Hartbeespoort, North West
Hartbeespoort Borehole Iron Removal
A smallholding borehole staining basins and laundry, and a household buying bottled water for the kitchen.
The family had lived with the borehole for years. Every basin, shower tray and load of washing came out with a rust-brown edge, and the kettle had to be descaled almost weekly. They had stopped drinking the water altogether and were carting bottled water in from town. We pulled a sample on site, sent it through for iron and manganese, and worked from the numbers rather than guesswork.
Two-stage skid on a raised frame, drain line tied into the existing soakaway.
What the sample showed
Iron came back at 3.1 mg/L and manganese at 0.42 mg/L, both well above the point where staining and taste become a daily nuisance. The borehole itself was sound, the yield was steady, and the pump was cycling normally. The problem sat in the water chemistry, not the supply.
Sizing the skid
We went with a two-stage setup: a backwashing iron filter ahead of a manganese media bed, sized to the household's peak draw rather than the borehole's maximum. The pump house is tight, so the skid was mounted on a raised frame to keep the drain line clear and route it into the soakaway that was already there. No new trenching, no rework of the existing plumbing beyond the tie-in points.
Readings before and after
| Parameter | Before | After |
|---|---|---|
| Iron | 3.1 mg/L | under 0.1 mg/L |
| Manganese | 0.42 mg/L | trace |
How it runs now
The backwash cycle runs on a timer, the media beds get checked at the same interval, and the household is back on its own water for drinking and cooking. The basins stay clean and the washing comes out without the rust line. If your borehole leaves the same marks, the starting point is the same: a sample and a photo of the pump house.
More site write-ups in the project archive, or see the treatment and filtration work we do.