Water bottle purifiers - what works and what doesn't?

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Beccara

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#225708 1-Dec-2017 11:57

Hi All,

We'll be off in Jan to sail around for a month coastally and I'm looking at water bottle based purifiers, Last year we found out onboard water supplies running low and using tablets like AquaClean and Aquatabs we found them difficult to manage due to 20L limitations and waiting times.

This year i'd like us to have another form of water cleaning onboard before we take the plunge into watermaker land and i've been looking around at products like lifestraw/water2go/fill2pure and was wondering if anyone here had any first hand experience with this class of purifier. The W2G and F2P both claim pretty good results with viruses and bacteria along with dissolved chemicals and metals, The life straw seems to only focus on bacteria

http://waterbottlestogo.com.au/product/750ml-water-bottles/

https://www.fill2pure.co.nz/stainless-steel-water-filter-bottle-479.html

I'm leaning towards the F2P as it has a stockist in NZ, Is in stainless not plastic, however, the the W2G seems to have more "voodoo" in the filter with the claims around not just being a mechanical filter. Does anyone have any thoughts/ideas/alternatives?

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Fred99

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#1911669 1-Dec-2017 12:59

I just completely gave up with tank water on our boat. Has about 200l flexitank, I've pulled it out, scrubbed with assorted concoctions recommended by experts, take great care with quality of water used to fill the tank, but the water still tastes manky in a few days. Probably not helped by the fact that the tank is in the bilge, so it equalises to water temperature of about or over 20 degrees (say compared to tap water which is probably closer to 10 deg or so). It goes "off" rather fast.

So, the tank water only gets used for dishes, washing up etc - I'm reluctant to even use it for cooking. We'll take a load of several 5-10l new water containers from the supermarket, then refill them with drinking water when available. From that, refill 500ml (approx) water bottles for drinking - and keep those in the fridge.

Geektastic

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#1911710 1-Dec-2017 14:48

I’ve found that the straw/bottle based systems are rarely much use.

Personally in your scenario I would be looking at Katadyn and MSR handpump systems. The MSR Guardian is the best - designed for the US military and gets everything but costs about $600.

However there are plenty of Katadyn options around $200-$300 that will produce far more volume of potable water for less effort than straw/bottle systems.

wellygary

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#1911717 1-Dec-2017 15:03

What will be the water's original source, ? are you talking about simply wanting to make water that was potable taste less manky, or are you planning on using a non-potable source??

Beccara

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#1911721 1-Dec-2017 15:21

Lots of coastal streams and waterfalls, Places like Whangamumu where access is a 4k hike over a hill to a road then a hitch - There's a waterfall there but the waters got particles in it

Geektastic

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#1911774 1-Dec-2017 19:05

MSR Guardian will catch everything.

Stan

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#1911826 1-Dec-2017 20:57

For a cheaper option this seems to get good reviews

https://www.amazon.com/Survivor-Filter-Purifier-Emergency-Nanofiltration/dp/B00QFXGSIY/ref=sr_1_5?s=outdoor-recreation&ie=UTF8&qid=1512114799&sr=1-5&keywords=portable+water+purifier

Geektastic

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#1911845 1-Dec-2017 22:11

Buy once, buy quality.

It’s worth remembering that you can add the unit into your earthquake box as it will enable you to create safe drinking water from streams, puddles and lakes etc in the event that public supply is not available.

Google Katadyn for other excellent models. Their top of the line unit is Red Cross issue for disaster areas.

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tieke

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#1911857 1-Dec-2017 23:06

For a water bottle on the go that will filter down to virus level, I'm a big fan of my Grayl one (review here). Mine's the previous version, so it's made of stainless steel rather than the current ultra-light version, but the concept is the same - it sort of works like a very fancy plunger coffee-filter.

They have a super-purifier cartridge as well as a less-stringent one, and what I like about it is that unlike the straw-style systems which are a bit of a faff to drink from, with the Grayl you simply fill the base unit with water and then slowly push the inner filtered part down into it, resulting in a bottle now filled with filtered water which you can drink normally/pour into someone else's water bottle etc. A lot easier to drink from than having to suck hard through a life straw etc.