WAND SLIDE/GLIDE DEMO 12/10/08
Aim – To determine whether there is any advantage to having any type of attachments to wands.
Equipment used –
Machine -
Prochem Performer I set at 1900rpm,
Temp - 210F temp,
Pressure - 200psi
Wand type - Prochem Quadjet 11”
Tee-jet size - 950015 outer, 110015 inner
Hose length - 30m
Carpet type - Polypropylene loop pile, on rubber underlay
Methodology –
Carpets pre-vacuumed with Dyson DC04 Constantmax,
Pre- sprayed with Prochem Performance Plus @ 64:1,
Liquid Slurry emulsifier @ 300:1 set to 3g/hr.
Single wand pass with ½ wand overlap
Moisture levels measured immediately after and then @ 1 hr intervals thereafter with Protimeter MMS
Note:
Dry carpet measured @ 70 as base level @ 18C, RH - 75%
Results –
0hrs -
1hr -
2hrs - 3hrs -
4hrs -
resistance(kgs)
Control 150 -
148 -
160 - 157 -
105 -
8-
wand
GreenGlide 186 -
164 -
150 - 102 -
80 -
6+
holed
Agitator 156 -
168 -
153 - 100 -
78 -
8-
"Slide"
Advantage 141 -
158 -
138 - 130 -
78 -
7
"Slide"
Slotted 163 -
143 -
134 - 138 -
78 -
7-
"Slide"
Twin Vac 158 -
145 -
94 - 82 -
75 -
7+
"Slide"
Hybrid 158 -
166 -
131 - 97 -
70 -
7-
"Slide"
TI wand 158 -
173 -
169 - 163 -
138 -
5+
"Slippery Sucker"
RX20 191 -
205 -
221 - 210 -
200 -
n/a
unglided
Note –
RX20 measured after 1 x wet pass & 1 x dry pass
All other measurements done with 1 only wet pass.
Summary
Surprise was seeing that most readings went up in the 1st hour before they went down again. All glided wands undoubtedly showed improvements on drying time, however it must be noted that jetting on GreenGlided wand was actually 2 x 85001 outer and 2 x 11001 inner jets, meaning that technically 33% less water was delivered to the carpet face. My error on that, I’d forgotten that I had changed jetting as part of another experiment, although I don’t think the difference would have been that great, at most probably 10% as a guesstimate. (Yes I like to play with my toys a lot J)
Slides across the range exhibited better moisture removal and ultimately faster drying than the glided wand, but not to a great degree. Average across the range was 75.8 as against 80 as a final reading, making them 6% faster overall than the GreenGlide wand and a whopping
42% faster than a standard wand!!
Even bigger surprise was the TI wand, included as a last minute “curiosity factor” and supplied by Greg King, which exhibited greater removal to start, but then was significantly slower to dry and the
RX20 supplied by Kim Howson - well, the figures speak for themselves!
What also needs to be noted here is that only a single wet pass was done, no dry passes as would normally be done with an attachment (
normally you wouldn't bother lifting wand off carpet face unless you like doing extra work for no reason, right?). I am confident that an extra dry pass would significantly change readings shown, but for the purposes of this demo I was wanting worst case scenarios to be shown here.
Conclusion –
If you’re not using a Slide or Glide, why not? They are making a significant difference to both the effort physically expended and drying times. 40% is a heck of a difference and no favouritism was shown to any product as Gary Bethel or Brett Holman will attest to, as they were present for the demonstration along with 30-odd curious Advantage Group members.
The advantage for the Slides, and to be fair this would need to be repeated on a variety of carpet types for greater accuracy, is that in my experience the different types work better on different fibre/construction types and the fact that they are so quick to remove (including the aluminium link) when compared to a Glide is also a major factor in their favour, but if you have a Glide already and aren’t using it as I know some of aren’t, think again and trial it a bit more!
Prepared by Franco Preo
13/10/08
as part of the Advantage Group Carpet Cleaners (Inc) AGM Demo Day
