The Framers Forum

Fortunate as I am to have a studio that sits between 17oC-21oC, the water in the dispenser gets manky after a while. Does anyone have any tips or tricks to prevent this or is it just a case of washing and changing the water more regularly??

Changing the water is the best and least thought process solution.

That's easy.
It's the little traces of gum falling back into the reservoir of water.
The gum is a natural product, probably a mixture of animal and plants and these will degrade over short time.
The simple solution is to just keep replacing the water.

This is our homemade gum tape dispenser, not as sophisticated as the fancy bought version, but subject to the same gummy residue build-up in our sponge. We combat this to some extent by squirting water, to which a few drops of bleach have been added, to moisten the sponge. We rinse out the sponge with clean water every four of five months.

Perhaps the same solution could be used in the water reservoir of your tape dispenser.