Building a pump box

[StG58]

Sweet! I know how it goes.

I'm going nuts finishing up projects. Four weeks from today, the wife and I go rogue. She retires, and three days later we are permanently out-o-here. We are all planned out to the middle of November, then we're drifting south on the Oregon coast. There's a surprising amount of off grid camping available down there if you know where to look.

 

[freedom_in_4low]

My college capstone project was literally to build this exact thing:

-make drinkable water from any source
-run off a car battery
-portability to the extent that it could be checked as standard baggage on a commercial airline

It wasn't for commercialization; overlanding didn't exist the way it does today. It was for relief workers to get drinkable water into an impoverished area or a disaster (this was like, a year post-Katrina, for context).

We used a couple of filter stages plus a UV tube. I don't remember the exact flow or pressure specifications but it wasn't intended to supply a shower...something like 1gpm. If I were building one today I would use a modest flow rate to keep the system light and compact, and when it's needed for washing, is use it to fill a tank to hang up high and use gravity for the shower.

We built it into a suitcase sized Pelican and just managed to keep it under $1k....in 2006.

 

[macleanflood]

Sweet! I know how it goes.

I'm going nuts finishing up projects. Four weeks from today, the wife and I go rogue. She retires, and three days later we are permanently out-o-here. We are all planned out to the middle of November, then we're drifting south on the Oregon coast. There's a surprising amount of off grid camping available down there if you know where to look.

I'm in Fall Creek if you need a shop, lift and tools...or a shower...

-Mac

 

[macleanflood]

Well I just got home from a week long away mission for work...and I don't feel like grinding off spring perches...

-Mac

 

[macleanflood]

Assembled. Need to anchor the pump and glue or screw the ISO electrical connector.

Plumbing fittings worked out perfectly. Box was flexible enough to wedge things in and start threading. No union needed.

Given I'm drinking out of a mini hiking filter I feel this is perfectly acceptable.

-Mac

 

[g.hayduke]

My college capstone project was literally to build this exact thing:

-make drinkable water from any source
-run off a car battery
-portability to the extent that it could be checked as standard baggage on a commercial airline

It wasn't for commercialization; overlanding didn't exist the way it does today. It was for relief workers to get drinkable water into an impoverished area or a disaster (this was like, a year post-Katrina, for context).

We used a couple of filter stages plus a UV tube. I don't remember the exact flow or pressure specifications but it wasn't intended to supply a shower...something like 1gpm. If I were building one today I would use a modest flow rate to keep the system light and compact, and when it's needed for washing, is use it to fill a tank to hang up high and use gravity for the shower.

We built it into a suitcase sized Pelican and just managed to keep it under $1k....in 2006.

I pretty much built your college project myself. It has 3 filter stages plus a LED UV device. It's powered off a12V car battery. The intended use is to refill 7 gallon jugs which I use for everything, including refilling my teardrop fresh water tanks.

I tested it twice. I did before/after treatment tests using a cow tank out in the desert as the source. Before treatment was positive for fecal coliform. After treatment, test was negative. Then I went to a boat ramp on a reservoir fed by the Rio Grande which carries a lot of agricultural runoff. I sent the boat ramp samples off for comprehensive testing. Results came back with everything within safe limits.

I did not want a battery in the unit because it has to be kept charged and adds a lot of weight. I'll be driving to the water source so I'll always have a high-capacity battery available.

It flows 1 gallon/minute. I would have designed for 2 GPM but the only 12V ANSI-spec LED UV device I could find is only rated for 1 GPM if the original source is non-potable.

The UV device requires a 0.5 micron pre-filter which is my final filter stage. A 0.5 micron filter will clog super fast without coarser filters preceding it.

The commercial unit on the market with 1 filter stage requires passing water through the system multiple times with ever finer filter media to produce potable water.

 

[g.hayduke]

Here are my accessories.

 

[g.hayduke]

Currently, I'm using a 30 micron washable sediment filter stage, followed by a 5 micron stage, followed by a 0.5 micron activated carbon stage, followed by a 12V UV stage. The UV device is activated separately from the pump after flow starts if desired.

I built this to fill jugs/tanks with potable water from any water source, including a cow tank out in the desert surrounded by cows and cow shit. It works per certified test results!

 

[g.hayduke]

The thing with the heat sink is a voltage regulator. It was needed because the UV device has very tight requirements on the input voltage. This voltage regulator should ensure a steady 12V supply to the UV device. Maybe not needed but I wanted this thing to satisfy the device requirements to ensure maximum safety.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09T9ZJSWH?tag=wranglerorg-20

I should also mention that I went with a LED UV device because the non-LED type is sort of like a fluorescent tube, is fragile, and requires frequent replacement. I wanted solid state, long lasting reliability.