WILL... I'm sorry but....

[bulrush]

A Berkey water filter works without power, it works by gravity. But they run $250+. They will also last about 10,000 gallons of water for one set of elements. If you do get a water filter, DO NOT get the hand pump type, get a gravity water filter. You just set it and forget it.

I've been camping with a pump water filter where using the water filter was the ONLY way to get potable water. It was a PITA when I was starving, weak, and exhausted from porting a canoe all day.

 

[Cajunwolf]

I have a 70 pint/day unit running in my crawlspace. Uses 650 watts running. 100 with just the fan on. It is power hungry. 11.5 KWH over a 24 hour period. Only my AC and electric stove consume more power. My crawl space stays between 50 and 60% humidity. It easily fills a 1.5 gallon bucket in a day. Mine dumps into the foundation drain. I also have a small RO system for the house. In the docs for it, they mention that for every gallon of drinkable water, it uses 3 gallons, so as CajunWolf mentioned, RO goes through a lot of water and needs a high pressure pump to work. Not sure how well the concept would work in desert climates.

I've been toying with the idea of doing a small solar system to just run the dehumidifier as it costs over $400 a year to run and the average life span of a unit over the past 12 years has been 2 - 3 years. Going to need a big battery bank to run over night, much less make it a day or 2 without sun.

Yeah, my watermaker is a current hog. I increased my potable water capacity to 80 gallons, and when cruising where water is expensive like the Keys and Carribean, I use the watermaker. I can get by, comfortably, on five, or less, gallons of fresh water a day. I then makeup water on those beautiful hot sunny days when the solar array is seriously making juice. I sold the boat it was on, but keep my water maker. It's stored safely away with the membrane properly stored.

 

[CheezWiz]

I think that in the desert in a self sustain mode, you could only get a really efficient split unit AC to run off of solar and collect the moisture from inside your well insulated house. Basically recovering as much of your own waste humidity as you can while conditioning your air. Or is it hard to keep the inside humidity up on a sealed home in Vegas? Other than that, water collection is the only real choice, but I bet that's against the law where Will is at. Lots of municipalities are outlawing rain collection these days.
I can't imagine a dehumidifier being efficient enough to do any good. Now in TN where I live, we got humidity.

 

[Cajunwolf]

Other than that, water collection is the only real choice, but I bet that's against the law where Will is at. Lots of municipalities are outlawing rain collection these days.

How is collecting rainwater illegal? Never heard of that. Nevada is still part of the US of A the last time I checked, WTF?

 

[morth]

It's illegal in the Denver area as well. My brother in law works for one of the cities out there and he said the rain harvesting is restricted so the natural rainfall can replenish the ground water

 

[Cajunwolf]

This is some excellent forum software, Will, what is it again? I'm using Invision Community Forum, a stand-alone version, meaning I have my own host, install, and maintain it myself. I'm upgrading from an old, old version, and from what I'm told it's supposed to have these features too. Dang, if not I'm might look into this software, do they have a stand-alone version, or is it only via their cloud?

 

[CheezWiz]

How is collecting rainwater illegal? Never heard of that. Nevada is still part of the US of A the last time I checked, WTF?

In some areas they do it out of concern for West Nile and other mosquito borne illness. In some areas it is because of water table depletion. In others it is because of people being butt holes.. Sometimes it's purely HOAs. Etc . I keep seeing posts and rants all over the place about it. Freedom in the USA is a rapidly diminishing idea. Note I never said it WAS illegal, I just said I bet it is just judging from the looks of the place where his new house is. I'm a beekeeper so I frequent a lot of forums about that and there's a lot of places making that illegal now as well. Nuts!

 

[Cajunwolf]

It's illegal in the Denver area as well. My brother in law works for one of the cities out there and he said the rain harvesting is restricted so the natural rainfall can replenish the ground water

Bovine excrement! They want you to use the municipal water so you have to pay money to the bureaucracy they can then misuse and waste.

 

[Cajunwolf]

"I live back in the woods you see
My woman and the kids and the dogs and me
I got a shotgun a rifle and a four-wheel drive
And a country boy can survive ..."

Nobody better tell me I can't collect rainwater, there are serious consequences!

 

[CheezWiz]

Bovine excrement! They want you to use the municipal water so you have to pay money to the bureaucracy they can then misuse and waste.

Yep, just like these stupid fees and taxes municipalities are starting to charge people for having solar panels or going off grid. Ack! But I think we're having some scope creep away from the topic of this thread. Don't get me started on the idiocy of large groups making laws. Lol

 

[Cajunwolf]

But I think we're having some scope creep away from the topic of this thread.

Very true, back to making water form hot air, right? There's a thread, "The high cost of Electricity ..." I think it is, we're delving into this very topic, and yes, like you, I've got a few things to say about that.

 

[b.james]

When stuck in Oz in the dry we find a tree! Sit in the shade mate .
Better than sheds.
Dig a hole in the sun ,fill it with leaves . cup in the middle. Cover with plastic sheet and a stone in the middle over the cup. Dirt all round the edges. leave in the sun for ten minutes and you have a cup of perfect drinking water. Put the cup back quickly. Lots a water to come out.

 

[Cajunwolf]

Down here along the Gulf Coast of Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Flordia, it's so humid you can cut the air with a knife, and it will bleed water. Step out of the air conditioning for one minute, and you're drenched in sweat. If you need a drink of water, wring out your shirt into a glass, a little salty, but hey, LoL.

 

[Loyalist]

Living on a boat, you fight humidity and wish I could send it to the less fortunate, but I have a water maker, reverse osmosis, and it works great. The one I have is good, it's a small volume model, and only makes just under two gallons a day, but I salvaged it from a salvage boat and rebuilt it for a fraction of the cost of the same one new. It needed the high-pressure pump rebuilt and a new filter-membrane-housing, which is expensive. Further, the whole thing was $2k, but I rebuilt for just under $1200, so not bad. Will mentioned reverse osmosis, and the only problem with is that this thing takes a lot of water to get a gallon of potable water. When running, you have a steady stream going back out the through-hull as it has to pass huge volumes through the filter housing, under high pressure, to get some of it to flow through the membrane creating drinkable water. Unless one was in a seriously humid area, like a tropical rain forest, it might not be practical. In the past, I've dealt with big high volume water makers offshore, but it's the same thing, you have to flow a vast about of water to get any good water, but the water tastes good, especially from seawater. Now there could be some newer ones on the market that I haven't dealt with yet, so this is just my 2Cents on what I've had experienced so far, but I've seen some home units to "purify" tap water for $700 to $800 range.

I too am in the midst of this process, rebuilding a katadyne ps 80e ro water maker. I am not going to use the katadyne chamber and elements as the price of the elements alone equals the complete replacement of the pressure vessel and after that I can use DOW filters at less than half the price of katadyne. My finished price is the same as yours and when running in warm water should produce 5 us. gallons/hour. At 12 volts and 9 amps in operation, it is a very efficient marine product. Something similar set up on a hand cart at the beach with a battery and panels could produce 40 to 50 gallons per day.

 

[Supervstech]

Here in NC, I install santafe dehumidifiers, as more and more homes get tighter to save energy, the central ac can’t run long enough to remove humidity to safe living condition levels below 60%... they are far less energy hungry than even a 20seer central ac, and they can be setup to bring in a fresh air change for the home.
I doubt they would be useful in NV, but in green grass states, they are a godsend for comfort. Especially in basements, where temps are usually below 70 year round...

 

[Cajunwolf]

I like the

Especially in basements, where temps are usually below 70 year round...

Down here on the coast we call a basement a heated indoor swimming pool, HA! ?

 

[EclecticBadger]

Interesting topic and so many videos to be found searching using 'atmospheric water condenser' or 'air well' including commercial products.

Zero Mass

Then there are technologies that use no power at all ...

Warka Water Towers

But I'm guessing you will be looking at solar to power a colder than ambient surface for condensation to form, in which case a dehumidifier would be the way to go.

As practical but totally unscientific real-life example: From October through March, I run a 340W dehumidifer for 8 hours overnight to control humidity from 80% to 45-50% (and lesser extent provide supplementary heat) in my house (four rooms, rough calculation around 140 cubic meters). At an ambient of 17C (62F) it extracts up to 4 litres (7 pints) of water a day.

Sidenote: It's a very friendly dehumidifier, because every time I turn it on the display says "HI".

 

[Rider]

Sidenote: It's a very friendly dehumidifier, because every time I turn it on the display says "HI".

 

[Cajunwolf]

View attachment 814

Dang! You beat me to it!

 

[svetz]

Tastier Water?​

UNTESTED ... if you live near seawater I heard an interesting tip today for making distilled water more palatable... add a drop of seawater back in after distilling as it's loaded with salts and minerals. They had been boiling their seawater for quite a while and added a couple of drops back into the distilled water. Not sure how likely it might be to get a parasite/bacteria/protozoa/worse from seawater, might be useful to boil/cleanse it some way first.

More Water​

UNTESTED ... If you live in a dry area but have access to non-potable water (morning dew, puddle), you might be able to increase your dehumidifier's water-making efficiency by wetting a blanket/swamp-cooler-evaporator-pad and putting it in front of the air-intake. As the dry air passes through it would evaporate water from the non-potable source and condense in the dehumidifier.

 

[Supervstech]

Tastier Water?​

UNTESTED ... if you live near seawater I heard an interesting tip today for making distilled water more palatable... add a drop of seawater back in after distilling as it's loaded with salts and minerals. They had been boiling their seawater for quite a while and added a couple of drops back into the distilled water. Not sure how likely it might be to get a parasite/bacteria/protozoa/worse from seawater, might be useful to boil/cleanse it some way first.

More Water​

UNTESTED ... If you live in a dry area but have access to non-potable water (morning dew, puddle), you might be able to increase your dehumidifier's water-making efficiency by wetting a blanket/swamp-cooler-evaporator-pad and putting it in front of the air-intake. As the dry air passes through it would evaporate water from the non-potable source and condense in the dehumidifier.

Why would you want a dehumidifier to make more water?

 

[svetz]

... If you live in a dry area ... you might be able to increase your dehumidifier's water-making efficiency

Why would you want a dehumidifier to make more water?

The OP is about:

... PLEEEEAAAASE talk more about your plans for your dehumidifier water collection set up. do you have it planned out? are you still designing it?...

You'd have to be fairly thirsty, water out of a dehumidifier might not have parasites or salt, but it could have other nasty microbes/dust/dirt/grease. The basic idea is solar panels make the power to run the dehumidifier, which condenses water, then you use a ceramic filter, then you can drink it.

It won't help BahamianPrepMan since his humidity is already so high, but in a dry climate it might help.

 

[Boondock Saint]

If you're going to that much solar angst, then use solar to super heat the water before collection and also use a purifier. Boiling the water via solar reflector and exposure to high UV should do the trick. Run that through a simple Life Straw and swap that out twice a year.

 

[svetz]

If you're going to that much solar angst, then use solar to super heat the water before collection and also use a purifier. Boiling the water via solar reflector and exposure to high UV should do the trick. Run that through a simple Life Straw and swap that out twice a year.

That solution doesn't work if you have no source water (e.g., surrounded by saltwater), but dehumidification will work though as it pulls the water from the air. Distillation works too, but probably takes more energy.

 

[Boondock Saint]

Yes pulling from air. That is still dirty. There's bajiollions of tons of micro-plastic in the air everywhere, and that micro-plastic also has bacteria and virus, from other continents. Unless water was collected on the filtered side of a collection, then other metals and poisons and airborne funk would be a contamination.

No matter where or how I attempted to collect water, even via humidity, I would boil and filter filter well.

Just because you're not paranoid doesn't mean they aren't out to poison you.

You could use Peltier thermo-electric plates to both contribute to the cooling and heating of a system via both sides at once, but they aren't very efficient.