Yes, it comes out to a gallon. You actually do not need that much. A half-cup of bleach would be plenty. Most ppl overuse bleach. The chart below shows how little bleach you need to treat contaminated water into drinking water. One half cup of bleach would be enough to treat 240 gallons of contaminated water into safe drinking water. ½ cup = 24 teaspoons. Do not use bleach that has perfumes, dyes, additives. Check the label. You would be using 24 times greater than needed for drinking water which should be enough to kill most all bacteria. Let the pieces stand in the bleach water 30-60 minutes. I personally use ½ cup to 10 gallons. Too much bleach will cause most plastics (not all), to become brittle. Circulating the water will cause the bleach to off-gas weakening the solution.
| Treating Water with a 5-6 Percent Liquid Chlorine Bleach Solution | | |
| Volume of Water to be Treated | Treating Clear/Cloudy Water:
Bleach Solution to Add | Treating Cloudy, Very Cold, or Surface Water: Bleach Solution to Add |
| 1 quart/1 liter | 3 drops | 5 drops |
| 1/2 gallon/2 quarts/2 liters | 5 drops | 10 drops |
| 1 gallon | 1/8 teaspoon | 1/4 teaspoon |
| 5 gallons | 1/2 teaspoon | 1 teaspoon |
| 10 gallons | 1 teaspoon | 2 teaspoons |
DOH Pub 821-031
Revised - January 2009
When rinsing, use your hand to "wash" the bleach off everything as it has a slimy feel to it and using your hand until the slimy feel is gone is a great way to know you have gotten it off. When you set the tank back up, double dose with some Prime and you should be fine.
