Australia's Science Forum

Hi All, Just wondering on this safety shower thread, I believe that they are also supposed to be tested and tagged once a year as per fume cupboards, which seems overkill in a school setting, I always think the standards are written for industrial settings not schools were we have very small amounts of chemicals, I have one fume cupboard that never gets used!Anyway do peeps get annual testing on their safety showers and eye washes??

MariaQ

I have been here 6 years and never seen an inspector or heard if they came through. There are no drains in the floors under the shower, so think I would notice if someone had tested them. I would still be trying to clean up the mess!!! Because I don't have anything better to do.

No drains under your safety shower?!!!!! Mental. I test mine once a month. And I had a fume cupboard repaired recently and the repair person said to run them for five minutes once a week to keep them in working order.

The Australian Standard says that they should be tested annually for flow rates. Pretty sure Scienceassist has something on their website about this. The standard doesn't specify the qualifications required to do this testing.
Having said that, I have never worked in a school where this testing occurs, so would be interested if anyone gets this done.
For the regular testing, best invention ever is the sock that goes over the shower and directs water into a bucket when testing. No water to clean up, no getting soaked trying to hold a bucket under it. It is essential to run the eye wash on a regular basis to ensure there are no foreign particles sitting in the taps. The last thing you need is a bit of metal going into your eye on top of chemicals!

Ours are tested but we have only had the proper fancy (read compliant) ones since late 2016. Mine are properly plumbed in with floor drain however our high school one is not. At 75L/min flow rate....that's a LOT of water to clean up!

Where did you get your safety shower test sock from? Price?

I bought it from Enware - same brand as the shower. This was at my last school and I bought one in 2017 directly from them. Last year I tried to buy one for here from them and they told me I would have to buy it through a plumbing supplier. I haven't bothered, as here the shower testing is done by our maintenance team. It wasn't a cheap item, I think about $200 but was worth the cost from a WHS point of view.

Merilyn! You are back!! Good to hear from you.

I made a sock from a KMart shower curtain. Cut it in half, sewed it into a tube, thread a piece of rope through the eyelets. I can tie the top over the shower, and put a bin under the bottom of the curtain and it all pours into the bin, no mess!

agregory wrote: ↑19 Feb 2022, 15:54 I made a sock from a KMart shower curtain. Cut it in half, sewed it into a tube, thread a piece of rope through the eyelets. I can tie the top over the shower, and put a bin under the bottom of the curtain and it all pours into the bin, no mess!

Cunning idea agregory

Also a reminder to run our Eyebath washes and get all the gungy water that's been sitting in the pipes all year cleaner than the acid you might need to wash out

How often should the safety showers be checked? We only have the little hand held eye washers so I change the water in those weekly.

KassH wrote: ↑21 Feb 2022, 13:39 How often should the safety showers be checked? We only have the little hand held eye washers so I change the water in those weekly.

We had some of those handheld bottles that needed water refills...I have ditched them and purchased 1L saline bottles for the labs with an eyewash attachment on them. They last ~3years..... never have to check, refill ect. Also our mains water here is nasty, can't imagine it would be very comfortable.

Our plumbed eyewash and drench hoses we turn on and have them flow for 30 secs each month.

Thanks Anna! I'll be adding the saline eye washer to the WHS budget list for this year.

To test our shower we use one of the extra large orange bin liners with the bottom edge of the bag cut off. The tie at the top of the bag then ties around the top of the shower head. I place a large green bin under the shower and put the end of the bag into the bin and turn on the shower. You then calculate roughly the volume of water and record on log.

I love everyone's creativity with making their own socks! The one thing I will say about the commercial safety shower socks is they repel water, which makes them very easy to handle after use. No worries about dripping water on the floor and trying to dry it out.

Just a comment, not a criticism in any way for those who have been a whole lot more lateral in their thinking than I ever am!