Why Bend, when you can Flex?
In today’s business environment we are far too frequently confronted with news of ‘another’ Australian manufacturer going under, or shifting their production offshore. So with that mind, it was rewarding for me to recently visit a true Australian success story and a company that holds an important place in our plumbing sector.
Go back around 25 years and most plumbers would have still been bending copper to hook up their water and gas lines – an arduous task at best and quite labour intensive. Then along came flexible connectors, which were heralded by many (though not all at first), across the trade.
Like many new technologies, there were early failures with flexible connectors, some due to faulty offshore manufacturers and the occasional poor installation. Needless to say, their name and reputation was tarnished for a while.
As with many products, flexible connectors are far more complex than they might look at first – meaning plenty can go wrong with them if, in the first place, they are not engineered properly or manufactured to exacting standards from the best materials available.
The most experienced supplier in the Australian market is Aquaknect, a Queensland-based manufacturer and the industry is lucky to have this dedicated supplier on its door step.
Aquaknect’s General Manager, Tom Davies, took me for a tour around his manufacturing facility and my first impression was one of surprise, firstly that such a niche business employed 25 Australians and secondly, to see the amount of testing equipment being used throughout the plant.
As you might expect, quite a few manual procedures go into producing such products, thus the need for plenty of quality checks along the way.
“Where do all these products go Tom?” I asked.
Once he showed me the range of sizes and types they produce for water, gas and other fluid handling needs, it became obvious.
The popular 8 or 10mm flexible under sink connector is only one of a vast numbers of product variants. The domestic range has now grown up to 50mm diameter for water and 26mm for gas applications.
For a number of years there was no regulation, until 1993 when Aquaknect achieved its WaterMark approval based around a newly written Standard. However, that didn’t stop some of the cheap unapproved product failing in the market. But what it did do was make the industry realise it had to be careful with selection, given the potential enormous legal liability with water or gas leaks.
Aquaknect has also expanded significantly into the commercial market with up to 300mm diameter product for speciality applications in manufacturing and mining. Currently the company is assessing a new seismic connector joint project and advising authorities in response to the earthquake rebuilding needs of Christchurch.
The sprinkler dropper sector is also of growing interest, as it is currently supplied primarily by US and Chinese product. Tom sees an opportunity to produce tailored-length product from customer drawings to make it even easier for fire sprinkler installers – while offering an obvious market advantage.
Where possible, Tom sources his part supplies locally, although the wire for the braided mesh, which is made from 304 stainless-steel comes from overseas, as these days it can’t be sourced locally. The role of the braid is to hold the pressure while the EPDM rubber tube (for water use) seals the water and keeps any contact from the chlorine in the water, away from the metal.
Tom says one of the market’s misconceptions is that stainless steel won’t rust but as the name implies, it is stainless rather than stain-proof and the effects of domestic and commercial cleaners (like Exit Mould and others) will attack the metal.
This has led Aquaknect to develop its Aquashield coating, which is a plastic sleeve applied over the braid.
In enclosed environments such as bathroom vanities or under the kitchen sink, such chemicals become active in the airspace and attack all metallic objects.
Aquaknect hasn’t followed others into using PEX pipe as substitute tubing. Tom believes these products are gradually being withdrawn from the market as it has been discovered that PEX is not as flexible or elastomeric as EPDM rubber. If it is kinked during installation or use, the pinch points at the kink will flex until they break down and ultimately pinch holes develop.
Therefore the next time you are about to install a flexible connector, take a closer look, as they are quite a work of art and the amount of technology/testing that is protecting your plumbing installation is critically important.
In the case of this manufacturer, you well and truly know what you are getting, as well as advice – it’s there for the asking.