Crystaltech MD Shares
Industry Expertise at Water Treatment Debate

Commercial warewashing expert and CEDA Technical Steering Group Member, Derek Maher from Crystaltech, joined a select panel of industry experts to discuss how to convince chefs to care about water treatment. Research by the Craft Guild of Chefs and Brita revealed that a high percentage of chefs were unaware that untreated water can cause breakdowns on core kitchen equipment, such as warewashing machines.

Derek highlighted one of the problems being the ownership of the issue, “Ownership of the issue also varies by operator. If you take the big supermarkets, you will have maintenance looking after the kitchen equipment and estates looking after the water treatment.”

The engineers at Crystaltech are often called out to a glass or dishwasher breakdown where water quality is poor and this factor has contributed to the breakdown. “I think that for every millimetre of scale, the appliance uses about 17% more power, so you will have a knock-on effect of that element burning out. An element can cost a few hundred pounds, so the expense really mounts up.”

Derek’s company, Crystaltech has an enviable reputation for achieving perfect glass cleaning results within the pub, bar and catering industry. Its team of engineers has been working with many of the major UK pub operators for a number of years to help them achieve optimum glass washing solutions, with award winning results.

There are a number of options to improve the quality of water which is used by a commercial warewashing appliance. Water softeners can dramatically improve issues with limescale and using a reverse osmosis system purifies the water passing through the machine, with the end result being spotless and removing the need for labour intensive polishing/drying post-wash.

Water softeners that are regenerated using salt can have an adverse effect on glasswashing results if the salt is not completely flushed out. This can be the case with glasswashers with internal softeners or automatic external softeners with the end result being a cloudy glass.