In 2001 I was commissioned to build a silver ion treatment system for Palm Springs Pty Ltd in Sutton Forest in the Southern Highlands NSW . The first unit was a very simple PLC controlled unit that reacted to a flow meter input when water was flowing. It proved effective in algae control in large polycarbonate bottles. A chronic problem that has plagued the bottled water industry.
It would be five years later in 2005 after Palm Springs Pty Ltds demise in the Eastern States that the second unit would be built & installed. This time the installation was in Canning Vale fpr Palm Springs W.A.
about a year later Coca Cola Amatil made an inquiry about setting up a trial of the technology after they acquired Palm Springs in a takeover. They noted that Palm Springs did not have an inventory of algae stained bottles & that it was likely due to the Silver Ion that my company (Sinnec) had installed at the Sutton Forest Plant .
Trials were held at the Neverfail Plant in Springwood in Brisbane. Over 20 pallets were bottled with one batch containing silver ion & a normal control batch.
Both batches were then quarantined outside in full sun. At six weeks the results decisively proved the silver ions effectiveness, as the control batch was developing green bottles.
My company Sinnec Pty Ltd was given a purchase order for a production unit for the Yatala QLD plant. Capable of treating flow rates up to 1000 litres per minute. This unit proved effective in holding concentration accuracies of plus or minus 0.005mg/L After 12 months in operation in Queensland orders were made for Neverfails Melbourne & Adelaide plants.
Silver Ion water treatment had come of age.
From there Silver Ion became the treatment of choice for most water bottlers in Australia, New Zealand & across the Pacific.
Over the years many knock offs have appearded on the market. As a testimony to my design they are nearly exactly the same.
However the lack of know-how displayed by these inferior copies demonstrate that these imitators will be incapable of further improving the design as they do not understand the parameters that were originally taken into account during the conception & design.
