The recent events in Flint, Michigan, made me wonder how we can test the quality of our water. In some locations I've lived in, I remember receiving regular water quality reports. I scrutinize them, but I never know for sure. Now I don't know whether I can trust such reports anymore. Is there a simple gadget to tell us how good our water is?

I have a water quality tester that looks like of like an overgrown thermometer. It gives me a number (ppm). It doesn't tell me what's in the water. It seems that my reverse osmosis filter works pretty well.

On Amazon I found listings for water quality test kits that can do tests for specific contamination. These kits aren't infinitely reusable and they don't seem to include a test for lead. I also have no idea how accurate they are.

So what do the sages of our forum say?