paramedicpete, I was wondering if you have time down the road to try your steripen out with those test and see if you get the same,worst or better results. And compare the time, the 1 1/2 minute vs the Miox 4 hour time. In my case I would boil my water than wait on the time for a miox. That's why I had bought my steripen. Any how if you are game in testing and comparing it would be appreciated.
Thanks

I suspect that it wouldn't be practical. In Pete's original protocol, he said, "The bacterial slurry was significantly turbid to the naked eye." So, that would rule out using the Steripen with the same protocol since the Steripen is designed to be used in clear water. He could use a different solution, but then it wouldn't be directly comparable with the other results.

Good point, the steripen can't compete in turbid water without some sort of prefilter to clear the water whether a handkerchief or something.

Actually, I did (sort of- only tested with one species of bacteria- I think), the post is so old it is not longer available on the site.

IIRC, I made turbid slurry of E. coli, post 1 round of the Steri-pen there was a substantial reduction in the number of organisms. It took two rounds of the Steri-pen to achieve 0 cfu (colony forming units). The turbidity created from the concentrated organism is different then turbidity from say, slit or mud. Keep in mind when using the Steri-pen, you are supposed to “mix” or move the pen around the container (like mixing with a spoon), this exposes most of the water more directly to the UV source. With the bacteria slurry, although turbid, the mixing caused the individual bacteria to come close to the UV source, thus killing the organism. With turbidity caused by silt, the silt might block the UV from hitting the individual bacteria; the “blocking” effect would likely be more pronounced with small bacteria and viruses, which might be small enough to “hide” in the rough surface of the individual silt particle

I hope this explanation makes sense.

Pete

That 4 hour time is based on the same bureaucratic/political FDA requirements suffered by the other excellent chlorine dioxide water treatment tools like AquaMira and MicroPur tablets. Real-world tests show that they work absolutely fine in much less time than 4 hours, even against crypto, but the FDA won't let the mfgrs say so.

Don't worry about the 4 hour thing.

From what I've read you have to be pulling water from a sewage-impacted puddle in a 3rd world country in order to get crypto in the quantities used for testing.

In the remote areas of the U.S. and Europe Cyrpto is pretty rare, so much shorter times have a very high chance of killing the one or two spores that are unlikely to even be in the water.

I have the Miox and feel comfortable with the 30 minutes called for Giardia.