# Solar stills

**URL:** <https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/solar-stills/671>\
**Category:** The Drawing Board\
**Created:** [April 2, 2013, 3:01pm UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/solar-stills/671 "2013-04-02T15:01:25Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![DudeGuy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/dfb087/32.png) [@DudeGuy](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/DudeGuy)\
**Post date:** [April 2, 2013, 3:01pm UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/solar-stills/671/1 "2013-04-02T15:01:25Z")

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I am not a survivalist, per se, but I love reading and collecting knowledge.

One of the really cool survival things you can build to purify water is a solar still.

[http://sommerleigh.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/solar-still.gif](http://sommerleigh.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/solar-still.gif)

> **[Solar still](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_still)**
>
> A solar still distills water, using the heat of the Sun to evaporate, cool then collect the water. There are many types of solar still, including large scale concentrated solar stills, and condensation traps (better known as moisture traps amongst survivalists). In a solar still, impure water is contained outside the collector, where it is evaporated by sunlight shining through clear plastic or glass. The pure water vapor condenses on the cool inside surface and drips down, where it is collected ...

It’s a simple concept that in real life requires:

A sheet of plastic  
A tool for digging  
A bucket  
Rocks

You dig out a hole of varying sizes and then secure a sheet of plastic above the hole with rocks. Then you place one rock in the center so the sheet sags down to where you’ve placed the bucket.

Basically the soil is heated by the sunlight passing through the plastic sheet, condensation collects on the plastic sheet and gathers in the bucket. Depending on the day and where you’ve placed it you can probably get a bottle of clean water a day from one.

So it wouldn’t be a complete solution to water needs but I think it would be a nice high end survival recipe that, by the time you can build one and passively gather water, it wouldn’t be game-breaking as much as it would be a convenience.

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**Author:** ![Zordelraak](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/fbc32d/32.png) [@Zordelraak](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/Zordelraak)\
**Post date:** [April 2, 2013, 4:39pm UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/solar-stills/671/2 "2013-04-02T16:39:12Z")

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Maybe instead of digging tool it must be constructed over shallow pit, also use rags in crafting recipe (just suggestion)

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**Author:** ![Otaku](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/discourse.cataclysmdda.org/otaku/32/27_2.png) [@Otaku](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/Otaku)\
**Post date:** [April 4, 2013, 10:50am UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/solar-stills/671/3 "2013-04-04T10:50:45Z")

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It becomes conviniet at first, but once users start to spam the map with them, getting a jerrycan of water every day, than it starts to get out of hand and survival is not as large.

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**Author:** ![Quill](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/bc79bd/32.png) [@Quill](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/Quill)\
**Post date:** [April 4, 2013, 2:41pm UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/solar-stills/671/4 "2013-04-04T14:41:19Z")

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> [@Otaku](#):
>
> It becomes conviniet at first, but once users start to spam the map with them, getting a jerrycan of water every day, than it starts to get out of hand and survival is not as large.

Make them traps, so if an animal steps in them they stop working. Also, that would be a lot of sheets. And it’s far more trouble to gather from a bunch of squares than sit by the river boiling water at two keystrokes per unit. I think they’d be decently balanced.

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**Author:** ![Flare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c0e974/32.png) [@Flare](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/Flare)\
**Post date:** [April 4, 2013, 10:08pm UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/solar-stills/671/5 "2013-04-04T22:08:57Z")

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Spamming them across the map seems lioe it should take a great deal of effort, I don’t think there’s any need to cut off the reward 8f they go through all that effort, and this isn’t even considering having to go around collecting water across the map.

On the subject of solar power [http://solarcooking.org/pasteurization/solarwat.htm](http://solarcooking.org/pasteurization/solarwat.htm)