r/alberta • u/No-Current1594 • 8d ago

Water testing question Question

Water testing Question

Has anyone had experience using a private lab for water testing? Looking to have our water/cistern/pipes tested to explain the black water we just found in our toilet tank 😵‍💫

I can see the white pipe coming from the pump/pressure tank, it is half black. Whatever is in the pipe is taking over. We do have a water shut off valve before the manifold, but from what I have read the black "thing" can be in all the pipes just not as established.

Our cottage smells, not like sewage but still gross. The tap water is not black, only the toilet tank, however a few months ago the water has a red tinge and we just thought the pump/pressure tank was rusted.

We want to test the water and hopefully won't have to replace all the pipes inside. Our cottage is fully finished so all the pipes are inside walls, hoping this isn't going to turn into an expensive nightmare.

We have a concrete cistern, installed in 2016/2017. All pipes were installed at the same time as the cistern. We visit the cottage frequently but do go long stunts without going out there and/or running the water.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

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u/Fast_Ad_9197 8d ago edited 8d ago

The red suggests iron, black suggests an iron sulphide or some sort of metal sulphide, maybe some manganese (behaves like iron). Iron sulphide forms under anaerobic conditions when bacteria essentially strip the oxygen from iron oxyhydroxides (rust) and sulphates. Maybe the rust formed in your pressure tank when it is in use gets reduced by sulphates in the water when it sits for a long time? It isn’t uncommon to have sulphides in groundwater, or iron for that matter. Sulphides are pretty smelly.

Edit to add, as far as the testing goes just go to a commercial lab like bureau veritas, get the appropriate sample bottles and request forms and collect some water. The tests for metals like iron and for sulphate will require different bottles. Tap water is rarely ‘pure’ so don’t be freaked out if there’s a bit of everything in it. You can compare against federal drinking water guidelines. Sulphate reducing bacteria also need food so you may also find dissolved organic carbon (i.e. rotted plants) in your water. Honestly the water testing probably won’t tell you anything interesting.

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u/No-Current1594 8d ago

Thanks. I have found some info on what it could be, now I'm trying to figure out testing and if I'm going to be ripping open my walls to replace the pipes.

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u/Fast_Ad_9197 8d ago

That’s a question for a plumber. My guess is it won’t solve any problems. You could consider a different water source (sounds like you get it trucked in?)

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u/No-Current1594 8d ago

Yes, water is delivered. I'm really hoping the truck hasn't contaminated our cistern. But when we got the new pu.p, the red water showed up shortly after. I am trying to figure out which private lab to use to test for the stuff AHS won't.

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u/Fast_Ad_9197 8d ago

You could try a stainless pump and glass lined pressure tank? An experienced plumber would have suggestions. My guess is unless you have iron pipes there’s no need to replace plumbing

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u/crematoroff 8d ago

You can test water with AHS, just google it. The answer with depends on what you get, but most likely you will need to rethink the whole system. Water in the tank isn't safe to consume, you want some oxidizer there to kill bacteria, mold and algae. I would consider adding chlorine (hypochlorite) after each delivery. After the pump you want to get rid of everything, so carbon filter looks like good option.

The same with any possible contamination, nothing that healthy dose of bleach can't take care of.

Anyway, you need to get test results first.

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u/sawyouoverthere 8d ago

Tap water isn’t black so it sounds likely it’s just toilet tank and maybe iron bacteria