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Enhanced performance for Aquasafe proved
ST is continually striving to identify ways and means of ensuring even better performance from the Aquasafe unit. We are pleased to be able announce some significant,documented breakthroughs.
Good News for all current and future users of Aquasafe
Southern Trident can now announce field tests documenting that the upper limit of daily safe water production has been raised from 20 litres to 50 litres, i.e. more than 2 1/2 times the previous performance claim.
How was this breakthrough achieved? Through three innovations:
- Use of a new wax, with a more appropriate melting point.
Field tests on the old wax showed that the melting of the wax was taking place at temperatures far higher than was necessary to ensure complete pasteurisation. ST has now sourced a new wax that has a more appropriate melting point. Tests carried out by the South African NHLS (the National Health Laboratories) prove that the new wax only melts at temperatures which ensure zero counts of bacteria.
- Pre-heating technique
This is a simple technique, identified by field users. It just means placing bottles of water to be heated in the sun, prior to insertion in the unit. These"pre-heated" bottles enable the Aquasafe unit to raise the temperature to pasteurisation levels faster, thus increasing performance.
- Multiple bottle insertion
This technique too comes from user feedback. Some people don't read the manual and apparently that's not always bad. In this case our current manual (the pictograms in the "Downloads area" of the website) specify that bottles are to be inserted into the unit , one a time and placed horizontally at the bottom of the unit. Well, one user was too impatient and inserted four bottles standing vertically in the unit. A bit tricky because of the small hole in the unit, but it can be done. He noted that the time to reach pasteurisation was virtually unaffected compared to the"official" method. Subsequently, ST conducted extensive testing at our Uitenhage factory and in Port Elizabeth to determine if this anecdotal evidence could be proved in a controlled environment. Result: It was true!
The sum of these three innovations is that using two litres bottles, it has been proved that the Aquasafe unit can produce 50 litres of safe water in six hours of sunshine.
Accordingly we will revise all our presentation material, pictograms and performance statements to reflect the above.