Volunteering in the Production Facility
Each task in the production facility is an essential
component of assembling Living Water™ Treatment
Systems (LWTS™). Each system can provide enough
safe water for 3,000 people!
Parts Assembly
The manifolds, used to direct the flow of water in
the LWTS, are assembled from the component parts.
These PVC manifolds need to be cemented together very
carefully to insure quality. This task requires familiarity
with plumbing and attention to detail.
Multimedia Filter Preparation
The filters used by the LWTS™ are housed in blow
molded pressure rated vessels that contain layers
of naturally occurring materials. This job involves
measuring out quantities of materials and carefully
pouring them into the filter vessels. The filter is
then backwashed, pressure tested and set aside for
future use. This task is simple but time consuming
and requires very minimal technical or mechanical
skills. Before it can be performed a brief training
session (about 1hour) must be completed with a WMI
employee. This task is most easily accomplished with
two people working together preparing filters for
four units at a time.
Hose Cutting
Many different lengths of hosing are used for each
LWTS. Hosing must be cut from a long roll of tubing,
marked with the appropriate color tape, and then organized
to be easily accessible when needed. This task can
be done by anyone who can use a pair of scissors and
roll of tape. It requires the least skill and almost
no training. This is the perfect job for someone who
only wants to volunteer once for a short amount of
time.
Unit Set-Up and Testing
Before being sent to the field, each LWTS is completely
set-up at the WMI warehouse to make sure the manifolds
fit and all hosing and parts are in place. This is
rather labor intensive, but can be accomplished in
about 1.5 hours when all parts are available. After
setting up the unit, water is run through to check
for leaks in tubing, problems with pressurization,
etc. The testing process, which takes about 30 minutes,
is completed by backwashing the system and draining
the tanks. Anyone anticipating setting up a LWTS system
in the field should be involved in this process. It
helps to familiarize the volunteer with the set-up
and operation of a unit.
Unit Packaging
After setting-up and testing the unit, the unit is
completely disassembled and packed. Because availability
of parts in developing countries varies extensively,
this is a crucial step. It requires multiple (at least
two) people to check and re-check what is packed for
quality control reasons. After packing, the unit must
be shrink-wrapped and prepared for loading.
