Recycled Water Filter

While you could survive for about a month without food, you can only go 3 days without clean water. Drinkable water is an absolute essential here on earth, every living thing needs it! With that in mind, I created this water filter design to quickly and completely filter out all the nasty stuff from water and to make it ready to drink. I also wanted to make this design realistic, as if you were in a survival situation such as camping or in a plane wreck, and needed a way to filter dirty water. Follow along as I show you how to make your very own water filter in less than 10 minutes!

Charcoal

• 2 pieces or a handful amount
• Any hardware store will have this or check a firepit for charcoal

Hammer

• Used to break up the charcoal
• Could also use a rock or just your hands

Sand

• Handful amount
• Fine sand from a beach or hardware store

Gravel/ very small rocks

• Handful amount

Paper Towel

• 1 paper towel
• could also use a scrap of a shirt or cotton cloth

Plastic bottle

• Any size

Cut off 1/3 of the bottle as shown in the picture.

Keep the bottom part of the bottle to use for later.

Rip off half of the paper towel and fold it over.

Push the paper towel into the top of the bottle and as far down as it will go.

This paper towel will keep our filter together and not let it fall out.

Throw your lumps of charcoal into a bag and crush it with a hammer.

It's important to get the charcoal as fine as possible, this makes a big difference in how well the filter works.

Dump the crushed charcoal into the bottle, it should fill up about an inch worth of space.

The reason why this layer is so important is because the activated carbon in the charcoal removes organic chemicals such as hydrogen sulfide from the water.

Put a handful of sand on top of the activated charcoal.

This sand should take up about the same vertical space as the charcoal.

The sand helps filter out really small things floating in the water, they can't fit through the tiny gaps in the sand!

Now pour your gravel into the bottle, the same amount as the sand.

The gravel filters out slightly bigger things from the water.

You know the drill by now . . . grab your handful of small rocks and put them on top of the gravel.

These pebbles should just about fill up your bottle but leave a little space on top so the water doesn't splash out.

The pebbles prevent the water from eroding and making a big hole in the middle of the filter.

Use the part we cut off in the first step as a cup to collect the clean water.

Unscrew the cap of the bottle so that water can drain out.

It's time to use this filter! find some really gross water and watch it become crystal clear!

Filtering can take a couple minutes, so be patient.

Always sterilize the water before drinking it!

Put your newly filtered water in the microwave for 4 minutes, this will boil the water and kill all the bacteria.

After that, go ahead and take a drink, your done!