| Some years back I decided to shop for some | | | | on, if needed, and pumps water from the pool up |
| land within the hills of Texas. It had been rough | | | | to a holding tank of approximately 500 gallons. If |
| land, all rock with steep cliffs and bottomless | | | | the tank is full the pump will not come on. This is |
| valleys. The altitude of the property put us | | | | often triggered by a float switch inside the first |
| several feet above the water table so making it | | | | holding tank that will tell the pump controller if the |
| rather pricey to drill a well. However the property | | | | tank is full or not. Currently bear in mind this first |
| had one thing going for it. Somewhere in that hill | | | | tank is simply dirty water with bugs and all. |
| was a giant abyss that may capture the rain | | | | From this initial holding tank the water is gravity |
| water, while it rained. | | | | fed to a smaller tank stuffed with gravel and |
| Now this water was not gushing out of the hill, it | | | | sand. This smaller tank has a float valve that only |
| actually only came out at about half a gallon per | | | | opens when the water is dwindling in that tank. |
| minute. There was no way to tap into the supply | | | | The dirty water flows into the filter tank, also |
| so we were stuck with the slow flow. We in time | | | | referred to as a slow sand filter, and slowly |
| gave the system a name; we named it the | | | | moves through the layers of sand and gravel. |
| hamster bowl. | | | | This movement polishes the water and eliminates |
| The hamster bowl lands up as a small pool of | | | | 99.99% of all impurities. The slow filter will |
| water approximately three hundred feet from our | | | | process almost fifteen gallons per hour or 360 |
| residence. There is grass, mud, fish, snakes as | | | | gallons ow water per day. We tend to never use |
| well as bugs swimming all in that water. The deer, | | | | that much thus it never goes dry. |
| hogs, turkey and other animals come back to | | | | Once the water is cleaned via the slow sand filter |
| drink there too. Now it absolutely was our turn to | | | | it is gravity fed into the final holding tank. The top |
| drink from the hamster bowel as well. | | | | of this holding tank is simply above the outlet of |
| The objective was to turn dangerous water into | | | | the sand filter. Once the last holding tank is full, |
| good water while not using high pressure or high | | | | the water from the sand filter is unable to exit |
| dollar filters and such. Therefore we were limited | | | | the filter tank thus causing the filter tank valve to |
| to the strategies we could utilize. The added | | | | seal. Once the filter tank valve is closed the dirty |
| problem was that the flow rate was such that | | | | water holding tank fills up and triggers the float |
| we were restricted on how much water we may | | | | switch that turns off the solar pump. It is all |
| possibly collect from the bowl without hurting the | | | | terribly simple and terribly cost effective. |
| natural system. During normal circumstances we | | | | So this is how we turned our dirty ground water |
| were obtaining approximately half a gallon per | | | | into refreshing usable drinking water for our |
| minute of flow rate, this translated to merely | | | | house. You'll find slow sand filter designs on the |
| over 700 gallons per day of total water. We set | | | | net with watch videos on how they work on |
| to require about a 3rd of that. | | | | varied video sites. There are various |
| The system is quite simple. We setup a solar | | | | manufactures for these types of filters but you'll |
| panel to power a pump that's situated within the | | | | make them just as well. |
| hamster bowl. During the day the pump comes | | | | |