This week we are still finishing our filter. It seems that we might be able to finish on Monday or Tuesday. We have been working really hard even though one of our members cannot work with us. We got our cinder blocks on Tuesday and the whole project is turning out amazing! To hold the bucket that will be inside the filter, we screwed in three 2x2's to support the bucket when it is full of water. We also decided that we did not need an overfill pipe because it would be even more difficult to install into the bucket. We also have another bucket at the end of the filter. Since it is raised by the cinder blocks the bucket is able to go directly under the filter. Here's a picture of our revised solar still:

Now, we also needed to get the PVC pipe down into the black bucket. At first we didn't know what to do so we brainstormed. We thought we might be able to drill a hole the size of the PVC pipe (one and a half inch), but learned that we couldn't drill a hole that was the right size. The hole was either too large or too small. So we tried measuring the diameter of the PVC pipe (which was one and seven eighths of an inch) and measured the same length on a 2x4 piece of wood. Using those measurements we drew a square in the corner of the wood. We then cut out the square using a saw. Finally we screwed the 2x4 to the top of the filter so it could hold the PVC pipe. Here's a picture:

So you might be wondering why we are doing this. It is because children in Africa die everyday from water borne diseases. By creating this filter, it will help families in Africa clean dirty water that they need to drink, cook with, bathe in, and grow crops with. This does not only provide drinking water for the people but it also helps with malnutrition by being able to cook food and grow fruits and vegetables and with sanitization by allowing them to bathe. This will hopefully decrease the amount of deaths due to water related diseases. Our goal is to allow access to clean water in Africa for children and families. We focus on Africa because that country is the most in need of help right now. We hope that you want to help people too by doing something that could change the world.