Hi guys, i was thinking of making my own carbon filter from scratch, as it seems a lot cheaper than buying a new one, and with 4 kids to feed, i need to save all the money i can.

The only problem i have found is that i am struggling to find a supplier of the actual carbon, i can buy small bags from the pet shop, but i am wondering how many that would take to fill a filter (as they are prebagged and not display any weight or volume). So my curiosity got the best of me last night whilst suffering insomnia from my medication, and started looking at alternatives. I found that quite a few people use barbacue charcoal to get rid of odours from fridges and freezers (if the power goes and food rots, its gonna stink) with good efferct, and was wondering if i bought a bag of barbacue charcoal (plain old stuff, not pre treated with lighting fluid), and broke it up into small pellet size pieces, does anyone think it would work the same as the stuff that comes in pre built filter.

The only other option is to buy an odorsok (sp) but having looked on here they dont tend to last very long, never mind the 12months the shop says it will.

All ideas and critisism welcome, i might be on to something here

Cheers.

just take a look through the diy section m8...theres loads of peeps who have built their own

Got to be real careful with smell... Not really worth building one to be honest

Just buy a normal CF (disposable), it will do you proud and will be worth it

Then after a year or so of use, you can drill out the rivets and refill the can with new activated carbon,
costs roughly £15 to fill 100mm, about £30 for 150mm.

cheers for the reply weedmonsta & DLT, i have already been looking in the diy section, that is what made me think of building my own. I am very handy at diy, and making a filter looks like it would be a piece of piss, but its the actual carbon i am gonna put in thats puzzling me, would barbacue charcoal work the same as the stuff in the pre-built ones?

Again, your help is invaluable to me guys, and GREATLY appreciated.

Cheers

Activated carbon, also called activated charcoal or activated coal, is a general term which covers carbon material mostly derived from charcoal. For all three variations of the name, "activated" is sometimes substituted with "active". By any name, it is a material with an exceptionally high surface area. Just one gram of activated carbon has the surface area of approximately two tennis courts, typically determined by nitrogen gas adsorption, and includes a large amount of microporosity. Sufficient activation for useful applications may come solely from the high surface area, though often further chemical treatment is used to enhance the absorbing properties of the material.

Coconut shell, a by-product of copra processing, is a good material for activated carbon/charcoal. Activated charcoal (charcoal activated with CO2, water vapor, or chemical compounds) made of coconut shell has advantages compared to other materials (wood, rice husk, corn cob) because of its ability to absorb color or aroma. It is used as supporting material for food and non-food industries (processing of cooking oil, sugar, and chemical matter purification).

Generally, coconut production at farmer level is 1 ton/ha, with coconut shell by-products of 0.9 ton, which in turn can yield 0.36 ton of activated charcoal. Price of activated charcoal is Rp 4,246,379.00/ton (US$440.00), income obtained is Rp 1,528,696.00 (US$158.00).

PROCESSING OF ACTIVATED CHARCOAL

Materials and equipment

* Coconut shell
* Drum or burning sink
* Oven
* Plastic pail
* Crusher wood/iron
* Draining tray
* Distilled water
* Sieve, 100 mesh

Methods

* Separate and clean coconut shell from other materials, such as coconut fiber or soil.
* Sun dry.
* Burn dried coconut shell at burning sink or drum at 300-500 oC for 3-5 hours.
* Soak charcoal in chemical solution (CaCl2 or ZnCl2 25%)...(calcium chloride or zinc chloride) for 12-18 hours to become activated charcoal.
* Wash charcoal with distilled/clean water.
* Spread on tray at room temperature to be drained.
* Dry in oven at temperature 110 oC for 3 hours.
* Crush or refine activated charcoal with crusher wood/iron into size of 100 mesh.
* Pack activated charcoal in plastic.

source here!

Cheers for that info weedmonsta, really useful , so just to clear it in my mind, not all charcoal is "activated", but can be "activated" by soaking in calcium or zinc chloride fro 12 to 18 hrs, am i finally thinking on the correct wavelength?

Again thanks for the help guys

Just google it mate - there are a few UK companies trading in activated carbon. A couple of them are mentioned (in a round about way) on the boards if you look hard enough.....i'm sure i've discussed them with Blab sometime in the past.....

edit to give you a clue.....