Can a water filter really last for thousands of gallons?

You’ve probably seen the claim “good for 5000, 10,000 or “a million gallons!” advertised on many web sites that sell water filters. Are these claims fairy tales? In my 18 years of trouble shooting water filter problems …pretty much.

The grim truth reared it’s ugly head on more than one occasion. Many of those “long life” filters where put out of action in less than 3 months because they got filled up with sediment/dirt/particulate matter and where no longer filtering. In this situation the water found a way around the water filter’s media and went out unfiltered to the dismay of the owners.

Once you put a water filter in service, degradation of the media/cartridge begins. How much it degrades depends on the water source and the quality of the water filter. The dirtier the source water, the sooner the water filter will pack out.

If your source water is dirty, you may need to put on a sediment filter either on the main line (which is not a bad idea) or right before it goes into your kitchen water filter. This will relieve a great load from the main water filter. A good sediment filter is much cheaper to maintain because the filter elements are usually inexpensive. You can get them at your local home improvement center.

However, the source water may be so polluted up with “junk” that the only economical recourse is to invest in an automatic back washing filter. The time, trouble and expense of replacing basic sediment cartridges can add up.

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