10 January 2009

Dirty Water?

| GardeningGirl
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I live on the southside and it seems the water quality problems of recent years are back with a vengeance.

Has anyone else been experiencing dirty water in the past week?

We didn’t have problems like this in our first home. We didn’t have problems like this when we lived in a brand new suburb with roadworks and new houses going up all around us. We didn’t have problems for the first three or four years in this house.

What has changed, apart from our water supplier finding a lot of money to spend on advertising to tell us how wonderful they are!

Their latest ads tell me what I can look forward to “tomorrow”. Water that doesn’t stain washing maybe?

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There was a large burst in Wanniassa last Friday that will have caused flow reversals and dirty water in the area. Another large burst occurred in Gowrie before Christmas with similar dirty water effects.

Blue water is due to excessive copper corrosion in internal service line fittings. Get a plumber and don’t drink it.

Canberra’s water is chlorinated to prevent harmful bacteria from regrowing in the mains. Concentration varies depending on distance from the treatment plants and residence time of the water.

I had dirty water in my toilet bowl this morning after I got up … 🙂

GardeningGirl12:10 am 15 Jan 09

We used to smell the chlorine sometimes in one of our previous homes. (That was the only variation in the water.) We were told it’s because we lived very close to the tank. We’ve been smelling it here lately although we aren’t close to the tank so I hate to think what it’s like for those closer.
Dirty water again tonight, and after that cleared there was an unpleasant earthy smell.

I think the water has been extra-chlorinated since we started pumping straight from the river, possibly?

Why is Canberra water so chlorinated? I was reminded of this on the recent Christmas visit to Sydney where the water has always been tasteless since I can remember. And lots of folks have always claimed Canberra’s water is the best in the country??!

BTW the water was murky and brown in Kambah for one day in the week or 2 before Christmas…
and I’ve often seen it blue-tinged in the bathtub which is a worry…

GardeningGirl10:02 pm 11 Jan 09

Thanks for the responses everyone.
There was a time when it happened so infrequently that I can’t even make a guess at the frequency. Now not a year goes by without at least one instance of dirty water, and there have been periods when not a month has gone by without it happening. One year we had weeks at a time when there was a definite brownish tinge to the water, thankfully usually not enough to leave stains on the washing. Last year was one of the better years colourwise, but we had a new experience for a while, a sulfurous smell.
Another recent problem (perhaps about two years?) is an unpleasant metallic taste. It’s obvious even over the taste of tea. It was this that finally compelled us to put a filter on the kitchen tap. I’m not sure if the metallic taste is less frequent or if the filter is reducing it somewhat, but it hasn’t been eradicated completely. I’d be interested to know if anyone else has noticed that taste.

I live in the “inner north” and I’ve been calling ACTEW about dirty brown water that has been happening regularly over the past few months. Actew come around and “flush” the system and tell me to run my taps outdoors for a while to clear the water.

Some of the reasons they have given me are the same as those above (as well as the possibility of water trucks “filling up” in adjacent streets and “unsettling” the dirt in the system). One thing they did tell me is that it’s blue water out of the taps that you definitely shouldn’t drink (wouldn’t say why though).

grunge_hippy1:29 pm 11 Jan 09

i had dirty water last week in isabella plains, as did my parents in gowrie the week before. mum said it was due to a broken pipe in their case. i dont know why we had it.

GottaLoveCanberra7:39 pm 10 Jan 09

Same for me in Bonython, nice and clean.

ultramelon, it must have just been you because my toilet and kitchen, also in Bonython, were fine.

yeah, water in the toilet and kitchen was brown this morning in bonython. It happened a few months ago too. One time i had these metal looking threads coming out of the kitchen tap.

We have noticed a blue tinge to our water – northside.
Who knows what is in it.

Jonathon Reynolds3:32 pm 10 Jan 09

An activated carbon water filter sorts out those problems.

Aldi (when they have them) sell them for a reasonable $99 – additional filters that last up to a year are about another $20 each. I had a plumber fit mine, but friends have done it themselves with no major hassles.

Water that has goes through the filter for cooking and drinking purposes comes out crystal clear and it also seems to remove the horrible chlorine smell/taste too.

GottaLoveCanberra2:31 pm 10 Jan 09

Southside here too and no dirty water ever in the last 2.5 years.

Nambucco Deliria2:07 pm 10 Jan 09

No dirty water in Wanniassa this year so far. Plenty at various times last year though.

Also might happen if they’ve been working on the pipe somewhere up the line. It could also happen if the fire brigade have had to use a hydrant in the area.

Things like this can be caused by many things, including running water through pipes backwards, which they do sometimes when flows need to go someplace else, or drawing from different dams.

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