How to purify your water

When you find yourself an a survival situation, you do not always have access to chemicals or a filter to purify the water so you can drink it.

You could just boil the water but this would n't get sand and other particles out of the water and the chemicals will also remain in the water after cooking it. Which in turn could affect your health.

So the best way to purify your water is to use a filter.
Often you can build a water filter with the resources you have available, this gets the particules, dirt and some of the chemicals out of the water.

It is wise to boil the water after you filtered it so that all bacteria and viruses are killed.

Step 1: The Filter

A water filter can be created by removing the bottom of a bottle. Turn the bottle upsidedown (with the cap down down).
and put the following materials in the bottle.
- pebbles
- Sand
- a piece of cloth or bandages
- charcoal
- a piece of cloth or bandages
- Sand
- pebbles

The cloth or bandages are used to ensure that all the different materials do not mix.
The pebbels and sand filter the particules and the dirt out of the water.
The charcoal gets a big portion of the chemicals out of the water, but it won't get it all out. (You can use charcoal from your campfire).
This filter will not remove any viruses and bacteria from the water so you have to boil the water after it is filtered.

Step 2: How to use your filter

Gently scoop some water from a puddle or a pond with your cup, try to get as little dirt as possible into the cup. The more dirt comes along with the water the faster the filter becomes clogged and can no longer be used.

Pour the water from the pool or pond in top of your water filter, catch the water at the bottom of the filter in a clean cup.
it is best to throw away the first bit of water that comes out of your filter it often is cloudy and not that clean.

If the water that comes out of your filter is clear it is good and you can use it.

Boil the water at least 1 minute before drinking it, cooking will kill bacteria and viruses that are still present in your water.

If you put some spruce needles in the boiling water, you'll also have a tasty tea.

dealowis says: Feb 5, 2013. 5:09 AM

this simple way is helping me. i use this as a experiment in school, my teachers all love it. they ask: who created this purifying water way? i answer: Elkliko who that made it!!
so thanks for the tips :)

elkliko (author) in reply to dealowisFeb 5, 2013. 8:07 AM

Nice to hear that you used this Instructable as an experiment, if you want to make it even more natural you can make a funnal from birchbark instead of using a bottle.

chiefredelk says: Jul 19, 2012. 8:45 PM

Water filters can be VERY important even to those people with city water may need one....

Sometimes our city water stinks and taste's like Chlorine and is almost impossible to drink.

I've had to add Hydrogen Peroxide to my water just to get it down. Boiling it did not help much...I plan on making a filter like this one but using a 5 gallon bucket. instead. ALSO.. I am thinking of pouring something through it FIRST to kill any bacteria that may be living in the filter...Since our water is safe to drink I do not want to add bacteria to my end product in the filtering process.. I would think a small amount of house hold bleach poured through the filter then flushed out with fresh tap water may work but to much at one time may soak into the charcoal and ruin it's effectiveness.. Does anyone have a better idea ?. Also IF I make a filter how often should I need to toss the sand and charcoal out and replace it with fresh..? Can you go by taste ? OR is there a tell tell by looks ?

Schmidty16 says: Jul 14, 2012. 8:43 PM

um kz i can help u with ur problem i will get back to u tomrrow but u can have like a big metal 55 gammion drum and have i mounted of a five or heat source and have copper tubing leading out of it and it will condense when it gets come i may wriit up a dizine but u will nee a way to cool down the steam to condense it back in to purfied water the u will have ur good coffie

kz440 says: Jul 6, 2012. 7:01 AM

I am curious about the flavor of the filtered water. I recently moved into a house that has terrible tasting water. I do NOT want to pay the high price of water service, not even my dogs care for the water. The water is safe enough but has a high calcium content and tastes salty. I can't even handle coffee made from it. Any clues as to the flavor change?

elkliko (author) in reply to kz440Jul 8, 2012. 2:44 AM

I can't say alot about the flavor of the water because the water i use isn't that bad i only have to remove the dirt, bacteria en chemicals that are in the water, I do not think that it wil get the salt out of sea water for instants. but you can always try it because the ilter is very easy and cheap to make.

In your case it can help to vaporize your water and than condence it again.
When you boil salt water the salt in the water won't evaporate and you can get rid of the salty tast, but as you can imagine this is a intensive way of cleaning your water and i don't know if it wil get rid of calcium.

kz440 in reply to elklikoJul 8, 2012. 8:03 AM

...actually, it's not salt water... it has a slightly salty taste though. I am going to try the filter, but perhaps on a larger scale as I have to have water for my spoiled dogs, but hey- they don't like this water either.

Thanks for your reply, much appreciated.

T

Josehf Murchison says: Sep 23, 2011. 4:31 PM

I always carry water.
Cedar tea will stave off scurvy.

Not a bad article.
A coffee filter can filter out debris nicely.
A good source for activated charcoal is aquarium filters.

How to make Activated Charcoal would be good also.
Take wood, paper, or bone, you can even use nutshells or corn husks.
Seal it in an airtight container.
A glass jar with a tin lid will enable you to watch as the material changes to activated charcoal.
Poke a vent hole in the lid and heat over a fire.
The smoke and hot gasses will escape out the vent hole leaving behind the activated charcoal.
Let cool slowly if you use a glass jar or the glass may shatter.

heathbar64 in reply to Josehf MurchisonJan 1, 2012. 6:05 PM

Ok so what exactly is activated charcoal and how is it different than regular charred wood? why is activated charcoal used for filters? I need to understand!

Josehf Murchison in reply to heathbar64Jan 1, 2012. 10:44 PM

Charred wood like from a bonfire is exposed to the air when it is burned and it has the chance to absorb carbon dioxide and other contaminants as it burns. Charred wood does not always burn through to the center.

Activated charcoal used for filters is burned in a container that does not allow air into the container to contaminate the carbon with carbon dioxide or other contaminants. It is pure carbon for a better term.

Activated charcoal used for filters, absorb carbon dioxide and other contaminants, this wont happen if it is already contaminated.

heathbar64 in reply to Josehf MurchisonJan 2, 2012. 5:17 AM

AH! I get it. Thank you josehf. Makes perfect sense.

evasiveJ4v3L1n says: Oct 11, 2011. 3:55 PM

Obviously this method is not very effective. True, it will remove large dirt and rock particles but what is the point of this when you can just use a thin wire mesh and take away the particles. After that you just boil the water without the hassle of building a complex and space consuming object.

voyageur10 in reply to evasiveJ4v3L1nNov 5, 2011. 3:14 PM

Do you really think that a simple "thin wire mesh" filter is the same as charcoal, pebbles sand AND mesh?

evasiveJ4v3L1n in reply to voyageur10Nov 5, 2011. 4:39 PM

Hi voyageur10,
it is true that charcoal and all that would be a lot better if you did not heat the water as it would remove some chemicals whereas the wire mesh would not. But when you boil the water you are removing the chemicals and killing the germs anyway.

hbueso in reply to evasiveJ4v3L1nNov 26, 2011. 4:44 PM

Not necessarily will remove all chemicals (boiling). In some cases might concentrate them.

elkliko (author) in reply to evasiveJ4v3L1nOct 16, 2011. 10:11 PM

The diference between this water filter and a thin wire mesh is that it wil get a big portion of chemical out of the water that would not hev been filtered with a thin wire mesh. That is why i prefer to filter the water with a filter instead of a mesh.

hbueso says: Nov 26, 2011. 4:42 PM

Distillation removes some contaminants, carbon filter others. I would first filter the dirty water for solids then, carbon filter it, distillation and carbon filter again. Plenty of info. on this on the internet. Research water purification methods and find which methods reduce or eliminate what chemicals and use them in conjunction with one another.