Yes I Filtered Water. Yes it Was Awesome!

     In my water class we learned about the filtration of water in both natural and artificial forms. We learned about how the water cycle was a form of filter and the natural ground water filtration process. We even went to one of our cities water purification plants,  which is the biggest in the world and observed and learned how the water most of us drank was purified. We were shown the steps and how they worked and everything .We were then challenged to create our own water filter out of simple materials we could obtain. We were allowed to make up our own guiding question as long as we tested certain things like pH So that is exactly what I did.

Source: M.D, 2019

The question I tried to find results for in this experiment was as follows: How much would the pH of the
water increase or decrease after it has gone through the filter. I then hypothesized that my water pH
would go down after it went through my water filter by at least 1. After making my hypothesis I had to
gather my materials in order to create my filter.

Materials:

• Empty liter Bottle
• Coffee filters
• Fine aquarium sand
• Gravel 
• Activated Charcoal
• Empty Seed starter cup 
• Dirty water from street
• Tape, lots of tape.

Now that I had my materials my procedure went as follows. I first assembled the separate parts of my filter. By this I mean I filled each part with what would filter the water for example, my since my water filter was about 3 levels I filled the top part (half an empty liter bottle) with a little bit of charcoal and fine aquarium sand. I then filled the middle part (empty seed started cup) with lots of gravel and sand that way the water. I did not put anything in my last one as that was were my water was going to go through and fill the bowl to see my final results. I then put them stacked so that the top part was top, the middle was middle, and the bottom bottom and I added a coffee filter between the top part and middle and middle and bottom. Now that it was in the order I wanted it to be in I taped it together. I tried to make sure it was taped well enough so that it wouldn’t fall apart when I tried to test it. It was all together now. Here is a sketch I imagined at the beginning and a picture of my end result:

                                                          Source used for all photos, A.G (me), 2019

I structured it this way so that the top part wouldn't have so much weight as the others and it would
be more stable. I also made sure that the coffee filters would divide the filtrating levels as so they wouldn't
combine with each other. I used sand and gravel to try and portray the substances water gets filtered
through in the natural process know as ground water filtration, I added the levels to try and portray it
too. I also added activated charcoal as something extra for the water to get filtered through.

Once I had completed my filter It was time to test it with this dirty water:

                                                            Source: A.G (me), 2019

Results:

Source: A.G (me), 2019

As can be seen in the pictures my water seems to have been drastically cleaned although it does not look fully clean the change can be seen. But to go back to my initial question in short terms yes the pH went down although as much as I had expected. The pH of the dirty water at the beginning of this experiment was 7.4 which meant it was about 0.4 away from being neutral. Making the H+ 10^-7.4, which in scientific notation is 3.981071705 ×10-8    . The pH of the filtered water was a 7.1. Making it’s H+ 10^-7.1 which in scientific notation would be  7.943282347 ×10-8. Meaning the difference in pH was about a 0.3 difference which when calculated as 10^0.3 is about 1.995 so about a 2 meaning the filtered water was about 2 times more “base”-ic. So while I had expected the pH to go down 1 whole pH scale that did not come true.

To conclude this experiment while I may not have obtained the results I may have hypothesized it still went down from a 7.4 to a 7.1 and considering drinking water is supposed to be at an average 7.0 pH level I take this experiment as a success.