What should a water purifier that saves money without compromising the experience look like?
Life is composed of the daily necessities and the trivialities in careful budgeting, which constitute our actual beauty.
In terms of water usage, Chinese people always have their own requirements. They desire clean and reassuring water, hot water, and cost-effective solutions... Besides the traditional electric kettle for boiling water, more and more people are beginning to choose water purifiers to enhance the experience of domestic water use.
The water purifiers on the market range from tens of yuan to tens of thousands of yuan, with a significant gap. But how to choose requires a careful calculation of the "economic account". The actual cost of a water purifier not only depends on the price of the product itself, but also the cost of "consumables". And no matter how careful the calculation is, ensuring the living experience is the prerequisite.
Is there an optimal solution for the water purifier that can meet all requirements? For this, the Zeekr Laboratory has prepared four integrated hot and clean water machines of the mainstream brands on the market to attempt to solve the problem through evaluation.
The Economic Account of the Water Purifier
In terms of product types, water purifiers, especially RO pure water machines, basically achieve the filtration of impurities in water. But the cost of an RO water purifier should not only consider the price of the product itself, but also the comprehensive factors such as the later use cost and service life.
The "consumables" of the water purifier are often the major part of the actual cost. On various social media platforms, it is not uncommon to see users of water purifiers joking that they have taken on a "debt". Generally speaking, in order to ensure the water purification quality, the replacement cycle of the water purifier filter element is between half a year and one year, and the price of the RO membrane filter element with slightly better quality is generally several hundred yuan. Accumulated over time, it is also a considerable expense.
Where there is demand, there is supply. Many brands have launched water purifier products with long-lasting filter elements, claiming that their filter element lifespan is more than two or three years. The filter element lifespan of the four water heater products in this evaluation is basically between two and three years, and the highest is Joyoung Jingxiaore R5L, which claims that its filter element can be used for 6 years without replacement.
Extending the service life indeed reduces the use cost in a disguised way, but this cannot be at the expense of reducing the water purification experience. The question is, are these long-lasting filter elements reliable?
In order to find the answer, the Zeekr Laboratory designed a corresponding experiment based on the test standard of the national standard GB34914 - 2021. The specific test method is: using a water sample with a TDS value (that is, the total dissolved solids) of 1012 (twice the test standard), let the four water purifier devices work separately, observe and record the attenuation time of each water purifier, and simultaneously detect the TDS value of the effluent.
In terms of actual performance, as the mainstream products of the mainstream brands, except that the water purification flow of Midea MRC2879 is relatively small, the performance of several devices is basically the same, and they can maintain a removal rate of 90%. Especially Joyoung ReXiaojing R5L and Midea MRC2879 can even reach the standard of 94 - 96%.
After a 1000L water purification workload, some water purifiers have slightly attenuated. Midea MRC2879, which has a relatively small flow rate, remains at 95.8%, Joyoung Jingxiaore R5L slightly decreases and remains at about 94%, and the other water purifiers have dropped below 89%. In contrast, 1000L is approximately equal to the half - year drinking water volume of a three - person family. Although the water quality produced by the water purifier still meets the standard, the filter element has attenuated - in actual use, the time when the filter element shows obvious attenuation may be shorter than the marked standard.
Overall, if considering from multiple aspects such as water output flow, water purification capacity, and service life, Joyoung Jingxiaore R5L performs the best. And returning to the initial question, the reason why Joyoung Jingxiaore R5L performs well in the long - term effectiveness of the filter element is that it can "wash itself". Behind this technology is Joyoung's self - developed aerospace water purification technology. A background is that Joyoung is the research and development unit of the manned spaceflight space kitchen, and the specialized aerospace technology is applied to this Joyoung ReXiaojing R5L.
The reasons why the filter element decays and needs to be replaced are, on the one hand, that its filtering capacity will gradually weaken with the passage of time, and on the other hand, the filter element that has been used for a long time often adheres to many impurities, pollutants and bacteria, which will instead cause secondary pollution to the water quality.
According to public information, Joyoung's original intelligent high - pressure pulse filter element self - cleaning technology, through the water hammer pulse effect generated by the pressurized water flow, enables the water flow to quickly and repeatedly wash the filter element and pipeline. During the flushing process, dirt is "knocked" off like a hammer. Moreover, Joyoung has also optimized the grid channel design of the RO membrane to solve the dead angle problem, increased the anti - fouling membrane sheet to make the anti - fouling ability stronger, and combined with the directly "doubled" activated carbon fiber filter material, comprehensively improving the overall lifespan of the filter element.
In order to avoid errors caused by a single experiment, the Zeekr Laboratory sent several products to the more authoritative third - party testing institution Vkan Certification and Testing Co., Ltd. After testing with the same TDS standard and 1000L water volume, it can be seen that Joyoung's water purification flow and overall water purification output rate are relatively excellent.
The water purification technology and long - lasting filter element that can "go to space" are indeed reliable.
Water Usage, Health and Convenience are the Most Important
Friends who want to buy a water purifier or already have one at home may face a soul - searching question - is the water from the water purifier really clean?
As early as 2019, the "White Paper on Microbial Secondary Pollution of Water Purifiers" released by the National Household Electrical Appliance Industry Information Center showed that in the household sampling survey, the over - standard rate of ultrafiltration water purifiers was 50%, and the over - standard rate of reverse osmosis water purifiers also reached 18.8%.
The purpose of using a water purifier is to drink clean and healthy water. And how do the four products participating in the evaluation, which basically represent the first - line mainstream level of the current water purifier market, perform in this regard?
For this reason, the Zeekr Laboratory tested the antibacterial property of the faucets of several water purifiers - after the water purifier runs for a period of time to eliminate interference, the same concentration of E. coli water sample is sprayed multiple times at the faucet outlet. After 48 hours of standing, the microbial content at the outlet is compared.
It can be seen that the performance of the water purifiers is different. Among them, the performance of Joyoung Jingxiaore R5L is unexpectedly good. The reason behind this is that Joyoung has applied the zinc oxide whisker antibacterial material, a technological achievement of manned spaceflight, to the entire water pipeline including the faucet outlet.
The principle of this aerospace antibacterial is to use the zinc ions released by the zinc oxide whisker material to destroy the bacterial structure to achieve sterilization, and this process is repeated continuously, which can be called a "perpetual motion machine" for sterilization and disinfection. A report provided by the third - party testing institution Vkan Certification and Testing Co., Ltd. shows that after the water sample test of Joyoung's zinc oxide antibacterial outlet pipe, the total number of colonies is only 3cfu / mL, which is far lower than the 100cfu / ml required by the domestic drinking water standard.
It is worth mentioning that Joyoung has also added a zinc oxide activated carbon antibacterial layer to the filter element, combined with the搭载的 Pasteur circulation sterilization technology, to sterilize in the water purifier internally to ensure that the water flowing in the pipeline is also clean, creating a triple guarantee for sterilization.
Of course, in terms of the test results, the mainstream water purifier products are still guaranteed in terms of basic health and safety.
Returning to actual use, in most Chinese families' daily lives, hot water is an indispensable part. Currently, the mainstream water heaters basically have a hot water function, and the difference lies in the different ways of providing hot water, such as instant heating and heat storage. Therefore, being able to quickly produce hot water that can be used with confidence is an absolute "plus point" for the product power of the water purifier.
In order to test the level of these several water purifiers, the Zeekr Laboratory simulated three standard household scenarios of using hot water for making tea (2L), cooking hot pot (3L), and stewing meat (5L) for testing. Because Midea MRC2879 does not have a heating function, it does not participate in this test.
As the results show, Canature CDR2000F with an inner tank for water storage does have an advantage in the initial water output, but after the stored hot water is used up, it needs to be reheated, which takes a very long time. In the end, Joyoung is the fastest to complete the task overall.
Research data found that the reason why Joyoung is fast is that its developed instant heating technology 3.0, as the representative of Joyoung's aerospace clean and hot technology, this technology can achieve a truly meaningful "instant heating and drinking, instant hot water", and can also maintain a relatively high flow rate, which is commendable.
What are the Standards for a Good Water Purifier?
In the present era when people pay more and more attention to the health and safety of water usage, the necessity of water purifiers can be determined. But how should people choose a truly "good" water purifier? This may require careful consideration of the "basic qualities" of the product when making a choice.
The first step in choosing a water purifier, or the basic standard, is definitely the water purification capacity. On this aspect, the mainstream brand products can basically maintain a high level, which can be said to be very "competitive", among which there are also top students like Joyoung Jingxiaore R5L that have made efforts in antibacterial and safety aspects. Besides the basic performance of water purification, the economic account that needs to be carefully calculated is also the core standard that the general public families need to consider. After all, the filter element that costs several hundred yuan is also a cost. In this regard, products like Joyoung Jingxiaore R5L with long - lasting filter element capabilities are obviously more competitive.
In the actual test, Joyoung Jingxiaore R5L also has several memorable points in the operation experience. For example, the faucet is anti - greasy, which is really very friendly in the heavy - oil Chinese kitchen. Another example is the touch screen that can be operated with wet hands, which solves the trouble of having to dry hands first before operating, which is not available in other products.
