Fresh water tank cleaning - the solution?

[Steve H]

The press today are reporting that LED Ultra Violet light is as effective as normal bulbs (I currently use it to decontaminate clothes, food & face masks).

 

With that in mind should somebody create a UV LED lamp which is sealed in a clear waterproof casing, which would then be introduced and fixed through a hole made in the top of our fresh water tanks? Just a regular flick of its power switch every so often should purify the water inside or keep an empty tank fresh.

 

.................. just a thought.

[TeamRienza]

A rather interesting thought.. not only would it benefit us motorhomers, but could presumably be used in countries with water contamination issues. Time will tell if it is practical.

 

Davy

[Paul-]

Soap and water is more effective at killing corvid-19 than a standard UV bulb and Puriclean for the fresh water tank

 

UVC is the one for killing things us included

[Derek Uzzell]

There's a lot of on-line material about the use of LED UV devices for disinfecting water. This example

 

https://www.wqpmag.com/uv-disinfection/uv-led-disinfection-technology-makes-waves

 

suggests that a LED UV emitter submerged in a motorhome's fresh-water tank might be insufficiently effective.

[BruceM]

This has been done for at least 25 years in pond filtration units (I happen to have one). A quick search engine search will pull them up (eg https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Jebao-Pond-UV-Clarifier-Sterilizer-Ultra-Violet-Light-7w-9w-11w-18w-24w-55w-UVC/112428747061?hash=item1a2d468935:g:23IAAOSw1rpdd5rb ). They would normally operate on 240v but I would have thought that a 12v version would not be a problem. The two questions to ask though are -

 

1/ If in tank how long would they have to be left on to be effective and would you want that current drain? I guess an inline automatically switched version might have viability?

 

and

 

2/ Are such devices really necessary? We have always fill our tank from the mains tap and drink it in both hot and cold drinks. We don’t sterilise our tank. Likewise, when hiking when the occasion has required it we’ve drunk from running streams. I doubt our constitutions are that much more robust than others.

[EJB]

A low wattage U/V Steriliser would be more than sufficient for any kind of MH/Caravan set up....add it to a decent (as apposed to those sold to this market) water filter and you could have wasted quite a bit of cash.

But fashion does come at a price! *-) ;-)

[rajohno]

UV is great at helping sterilise free particles and has been used in large air conditioning systems post cooling and filtration for many years.

However the issue with water is that the prism effect counteracts the effectiveness of the ultra violet light.

UV will not stop biological growth within the tank either, so the best solution for a MH tank is drain it when not in use and allow it to vent. clean it at the start of the season with something like puriclean. if the tanks are in constant use then there should be no issues for a long period unless contaminated water is brought onboard.

you could fit electronic devices, carbon filters, lime filters and so on but costs and weight all add up.