Baptist Missionary in Brazil. My wife grew up there and I taught school there for two years prior to making the move full time in 1999.
Solar Power – DIY – For Your Home
Hi, do you have to regularly replace the synthetic fiber ball and/or charcoal pieces?
Seems like they’d get a bit gross (particularly the fiber).
& I’m curious how/why you got to Brazil…. I have an insane amount of envy for that.
Solar Power – DIY – For Your Home
if you want reallllllly fine sand, try to find some blotters sand online, for writing with a quill, that stuff is like flour almost (i dont know if you wanted some that fine, but yeah)
Save money today on DIY projects for your home
I’ve appreciated your detail description of “activated”
thank you once again : )
DIY Solar for Your Home? Read More
Thank you!
I understand “Giant pressure cooker”
the concept is clearer now : )
solar heating for your home? Read here!
The “activated” refers to the total surface area/unit …. typically a minimum of 400 square meters per gram …. upwards to 1000 square meter or more …. A big chunk of regular charcoal … maybe … has a few square meter. You grind it up, it’ll go up quite bit …. Charcoal is cheap, smaller particles will ‘absorb’ more toxins, since more area will be exposed. Activated charcoal has a very pourous structure, think about the path a drop of water has to take to make it through a sponge
Do it yourself home solar heater
Dry charcoal sounds perfect ….Oxygen free heating might not be possible on your own … but that how its made commercially. Think: Giant pressure cooker filled with, oh … ground up corn stalks … that you raise to 1000 degrees without allowing oxygen into it. Water, hydrogen, etc. gets released, but thanks to the original organic matrix, the carbon is left in a spongy matrix … lots and lots of surface area.
Do it yourself home solar heater
thank you so much for replying to my curiosity re: activated charcoal!
Dry charcoal (sterile and porous) is ready to do its work of filtering. Perhaps that is what is meant by activated or is it that the carbon must be commercially produced to be called activated charcoal.
I’m fascinated by this statement “Formed through heating carbonaceous compounds (say, moldy grain) in an oxygen free atmosphere”. Is this product black? …and what kind of heating is oxygen free? Thanks
Do it yourself home solar heater
“thank you! …I’m still curious about what activated charcoal is : ) ”
Chunks of relatively pure carbon that have a huge surface area relative to its volume. Think: little bits of carbon sponge, where contaminants (through various processes) gets stuck to the surface. Formed through heating carbonaceous compounds (say, moldy grain) in an oxygen free atmosphere.
In a pinch, use the black that forms on a burnt log. Not perfect, but better than nothing.
solar heating for your home? Read here!
try play sand at your major hardware stores
Save money today on DIY projects for your home
I’m makin my own water filter too! I found some charcoal used for filtering the water for fish, all I really need now is fine grain sand! I jest cant find any in stores! Pls help and suggest.
Do it yourself home solar heater
thank you! …I’m still curious about what activated charcoal is : )
DIY Solar for Your Home? Read More
This filter is intended to be used in the bush for cleaning up drinking water before chemical treatment. I don’t think it will remove a significant amount of chlorine.
I suppose there is a harmful dose of iodine but in the concentrations used for purifying drinking water it is not a problem. Iodine has been used for this for a very long time.
2% Tincture of iodine – 5 drops per quart/liter – wait half an hour. This dose can be doubled for very dirty water.
Save money today on DIY projects for your home
The parts aren’t hard to figure out if you have a bin of PVC parts in front of you.
2 twenty mm pipe sections about 4 inches long
1 twenty mm pipe joint
1 twenty mm reducer. This part narrows the water flow
2 perforated plastic discs or screens to sit above and below the activated charcoal. You can make these out of soft plastic.
Activated charcoal pellets
Synthetic wadding
Hope this helped.
solar heating for your home? Read here!
looks like a great bit of kit, thanks for sharing! could you possibly share a rough parts list? particularly, what is the coupler and reducer referred to at the hardware store?
solar heating for your home? Read here!
Chlorine – Tastes better doesn’t react to food, dissipates over time, won’t stain water bladders. In liquid form it will leave white spots on clothes and gear if you’re not careful.
I use Chlorine tablets personally (Clor-In 1, made in Brazil) but when I teach survival I teach the 2% Iodine method because they will be able to buy it in any pharmacy in Brazil for about $1.50.
Do it yourself home solar heater
There are pro’s and con’s to both. I can’t really comment on the long term health effects of either. I haven’t noticed any. You should know how to use both.
Iodine – Tastes funny, reacts with starches. Taste and reactivity can be eliminated with ascorbic acid. Stains water bladders. It is very common and easy to find as a 2% solution. Very inexpensive.
Do it yourself home solar heater
Hey I like your videos and I am now a subscriber. I think this filter would work great! Do you recommend Iodine or Chlorine? I am leaning toward Cl because it can dissapate over time. Any advantages to either?
DIY Solar for Your Home? Read More
Yep thanks for sending it along my friend pretty good stuff… just like he said a fish tank filter in a tube…. cool!!
solar heating for your home? Read here!
cool
solar heating for your home? Read here!
Indeed. Got my project for tomorrow.
solar heating for your home? Read here!
How smart is that !
Outstanding info !
solar heating for your home? Read here!
Interesting! …what is activated charcoal? and I’m curious about the chemicals. Are you okay with ingesting chlorine? …and how does adding chlorine make water taste better?
I’m curious about the iodine pellets too. I understand iodine is added to salt for heath reasons (I’ve forgotten exactly why; it prevents something?!?) anyways could one ingest too much iodine? I am concerned with the additives of municiplal water and want to know if your filter system would remove them.
thanks!