The Dirt Cheap Berkey Water Filter

What’s the third most important element of your survival after shelter and oxygen?

Depending on health, physical activity and enviroment humans can survive less than five minutes without oxygen, less than ten days without water (50 F / 10.0 C with little to no activity) and four to six weeks without food.

Clean water is essential.

Just imagine how disappointed you’d be after investing all your time and money building your stockpile of survival food, just before you died of dehydration.

Having food storage without a reliable source of clean water is like eating soup with a fork, you’re only getting some of what you need.

As you know, I’m a fan of the Berkey system, having used the Big Berkey extensively for over a year, I can personally attest to their performance. However, a lot of people can’t or won’t spend $250 or more for a filter (mine was a donation from directive 21).

The key to the effectiveness of the Berkey system is the Black Berkey purification elements. Fortunately, it isn’t difficult to improvise upper and lower chambers. Here’s how to make your own “Dirt Cheap Berkey Filter”.

What You’ll Need

• Berkey Filter Element $48.50 each
• One gallon round pitchers (Wal-Mart) $2
• One gallon pitcher with spigot (Wal-Mart) $5
• Drill and 1/2 inch bit
• Hack saw
• Super Glue

As you can see from the pics it’s a simple process – the whole thing took me about 15 minutes.

First drill a 1/2 inch hole through the bottom the pitcher without the spigot (top chamber). Avoid applying pressure when drilling as this could cause the plastic to spit across the bottom, use only the weight and momentum of the drill to get through.

Next thread the plastic tip of the filter element through the hole (rubber washer to the inside) and snug up the nut on the other, avoid over tightening, as this could damage the filter element or nut.

Since the top of the lower chamber was the same size as the bottom of the top chamber the filter became unstable when the two were put together.

To stabilize the unit, I improvised an adapter by cutting a two-inch tall ring from another pitcher with a hacksaw and super glued this to the bottom of the top chamber (see pic).

You might be able to come up with a better method or find containers that fit together forming a stable unit without any modification.

What do you think?

Related posts:

1. Berkey Water Filter
2. Win A Free Go Berkey Filter ($139.00 value)
3. Making A Clean Water Filter

Read the original story at The Survivalist Blog .net