Hey guys, in this article we’ll share an honest Berkey water filter review, it’s just our experience, not sponsored. We’re living in Italy and bought it on January 2020.
First of all it must be said that we decided to write this article as a lot of our friends never heard of Berkey water filter and were interested to find out more.
Since maybe other persons in Europe are in this situation too, we thought that a 2020 review of this product might help.
As already said, we bought it in January 2020, from Amazon, and happily used it since.
We couldn’t find a local store or dealer in Italy but Amazon never disappoints. We chose the travel Berkey version, link, perfect size for our family of 3 + a dog 🙂
It has a capacity of 5-6 liters and filters the water in approx. 25 minutes.
Why we chose to filter the water
Italy is one of the european countries that uses the most plastic water bottles, even though the tapped water is demonstrated to be of a good quality.
We are committed to a #lesswaste journey and since years we were trying to find methods to replace the plastic water bottles.
Why? because they are the most single use plastic article we use in our day to day life. It’s even dangerous to use it more than once.
But why this hate towards the plastic bottles? Here a national geographic article, link, where the story of plastic bottles is shared and most importantly, statistics are also shared, like the 450 years needed for fully recycling them, or the 1 million plastic bottles sold globally every minute..
Moreover, the water that comes in plastic bottles may be bad for our health. Here a link to an article where the water plastic particles are discussed, with studies and facts..
Why we chose the Berkey water filter
We tried water filter pitchers but didn’t convince us since the filter has to be replaced monthly so it’s not very sustainable.
We read a lot also about the under sink filters but were not convinced of their efficiency since the pressure of the water is very high, Berkey in comparison has a slow flow rate.
Tried also to buy filtered water from our city water station but it has to be consumed in max 3 days and it’s not very comfortable to transport it to our home, we live in an apartment at 2nd floor without elevator.
After a lot of research on this topic we finally chose the Berkey! It’s manufactured by New Millennium Concepts, Ltd. in Arlington, Texas.
We couldn’t have made a better choice, especially now during the coronavirus isolation time. We don’t have to go to the supermarket to buy water, we have it at the comfort of our sink, safely filtered thanks to Berkey 🙂
Before writing this article we would have wanted to make some comparison certified tests of the Berkey filtered water vs the plastic bottled water but because of coronavirus, again, it was not possible. We’ll do it anyway in the future and come with an update.
For the moment you can find here below all the technical details regarding the Berkey filters:
At a first impact may seem expensive, but if considered long term, it’s an economic solution. The initial cost of the containers and filters was around 280€ and the filters can last over 5 years.
Depending on the version you choose, it can come with 2 or 4 filters. There are also specific filters to reduce fluoride. The good news is that their filters leave in the good minerals.
Our Travel Berkey manages to filter 5-6 liters of water in approx. 25 minutes, that being said, we never ran out of water because of the slow flow rate.
We clean it once every 2 weeks just by flushing the filters and cleaning the stainless steel container with mild soap, water and vinegar.
This article is not meant to convince you to buy this product, so you’ll not find here all the technical details of this product.
We just wanted to share with you the main reasons why we find this product so useful, comfortable and sustainable.
We’ll make a second article on this topic where we’ll show how we clean it, in the meantime below you can find instructions for how to assembly the Travel Berkey.
How to assembly the Berkey
Steps to follow:
1. Start installing the water tap.
Pay close attention to the external seal, it has to be assembled with the pointy end on the outside (check the photos below).
With a fixed 22mm spanner (best if the spanner is in plastic to avoid scratches), tight the inside plastic nut.
2. Filters assembly
Before installing the filters, we have to fill them with water using the brown seal.
Keep tight the filter with the seal under the water tap in the sink for 2-3 minutes. By doing this you take out the air from the filter and make it work better & faster.
Now the filters are ready to be attached to the Berkey container.
Install the thick seals on the filters, insert them in the Berkey container holes and manually tighten the wing nuts on the other side.
3. Check for the leaks
Fill a quarter of the Berkey containers with water and check for leakage.
For the filters we used 2 simple transparent glasses of water and checked for leakage around the seals.
If there are leaks found, check the wing nuts, they are probably not tighten enough.
Same check to be done for the water tap. If leakage is found check the seals direction and tight it harder but don’t exaggerate.
4. Add the standing seal & assembly the Berkey lid
The standing seal is to be added to the container on the bottom.
Tight the lid knob using a phillips screwdriver.
5. Enjoy your Berkey water filter 🙂
For better understanding, watch the video below:
P.S. In case you are interested in other #lesswaste projects, check out this homemade laundry detergent, link. Sustainable and healthier for your skin 🙂