Making Collected Water Potable

[jennyjj01]

Today i popped the lid off my 120L water butt. It's rigged to my downspout and hasn't been used/ emptied since summer. It's been sat there full to capacity.

My God it was disgusting ! There was a slab of mould flouting on top and it stank like old dead flowers. I wouldn't want to make tea with it.

I suppose I might have been better to occasionally drain and clean it, but I'm gobsmacked at how gross it became.

So what should I do? put some sort of inline filter in the collecting pipe? Treat the water chemically? If so what with?

Or should I just anticipate filtering or boiling it?

[Deeps]

Don't know how bad it was but most water can be 'treated'. Have you got a Millbank/Brown bag ?? They take the worst of the sediment out of water, then you can put it through a filter (I'm a fan of Sawyer because of the small size) and either boil or chlorinate (puritab) or both if you feel the need.

[jennyjj01]

I suppose I should stop being a wuss and draw a glassful from the tap and not look in the top.
I remember when I had my storage tank removed from the loft and saw the shite that was in there. I'd been bathing and brushing my teeth in that for 20 years and was nearly sick just looking at the gunge.
Will looksee puritab. I have sawyer filters if push comes to shove.

[jansman]

The animal that I am ( so my wife says!) sees me ,in Summer,filling a bottle from the tap of a water butt when I am in the garden.Its a long walk down to the nearest mains tap.It looks clean enough to me.Like Deeps says,filter it through a Millbank ( or t shirt), and boil if that makes you more comfortable.

You will have NO problems doing it that way.In my late teens I was posted to Belize for jungle training.There,I found out what dirty water does to a human being! Here in the UK,the simple steps that Deeps suggest will more than clean your rainwater.

[Arzosah]

I suppose I should stop being a wuss and draw a glassful from the tap and not look in the top.

Not without treating it, surely even if I was watering plants with it, I'd make sure it didn't go on to the leaves, especially if they were going to be eaten raw. Mind you, my awful digestive system and lack of resistance to bugs is legendary in my family ...

That's the sort of thing that I bought the pool shock for recently ... I have a good stock of ordinary bleach, plus purification tabs plus filters and the ability to make expedient filters, plus the ability to boil, of course, but for anything long term, I wanted the pool shock as a backup.

Mind you, if I go under a bus before I enter an OAP home or something, people are going to be staggered at the stuff I've got

Just seen what jansman posted immediately above this post. I'm a wuss, there's no question of it

[jansman]

No one is a wuss for wanting clean water.Our whole water system was built by Victorian engineers and Navvies,with the aim of eradicating water borne diseases - and only a relatively short time ago.So no,if you want to be sure,then be sure!

[Arzosah]

Thanks jansman.

if you want to be sure,then be sure!

I love that phrase! New favourite

[ForgeCorvus]

Any water can be made safe, for fresh water the 'Belt & Braces' method would be :

Course filter (Mil-bank, coffee filter, rag in a funnel)
Fine filter (Sawyer or WHY)
Chemical (bleach, puritab or other) /Heat (boil) treatment
..........Or................
Course Filter
Purifier

I'd chemical treat the whole tank if it was mine...... But then I'm a heavy-handed bloke

Prevention is better then cure though
Something I found interesting, its mostly about how to setup an off-grid system
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PL5EdNzhNMI

Google "First Flush water harvesters" for a way of keeping the crud levels down (heres one self-build version http://arkitrek.com/http:/arkitrek.com/ ... -diverter/ )

[Arwen Thebard]

In the way of being 'proper-preppers' we really should all be trying out our water filtering techniques and skills now. I am embarrassed to say I have not drunk any water taken from our water butts.......YET. You definitely cannot be too careful though, imagine getting a case of the squirts in an emergency situation.

I wonder which stages of purification will fall by the wayside first? Secondary boiling perhaps? Insufficient chlorine tabs? Un-flushed or blocked sawyer filters?

I suppose our internals will get resilient to a lower level of clean water over time?

[Deeps]

In the way of being 'proper-preppers' we really should all be trying out our water filtering techniques and skills now. I am embarrassed to say I have not drunk any water taken from our water butts.......YET. You definitely cannot be too careful though, imagine getting a case of the squirts in an emergency situation.

I wonder which stages of purification will fall by the wayside first? Secondary boiling perhaps? Insufficient chlorine tabs? Un-flushed or blocked sawyer filters?

I suppose our internals will get resilient to a lower level of clean water over time?

Where I generally walk (highlands) there's no need to do anything with the water, a cursory look along the water course to make sure there's nothing dead is usually sufficient. When I camp in the Scottish central belt I like to do it properly. I'm sure its probably fine but its good to practice. To be honest, its fine 'playing' at it but if you had to do it all the time I dare say it would become tiresome having to treat ALL your water like this. Probably ties in with your post I quoted in another thread about living like our ancestors. I have recently ordered a 8L Dutch oven which is much bigger than I would normally need (and about twice the size of my current one) which would be handy for boiling water and decanting it to another container to cool.