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INNOVATION RESOURCES

Drainwave

Breakthrough:
An ingenious device that uses waste water to increase the flow of water through domestic sewage systems that are suffering from the introduction of low flush toilets.

Inventor:
David Fisher and Quintin Davenport, Australia

Financial reward:
$100,000+

The Story:
Drainwave

Australia’s attempts to drastically reduce the amount of water it wastes has been good news for the environment, but bad news for sewage systems that need large volumes of liquid be flushed through them. The installation of low flush toilets brought with them an unintended problem; damage to sewage pipes that were designed for higher flush volumes.

Increasing Flush Volume

Drainwave is an innovative device that collects waste water from household use (basins, washing machines, showers) and combines this with water from the toilet to increase the flush volume down sewage pipes. The invention stores the water temporarily and once it has reached a predetermined capacity (9.5 liters) automatically tips which sends the water surging through the pipes.

The invention is stored underground near the home and contains only one moving part and so it requires little or no maintenance.

Drainwave is the brainwave of David Fisher and Quintin Davenport who met at university. In fact Fisher went back to the lecture hall when he was 30 to study engineering because he wanted to develop products and didn’t have any formal training. Both are passionate about inventing things and had come up with a whole page of ideas that they wanted to look at and commercialize.

Brainstorming

The innovation was borne out of a brainstorming session when they asked themselves the question ‘why do toilets use so much water?’ The answer was not to clean out the toilet but to prevent pipes from blocking.

And so began their journey, one that has had more twists and turns than an S bend and required dedication, passion and perseverance.

“To start with we thought how are we going to collect water and get it down the drain line?” said Fisher. “We looked at things like holding tanks and valves and lots of complicated mechanical things and quickly realized that wasn’t going to be a cost effective solution. We figured we’d have a tipping bucket like the Chinese water buckets you see in people’s gardens; it fills up with water and tips once gravity takes hold.”

Prototype Making

To get their idea off the sketch pad the dynamic duo at first constructed their own prototypes in Fisher's garage. “We had a house along the road with a big 'For Sale' placard and we figured they wouldn’t mind if we borrowed their sign and we made our first prototype out of the cardboard from the sign.” Fisher adds.

It was a very basic design and the first few prototypes were based around this original shape, but it turned out to be a terrible one as it didn’t put the water down the drains in the right concentrations. And so refinements were made.

“I had a pad by the side of the bed (and I’ve driven my wife mad with this) and for the next six months used to draw different designs and shapes and wake up in the middle of the night and sketch a new one, and then I did some balance equations when I got up in the morning.”

Fisher and Davenport continued making prototypes themselves and progressed from ‘borrowed’ signs to PVC sheeting and experimented with different shapes. They received a quote from a company in Adelaide for the detailed design work but it was more than they could afford. So Fisher bought a software design program, and even though he didn’t know how to use it proceeded to learn and make up the three dimensional design in the computer program as well as using another program for strength and load testing.

Rapid Prototyping

Then they approached a company in Melbourne who could carry out rapid prototyping and they made some quarter scale models. A full scale model was made in China, but at this stage the pair were paranoid that their idea might be stolen and so the bucket was made by one company and the rest of the device by another. When they were put together and tested the results were far better than the inventors had imagined.

Applying for Patents

Drainwave was patented before the pair started on the prototyping. “We wrote a provisional patent which at the start wasn’t very expensive; it was only a couple of thousand dollars.”

But now they have full patents in 40 countries and they have filed registered designs in those countries to protect the shape they eventually came up with. “So if someone was to work around the patent they would still have to come up with a better shape and I think they’ll struggle to do that. Drainwave is also now a registered trademark in those 40 countries.”

During this whole process a number of investors have come on board including an accountant, a commercial lawyer, a pure investor and a branding and marketing specialist. The state government of Tasmania which is supportive of new ideas and innovation originally provided AUS $20,000 and followed it up with a further AUS $130,000. And last year Fisher and Davenport’s company received an AUS $500,000 grant related to climate change.

A Lengthy Journey

One aspect of the inventing business that has taken up more time than they thought is the approval process. The plumbing industry is very regulated, you can’t just plop a product in the system without the appropriate certifications, and in Australia Fisher and Davenport had to write the new standards and then have them approved.

Orders are now coming in thick and fast; the first four hundred are almost ready to be shipped out and demand for Drainwave is increasing as word gets out. And though both are happy with their overall progress Fisher contends that the four-year process had a number of surprises for them.

“It’s taken far longer than I thought it would by about double the amount of time. There has been a lot of frustrations along the way and I suppose the biggest surprise for us and the biggest frustration and also the biggest learning curve was realizing we had to write regulatory documents to get it approved.”

Huge Market

Water saving is now a critical concern in many countries and as Fisher points out it is not a lifestyle decision to flush a toilet, you have to do it. And as toilets reduce their flush volumes the need for something like Drainwave to prevent blocked systems becomes ever apparent. This means that the potential market is huge. Fisher contends that in Australia alone it could be up to 160,000 units a year and that any first world country with a gravity ball water system is a possible market.

[NEXT STORY]Article by: Paul Arnold

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