Designing a Water Filtration System for Lower Cost of Ownership

Whether you’re serving up specialty coffee drinks or sodas to accompany the lunch special, it’s important that customers taste the drink they ordered, and not the disinfectant in the water supply. Water filtration systems play an important role in making sure the drinks, and the ice in them, aren’t clouded with sediments or unwanted tastes and odors.

Filtered water benefits foodservice equipment as well as the overall customer experience. Water may contain chlorine or chloramines which can in turn cause corrosion and damage the equipment permanently. Water filtration systems for equipment help keep things running efficiently with less downtime.

Centralized Water Filtration Versus Point-of-Use Systems
Operators have a choice when it comes to water filtration—centralized water filtration systems or individual water filters. Centralized systems treat the incoming water in one place, with lines running from the system out to each piece of equipment. Individual filters, also referred to as point-of-use filters, are installed on each piece of equipment.

Consider the following when choosing which application works best for your operation:

• Number of equipment. Individual filters are a good option for a kitchen with just one ice machine, or a coffee shop with only one espresso machine. Once you start adding more equipment, centralized systems can save space and improve efficiency.
• Position of equipment. Even if you only have a couple pieces of equipment needing water filters, the kitchen design might not allow space for a filter at the point of use. In that case, it’s easier to run a line to the equipment from a centralized system.
• Size of the operation. Centralized systems are ideal for operations with multiple types of equipment all within an area around 3,000 square feet or less. For operators with a few soda dispensers, coffee machines and ice machines, it’s a space saver to have the centralized system in a back room and run lines out to each piece of equipment. However, avoid running long lines, or having to go through floors or walls. Large operations, such as hotels and casinos, often install more than one multi-unit system to accommodate all their water filtration needs.

Advantages of Centralized Water Filtration Systems
The adage “out of sight, out of mind” is unfortunately true when it comes to point-of-use water filters. Because the filters are usually installed behind equipment, staff don’t see them and often neglect to change them. It’s also easy to lose track of the inventory of filters on individual pieces of equipment, especially if each is on a different filter-change schedule. Not changing filters can lead to equipment issues, running up maintenance costs and downtime. A centralized water filtration system, typically installed in a utility room or in the back of a kitchen, makes the filters more visible, helping alert staff to the task of replacing them. Plus, along with saving space, a centralized system saves time as filters are easy for staff to access.

Aqua-Pure™ Water Filtration (formerly 3M Drinking Water Filtration) offers a variety of multi-unit options to help design a centralized system that best fits your operation. The systems are modular and expandable, making it easy to switch out filter sizes as capacity needs increase, or add additional heads to accommodate more equipment.

Each unit has multiple outlets as well to allow for different settings for each type of equipment. For example, one centralized system could be used for both a coffee or ice machine that requires a scale inhibitor and a soda dispenser that doesn’t. The experts at Aqua-Pure water filtration can analyze your equipment and water capacity needs to help design the multi-unit water filtration system that best fits your operation. Get started HERE.