As this was supposed to be a replacement filter, did it match the previous filter (in looks of shape and design, and part #).

If unfiltered water is making it past your filter... I would guess the replacement filter didn't exactly match or a gasket seal was left out when reinstalling.

If the cartridge filters are clogging up too quickly, consider a "sand" style filter instead - i.e. the type where you can fill it with the appropriate type(s) of media for your specific water problem (e.g. resin, carbon, manganese, zeolite etc), and can simply backwash it weekly to keep it clean. Also, you must consider flow rates - all of the cartridge filters I'm seeing here are way too small for whole-house filtration - these are the size you use for single tap filtration.

The water filter is simply put before the inlfux to the cistern.

Such a cistern is about 1600 liters.

For us it would take at least 3 days for turnover.

You should consider to control the filling more or less manually and not filling up to the edge.

Most simple filter at the influx.

10 inch housing (2,5 inch diameter), different types/sizes of housing and cartridges are available.

(10 inch, 20 inch, 30 inch, 40 inch, diameters: 2.5, 4.5)

For your application a small 10/2.5 housing is sufficient.

As a starter to the science of sediment filters see this page of a specialized online shop where I buy my stuff.

Much much cheaper than the extortion at local homestores:

Star Water Filter Co. - Sediment Cartrides

Housings:

http://www.duan-daw.com/category/19/%E0%B8%81%E0%B8%A3%E0%B8%B0%E0%B8%9A%E0%B8%AD%E0%B8%81%E0%B8%81%E0%B8%A3%E0%B8%AD%E0%B8%87%E0%B8%99%E0%B9%89%E0%B8%B3-housing

In the picture you see a 5 micron cartridge after about 3 days of use

New cartridges are white

I just changed to washable cartridges (more expensive, not yet sure whether it pays).

Depending on how bad the water is, it might be useful to put two filters in a row.

One with a 20 micron cartridge followed by one with 5 micron.

The black thingy is a handle to open/close the housing.

sedimentfilter.jpg

So we've been using the the housing with a 5 micron filter for a while now. We're changing it every few weeks which seems like it's not frequent enough so I would like to order from the website above in bulk. Which filter do you recommend? How are the washable filters going?