Don't make a meal of hygiene
February 1st 2009

With food preparation,hygiene is paramount, so it makes sense to have no-touch washroom facilities.Premier Foods is using Rada Sense technology to keep staff hands clean and minimise cross-contamination

Rada, the commercial division of Kohler Mira, introduced the Rada Sense digital water control technology three years ago.

The Rada Sense concept was recently installed in the upgraded washrooms of the Premier Foods factory in Ashford.The factory concentrates on the production of dry foods such as Batchelors 'Cup a'Soup' and pasta based products and is Premier Food's main dry foods plant in the UK.

As part of the overhaul and upgrade of the male and female washrooms, the decision was made to create no-touch control of hand washing and showering environments.This has involved installing 22 Rada Sense units – 11 in each washroom – as well as Kohler Odela w/c pans and urinals, which flush automatically using the Rada Pulse no-touch central electronic flow control system.

All in the timing Rada Pulse offers programmable timed flow control for urinals and w/cs. It is easy to programme, via a hand held programmer, and optimises water use while giving the benefits of no-touch operation.

In addition to the washrooms used by production staff in the personnel plant, Rada Sense hand washing controls are installed in the lobby washroom areas used by staff and visitors.

"We had previously used knee operated equipment in the washrooms but when in the interests of hygiene,we opted to completely upgrade them,we specified Rada Sense," explains Colin Watson, the Premier Foods project engineer who oversaw the design and installation.

"There was obviously a need to avoid any opportunities for cross contamination and for the comfort of our staff, a whole installation based around Rada Sense digitally controlled hand washing and showering was really appreciated.

"Because Rada is part of Kohler, when we were looking for stylish, high quality sanitary ware, it was good that we were able to coordinate the complete installation virtually from one source." Kohler Mira says Rada Sense digital water control systems are increasingly being specified in areas where hygiene is paramount or prevention of hand borne contamination is high on the agenda.This covers food processing facilities such as at the Premier Foods installation, but also hospitals, critical care units and even sports and leisure facilities.

Rada Sense digital mixing valves are operated by infra red wall mounted control panels which are installed above wash hand basins or in shower cubicles.The system differs significantly from traditional 'no-touch' controls because not only does the panel eliminate risks of cross infection by allowing the user to initiate water flow, it also allows the selection of the water temperature without touching the panel.

For safety, precise maximum and minimum water temperatures and flow times, can be pre-set using a remote hand held computer.

These settings are maintained even if there are water pressure or temperature fluctuations.

To maintain best practice in the hot water systems that supply the basins and showers, the Rada Sense digital mixing valve incorporates an intelligent 'duty flush' feature that monitors the time since the outlet was last used. If it has not been used for a pre-determined time (say 12 hours) the appliance is automatically flushed through at a safe temperature to clear water that may have been stagnant in the pipe work or, more importantly, in any dead legs.The non use period, flush temperature and duration can also be pre-determined and logged in the mixing valve.

Prevention better than cure To comply with HSC 'AcoP L8' directives, routine thermal disinfection as a means of preventing or controlling legionella is also recommended. With Rada Sense this can be achieved by activating the thermal disinfection mode which – under supervision – allows hot water at a temperature of at least 60°C to be flushed through the electronic mixing valve and all outlet pipe-work – a process Rada claims is not possible where conventional TMV's are fitted.

The disinfection procedure is activated by a hand held computer which then records the temperature and duration and produces a log of the disinfection process that can be stored on a PC.

Other key features of the Rada Sense T-logic technology include a facility that performs 5 safety checks, 40 times a second, a 'lock out' facility that activates if a fault is detected and a second temperature sensor that will close down the system if for any reason the water temperature exceeds a safe level. The mixing unit is supplied factoryset to comply with TMV3 safe temperature settings.

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