Throughout the cleaning product life cycle, ranking of performance is an important type of assessment. It is also a type of assessment that can be quite time-consuming. With the right approach, however, it is possible to evaluate and rank the product performance in less than one hour. Here we tell you how.
A faster way to rank the performance is to run the wash step and the result assessment at the same time, rather than in sequence. This can be done with real-time surface analysis methods. This means that in the cleaning step, when the soil is exposed to the cleaning agent, the real-time measurement equipment will not only clean the surface, but it will also measure the soil removal. Combining the wash step and result analysis, makes the assessment less time-consuming than if the steps had been executed one at a time.
As an example, let us look at detergent efficiency evaluation by the QSense® technology. This technology measures changes of mass at the surface, i.e. it detects if, and how fast, the soil is dissolved and removed from the surface, fig. 1. During the cleaning step, the soil removal result is presented in real-time, which means that samples run in parallel can qualitatively be compared already during the wash step. From the cleaning profile data, information on soil i) swelling time, ii) mass removal rate and iii) total mass removal is obtained. Combined, this information will assign a performance score to each product candidate. The assigned score allows for them to be ranked and compared.
Figure 1. The graph shows the cleaning profile of a detergent candidate. Measuring the mass changes, the cleaning product performance can be assessed and compared with other candidates already during the wash step. The performance ranking is then obtained via the cleaning profile performance score.
Overall, a typical measurement setup, execution, and ranking assessment takes less than one hour. As the soil removal data is displayed in real time, an indication of the performance can be obtained already during the measurement.
Download the guide to read more about the detergent product performance evaluation and the cleaning profile analysis.
Eva Ekerot is the Senior Commercial Portfolio Manager for QSense. She has a background managing numerous product portfolios within the medical technology and analytical instrument industries. She is devoted to user driven development of high tech products. More user friendly technology is accessible to more people!
