"If you can refill a salt shaker, then you should be able to refill a Brita, PuR, or other brand water pitcher cartridges. All that you will need is an old cartridge, some activated carbon, a polyethylene plug, a sharp utility knife or Xacto knife. A 1/2" drill motor and 1/2" drill bit are optional, but can aid in rounding out the hole."

Hmm, last time I checked, you didn't need a polyethylene plug, an xacto knife and a drill to refill a salt shaker.

Why is anyone paying 6-10 bucks for a refill filter?

Walmart has them for 5 bucks a piece when they are regular price, and lower on sale.

There are many areas where 'do it yourself and save' makes sense, but drinking water might not be one of them.

While this is a nice tip, it's important to note that the filters themselves will eventually harbor all kinds of bacteria and fungi. Some of which may be difficult to remove simply by bleaching. That's one of the biggest arguments for tossing and buying new cartridges from time to time.

No thanks, my time & health are worth more than half-assing a water filter. "Activated Carbon" is great...but I want to know what I'm running my water through is food-grade. Similarly, changing out the carbon portion of the filter without refreshing the ion-exchange resin is really half-assing it. The carbon just cleans up the taste.

Anyone paying $6-$10 a piece for these things has obviously never been to Costco when they have a promo coupon for them!

What do you do with the stuff that comes out of the filter originally?

Isn't it full of the lead and nasty stuff you previously filtered out?

Isn't that dangerous from a ground-water point-of-view?

@puddleglum411: The only issue I have with buying them from Costco is that it means I have 10 of those filters, and since I am the only one in the household drinking water, 3 years worth of filters is overkill.

I have installed the tap water filter that comes out of a separate spigot on my sink. The sink hole used to hold the spray wand, but I swapped out the faucet fixture to have the new wand/faucet combo. Total cost for new fixture and water filter spigot w/ filter was about 180.00.

That's expensive, but at the same time, I don't need to waste fridge space and energy keeping the water container in there, and I don't have to ever fill up the container either.

@theysaidwhat:

No! any politically correct Consumerist reader doesn't shop at walmart.

I put this on par with DIY ink refilling (or the ink refilling service at OfficeMax/Depot etc). Yea, you can save some money, but are the time, effort, and decrease in quality worth the savings?