Clean water is essential when you’re travelling Australia, and what better way to ensure it than with a tried-and-true B.E.S.T. RV Inline Water Filter.
It’s a banner year for B.E.S.T. Water Filters, with 2024 marking 21 years since the first B.E.S.T. Inline Water Filter was sold. To this day, B.E.S.T. Water Filters remains the only RV water filter company that is 100 per cent Australian made, owned and designed. And every filter is hand-assembled, meaning quality is assured every step of the process.
About the company
While the B.E.S.T. Inline Water Filter has been helping Aussie adventurers enjoy clean water for 21 years now, the research and development began a good 20 years before the product was developed. B.E.S.T. founder and third-generation plumber, Colin Hopgood, trialled the first ‘silver impregnated’ water filter in the 1970s, but after installing it in a caravan he soon discovered that the antibacterial process was inadequate for RV use. So, the search for the ultimate solution continued. Colin eventually came across the SilverSafe process in the 1990s and acquired it in 2000. Within a few years the filter we now know and love had been designed.
One of the major successes of the B.E.S.T. Inline was that Colin liked to talk about the truths of water filtration and how bacteria works the way a plumber would rather than a salesperson. “After buying an old school bus and equipping it with all the essentials to make the filters, he packed up his young family and hit the road with the intention of selling a few filters along the way to fund the trip around Australia,” Colin said. “That didn’t end up happening because after doing a few talks at different caravan club meet-ups people started going into shops and asking for the B.E.S.T. Inline Water Filter. After five years on the road, the filter had well and truly caught the interest of Aussie travellers and it was time to set up a base.
These days, the B.E.S.T. Water Filters factory is based on the Gold Coast, Qld, with five expert staff members who assemble each and every filter by hand with 100 per cent Australian-made parts.
Why should every caravanner have a water filter?
There are tons of great places to take your caravan in Australia, but you can't always be sure you'll have clean water sources to refill your water tanks or be able to find drinking water that doesn't have an unpleasant taste. Whether it’s bore or creek water or heavily chlorinated tap water, there are plenty of advantages to having a reliable water filter handy when heading on your next adventure.
When we asked the team at B.E.S.T. this question, they responded “It is very important, and not just a water filter but an RV water filter. Water on the road can change quickly from town to town. You need a system that will balance out the water and keep it as neutral tasting as possible. Domestic filters can’t do this, nor will they keep it safe from bacterial growth. The B.E.S.T. Inline Water Filter was designed with these problems in mind.”
How it works
The best thing (pun intended) about the B.E.S.T. Inline is that it is very easy to use. To help owners, B.E.S.T. has put together a few short YouTube videos on its channel ‘Filter Facts in Flash’ section — click here to check them out.
Installation
Adding the B.E.S.T. Inline to your caravan or camping setup is a simple process. It can be installed anywhere along your RV’s existing filling hose, but a good rule of thumb is to place it approximately 1.5m back from the RV. Simply cut the line, add hose connectors (such as those by Gardena, Pope, Neta and so on), and the inline will clip in between them.
The filtration process
With the B.E.S.T. Inline installed, when water enters the unit the first stage of the device stops the dirt and any sediment. The second stage is a fine filtration barrier designed to trap bacteria, which is then killed off by B.E.S.T.’s SilverSafe process. At this stage the water is clean, so the combination of high-quality carbons adsorbs the chemicals in the water for improved taste and odour. As the water continues to flow through the inline and out the other end it passes through a second bed of SilverSafe and cleansing membranes.
B.E.S.T. also uses a blend of carbons rather than coconut carbon, as seen in other water filtration devices on the market. “A few years ago, some councils opted to change from chlorine to chloramine,” Colin said. “Chloramine takes a longer ‘contact time’ to be removed, which the basic coconut carbon used in all other filters can’t achieve. The solution to us was simple, as we mix a blend of high-quality carbons to remove both chlorine and chloramines.”
Water pressure
Users can also enjoy premium water pressure with the Inline water filter. To be certified in Australia, water filters must be pressure tested to 2100kpa for 15 minutes, but B.E.S.T. has exceeded this by pressure testing its filters to 3200kpa for 72-hours. “Most of the other filters on the market are made to the US market requirements,” Colin commented. “They can be of high quality; however, the water pressure in the United States is less than half that of Australia’s water pressures.”
Cleaning and maintenance
One of the standout features of the B.E.S.T. Inline is that it is the only one on the market that has been designed to be successfully backflushed, allowing you to clean the filter as often as you want to remove the dirt and debris that will get caught inside the filter after use.
As the B.E.S.T. Inline is hand-assembled here in Australia, should changes be required in the filtration media, the B.E.S.T. team can accommodate this immediately.
Find out more
We’ve put the B.E.S.T. Inline Water Filter to the test plenty of times here at Caravan World, in locations all around Australia. To see for yourself why it’s a good option, check out this review we did during a massive tour to Cape York, Queensland.
Watch the B.E.S.T. Inline Water Filter product test:
To find out more about B.E.S.T. Water Filters, head to its website, where you can purchase its filters (various models and packs available), find out where to buy them in store and view B.E.S.T.’s tips, tricks and frequently asked questions.
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