water treatment by distilling

[J man]

I have seem some filter systems that treat drinking water by distilling it. Waterwise is one company I know of, anyone ever use their products?
Waterwise

I have a well and am surrounded by fields that get sprayed with whatever nasty crap the farmer uses on his corn and beans. We currently do not drink our water because of this. I would like to find a safe option to make our water drinkable. Also thought it could be used in a SHTF situation.

 

[kybares]

Burkey water filters will remove the "nasty crap" the farmer uses. No distilling, gravity fed purifier.

 

[navarre1095]

Sawyer® Products - Water Filtration, Insect Repellent, Sunblocks and More
I am partial to these

 

[Sailor]

Surrounded by corn, have a still...... why make water?

Berkey.

 

[cosermann]

Distillation, by itself, won't remove anything more volatile than H2O. It's not the end all be all of water treatment. But it is one option for some things. Just sayin'.

 

[BigMatt]

You can remove the volatiles out of water, you just have to distilll it twice - once at a lower temperature to remove the volatiles and a second time to remove the things less volatile.

 

[ATOMonkey]

Coffee makers probably costs a lot less than those things. They also come with built in filtration.

Just sayin'....

 

[rhino]

Proper distillation technique or reverse osmosis are your best bets.

You should probably have your water tested, though. There is no way to know what is really in it until you do. Then, once you know what you have, you can select a treatment process (or series of them) that is appropriate for your needs.

I have seem some filter systems that treat drinking water by distilling it. Waterwise is one company I know of, anyone ever use their products?
Waterwise

I have a well and am surrounded by fields that get sprayed with whatever nasty crap the farmer uses on his corn and beans. We currently do not drink our water because of this. I would like to find a safe option to make our water drinkable. Also thought it could be used in a SHTF situation.

 

[cosermann]

... You should probably have your water tested, though. There is no way to know what is really in it until you do. Then, once you know what you have, you can select a treatment process (or series of them) that is appropriate for your needs.

^^^ This.

 

[gage]

Proper distillation technique or reverse osmosis are your best bets.

You should probably have your water tested, though. There is no way to know what is really in it until you do. Then, once you know what you have, you can select a treatment process (or series of them) that is appropriate for your needs.

Agreed on the testing but imagine that the quality (absence of pesticides, insecticides, undesirable chemicals etc) might be seasonal so would see the benefit of testing more than once through the year.

https://engineering.purdue.edu/SafeWater/drinkinfo/testwater.html

Does anyone have a good source/link comparing RO verses distilled H2O capabilities of purifying different types of contaminates. Is it true RO is more effective at removing radioactive components?

Hi RhinO! Educate me on proper (or improper) distillation.

 

[rhino]

That's a good point, but I would expect the seasonal nature of any contamination to depend on the depth of the well and the nature of the aquifer(s) in which it is installed. If it's really deep or it's isolated by relatively impermeable layers, it's not going to change much in the short term. Of course, if we're talking about contamination running into an open well from the surface . . . that's another story.

Re: distillation ... someone mentioned doing multiple distillations to separate water from substances that have both higher and lower boiling points. If I knew there were VOCs in the water, I'd aerate before doing the distillation. That will remove a significant amount. If all you have is organics, you could do well with aeration followed by carbon adsorption. If you have ionic species (like metals, nitrate ion, etc), you're going to have to either distill or use reverse osmosis.

Ultimately distillation is very energy intensive and the fraction of recovered potable water from the total is not always good.

Agreed on the testing but imagine that the quality (absence of pesticides, insecticides, undesirable chemicals etc) might be seasonal so would see the benefit of testing more than once through the year.

https://engineering.purdue.edu/SafeWater/drinkinfo/testwater.html

Does anyone have a good source/link comparing RO verses distilled H2O capabilities of purifying different types of contaminates. Is it true RO is more effective at removing radioactive components?

Hi RhinO! Educate me on proper (or improper) distillation.

 

[navarre1095]

Look up the data on biosand filtration. You can make a filter out of found and hardware store parts. Boiling and distillation are not the only or necessarily the most efficient ways to get drinkable water. We have a member at the ZS forums who has access to certain contaminants and has been testing off the shelf filters for removal. It appears that a Brita pitcher if prepared according to directions will remove 92% of I-131.

J-man, I have 5 or so pesticide test kits for drinking water at my lab . PM me and I'll send you one.

 

[Vespid_Wasp]

I have seem some filter systems that treat drinking water by distilling it. Waterwise is one company I know of, anyone ever use their products?
Waterwise

I have a well and am surrounded by fields that get sprayed with whatever nasty crap the farmer uses on his corn and beans. We currently do not drink our water because of this. I would like to find a safe option to make our water drinkable. Also thought it could be used in a SHTF situation.

You should get a simple test done before you take any drastic steps. Chances are your water is cleaner than what most folks in the city are drinking. Most of what herbicide doesn't get used directly by killing weeds, is broken down by sunlight and microbial action before it even begins to permeate the soil.

 

[Iroquois]

OK let me see what I remember from refrig class. It takes 1 btu to raise 1 lb. of water 1 deg.f. that means it takes 211 btus to get water from 0 to boiling temp. But for
some reason I can't remember it takes like 900 btus [or some such unlikely number]to
actually beak into a boil. Not a good return for the money. A good carbon filter and an
R.O. system is a whole lot less expensive. I doubt you'll ad 2 weeks to your life by drinking distilled water over R.O. water.