What To Look For In A Water Ionizer
by Boel Stoddard
Shopping for a water ionizer can get more than a little overwhelming. There are so many claims and counter-claims on the internet. For example, you will find so called “ionizer review sites” and “consumer guides” that look very legitimate at first glance, giving the impression of being 3rd party, independent reviews, yet a little research quickly reveals that these sites are nothing more than a marketing tool used by distributors trying to persuade you to buy the particular brand or brands they represent. So, how do you know who to trust, and what information do you need to make an intelligent decision?
Before I bought my machine I did a lot of research because I wanted to be sure that I was getting the very best, and I also wanted to know that I was not paying more than I had to. Here is what I found out, and I hope it will be of help to you, because once you know what to look for when shopping for an ionizer, the task becomes much easier.
I will tell you right up front that my own research led me to purchase a machine from Enagic; that I am now a happy owner of a Kangen™ machine, so happy in fact, that I am now an active distributor for Enagic. As I searched the internet, I quickly noticed how common it is for other brands to compare themselves to Enagic. They claim to ‘be the same as’, but for a much lower price. I asked myself why this would be so. I figured that if others kept comparing themselves to their top of the line Kangen machine, it must mean that Enagic was setting the industry standard. So what remained was to find out if the lower-cost machines indeed measured up in a true comparison.
Enagic’s Kangen™ SD501 uses seven 4.75″ X 7″ solid 100% titanium plates, coated with medical grade platinum, and it uses 230 watts of power, because this size and number of plates and this level of power is what is necessary to transfer enough electricity into the water to accomplish the following:
• Fractionation (splitting the water into its acid and alkaline components)
• Micro-structuring (making the water hexagonal)
• Ionization (giving the water a negative oxidation reduction potential [-ORP])
The more stable the water is, the longer it will hold it’s properties after you first draw it, and sufficient plate size and power is required to create STABLE hexagonal water that is medically effective. Enagic’s machine is a registered medical device in Japan, and used in hospitals there.
Important things to find out about any Ionizer you are looking at:
• Plate size and type (mesh, slotted, “holed” or solid)
• Plate material and quality (is it 100% titanium, medical grade platinum etc.)
• Power
• Type of power supply
• Warranty
Lets start with the ionizing plates. This is very important. Most plates will be either mesh or solid. Unfortunately, we also have a gray area in that some manufacturers call their plates “solid”, when in actuality the plates are slotted or “holed”.
The first thing I easily ruled out was mesh plates. You do not want mesh plates in your ionizer, for the following reasons:
• First, to plate metal mesh with platinum evenly is a real challenge, given the nature of mesh. The reason for the use of mesh, despite claims to the contrary, is not to increase surface area, but to decrease manufacturing costs. Platinum at around $1,000 to $1,500/ounce and is by far the most expensive part of any water ionizer. Companies that try to compete on price must obviously keep their manufacturing costs down, and using mesh plates is one way to do this, as it requires much less platinum.
- When platinum is used sparingly, the result is an inconsistent and thin layer on the plates. Over time, because of the effects of flowing water, mesh will slowly lose its effectiveness, and will no longer be able to produce ionized water with the properties mentioned earlier.
- As the photos of decayed electrolysis plates below demonstrate, water passing over the open architecture and exposed joints of the thin, porous mesh plates causes severe deterioration.
Mesh plates that have decayed after a few months of use
Plate quality and power capacity
Micro-structuring of water is the key property that allows the water to penetrate the cells of the body providing hydration and acid waste elimination. It is even more important than the alkalinity of the water. In order to achieve micro-clustering, enough energy must be introduced into the water to change the angle at which the hydrogen atoms attach to the oxygen atom. That takes a lot of energy.
As mentioned above, the Enagic Kangen™ SD501 uses 230 Watts of power, transferred through seven solid platinum-coated titanium plates in order to accomplish micro-structuring and the creation of stable alkaline ionized water. The other machines simply do not use enough power — in fact, they cannot, as their smaller plates lack sufficient mass and would melt at 230 watts of continuos power. Do not be deceived by companies that state they use 280 watts (Tyent), when you look closer you will find that they use SMPS (see below) making the actual average power MUCH lower.
The thickness of the plates as well as the quality of the metals is important. Enagic uses 100% medical grade titanium and high grade, micro-plated platinum. Competing machines use 70% Titanium (with Aluminum, Nickel, Chromium and Copper).
It can sometimes seem difficult to discern the true size, thickness and quality of the plates, but these aspects are revealed by the amount of power used and the type of power supply used. If the machine you are looking at states it uses 200 watts or more, you need to find out whether the machine uses a transformer or switched mode power supply (SMPS). This is crucial, because if the ionizer you are looking at uses SMPS technology, this is a sure sign that the plates are NOT of the size or quality to sustain continuous power of 200 watts or more. You will find some sites using terms like “Turbo” charge, “pulsed power” or just “SMS”, to describe SMPS.
Here is a quote from one website, promoting SMPS as an advantage:
LIFE Ionizers™ are powered by the most advanced power supply available today—the same kind of power supply used to preserve the longevity of delicate electronic equipment such as HDTV. This advanced system is known as switched-mode power supply (SMPS). Unlike a standard power transformer, SMPS regulates voltage by turning the flow of electricity on and off at an extremely fast rate. With a standard transformer, the power is always flowing. When it flows too high, it is absorbed by a “pass” power transistor. A SMPS regulator rapidly switches a power transistor between saturation (full on) and cut off (completely off). The flow of electricity is an average between full on and completely off. As a result, the power transistor does not have to dissipate excess power. Since the power supply is at “full off” about half the time, an SMPS consumes much less power and generates less heat than a traditional transformer does. The steady supply also causes less wear and tear on delicate electronic components. As a result, your LIFE Ionizer™ lasts longer and uses less power than competing equipment.
What does this mean?
It means this ionizer will operate at an average of very low wattage. Life Ionizers™ state that their top of the line model runs at 33 to 208 watts. Given the quote above: “the power supply is at “full off” about half the time, you can see that this machine will not be able to produce potent and stable water, because it does not use sufficient power to do that.
SMPS is used in flat-screen TVs, you will not see it in ionizers that are approved medical devices, like Enagic’s. Calculating very generously, the average power output for the top of the line Life Ionizer™ will be 120 watts at best, and most likely quite a bit lower. They are telling you right there that their ionizer “uses less power than competing equipment”.
As stated above, in order to create stable, potent hexagonal water, you need a lot of power, and this is why the Kangen™ SD501 uses 7 large solid plates and 230 watts of power. A machine that uses 80 watts or 120 watts of energy, or SMPS transformer technology, cannot transform pentagonal water into a stable hexagonal liquid crystalline structure the way a non-SMPS 230 watt machine can. This is simply a fact of physics.
Another quote, this one from Tyent:
On their product features they claim “Largest Plate Surface in the Industry”, and “Most Power in the Industry”. If you go a little deeper and find their product specification page, you find this:
Quote from Tyent site:
“Adoption of seven electrodes made of dream material, platinum and holed titanium.
The use of new materials of platinum and titanium for the electrodes of the electrolytic tank, the core part of the reduction water appliance, extends its life span and heightens the ratio of generating hydrogen.”
“The first automatically controllable SMS method power supplier in the industry
The power provided to each part is monitored at the CPU chip and is safely supplied to maintain the safe use of the function of the product.”
Armed with what you have learned so far, you should already be able to see that this is not a product that will produce potent and stable hexagonal water. Note the terminology: “holed plates” (this is a new term, but clearly not the same as solid plates) and they use the term Switch Mode Supply, just calling it SMS instead of SMPS. As for the above mentioned Tyent “dream material”, by definition, dream material defies proper analysis in this context.
The above are only two examples of manufacturers who promote SMPS and over-heat protection shut-off as an advantage, when in reality SMPS is used because the inferior plates in the machine cannot withstand continuous power of 230 watts, so the overheat shut-down mechanism is there to protect the plates from melting down. The reason for a manufacturer to use SMPS is not to provide better quality for the consumer, it is to be able to use smaller or thinner plates to lower manufacturing costs.
Enagic’s Ionizers do not shut down from overheating because they don’t overheat in the first place. Enagic’s Ionizers have twice the flow rate of the nearest competitors.
Warranty:
The Kangen™ SD501 comes with a full 5 year warranty. Many companies claim to have a full 5 year warranty, while their warranties are either limited or have a number of exclusions, such as limits to the amount of water produced per day.
Always look at the details of the warranty offered:
• Hard Water is a concern with ionizers, and several competitors go so far as voiding the warranty when the machine is used in a hard water area.
For example:
• In the case of Jupiter and Life, their limited warranty is VOIDED if used in hard water areas. That is an area greater than half of the United States.
All ionizers do face this issue of buildup on the plates from hard water. Enagic has addressed this problem. In addition to a regular self-cleaning feature, Enagic offers
a 100% natural citrus acid cleaning cartridge (The E-cleaner) which will clean and remove the build up of calcium off of the platinum/titanium plates. Do not overlook the importance of this feature. Regular cleaning is a huge benefit of all of Enagic’s water ionizers, one that extends the life of the machine for many years to come. Other ionizers do not have this capability.
In the event that very hard water still causes a problem with prolonged use, Enagic will deep clean the electrolysis chamber for $40. Compare this to the competition: they do not offer deep cleaning, and some of the competitors charges upwards of $800 to replace their chambers.
There are no daily, weekly, monthly or yearly limits set as to the amount of water that can be produced from Enagic’s Kangen Water™ machines. You can produce great volumes of water, and the water will be stable enough to allow you to share the water outside of your household. For example, Dr. Dave Carpenter gives away an average of 500 gallons a day to his patients, from his SD 501.
• In the case of Life Ionizers™, they have recently changed their warranty and now reads, ” ALL MACHINES THAT ARE USED FOR HIGH VOLUME APPLICATIONS SUCH AS WEIGHT LOSS/ FITNESS, ETC…WILL VOID THEIR WARRANTY.” How many gallons is considered “High Volume”? Prior to this change, their warranty read, “THE WARRANTY IS VOID IF MORE THAN 2.5 GALLONS / DAY ARE PRODUCED”.
The warranty language is not published on websites, you will not see it until you receive your machine. I recommend that you call and ask the seller to provide you all the details of their warranty before you make your purchase.
Results:
The bottom line is results. I have seen other people buy a Life Ionizer™ (and other competing machines as well) because they wanted to save money. They were getting great results with water given to them, water that was produced by the Kangen™ machine, and figured one ionizer is as good as the next. Unfortunately, after receiving their lower cost machine, the health issues that had improved for them while drinking the Kangen Water™ began to reoccur.
Kangen™ machines are marketed by having happy, satisfied customers refer others to buy the machine. The competition markets by attracting people who have used or heard of Kangen™, and then they claim to offer “the same” — for less money. Enagic offers lower cost machines – the difference is they don’t claim that they are “the same” as the top of the line model. If price is the most important factor, consider that you can get the Sunus for $1,280.00. You still get a great little machine, with the capability of using the cleaning cartridge. If you want true strong acid and strong alkaline water, then consider the Junior, for $2,280.00. This machine still outperforms the competition, though you will not be able to share water outside of your own household, as you can with the SD 501, because the water produced is not sufficiently stable for that purpose.
A friend of mine talked to a rep for one of the competing companies who said (this is an approximate quote) “Those Enagic reps are doing a great job – they are out there giving their water away, educating people, holding meetings, really getting people aware of the potential health benefits of ionized water. Then people go on the Internet and buy ours because it is half the price.” The rep was proud of it, and even said that if they could market theirs the same way as Enagic they would. But they know they cannot.
The competing companies cannot market successfully by giving water away, because people don’t see results with those machines the way they do with Kangen Water™.
I found when I was shopping for an ionizer, that there is no other machine out there that offers what the Kangen™ SD501 has to offer. The Enagic ionizers have a minimum life expectancy of 15 years and possibly long beyond. This is based on engineering and results.
Enagic Return Policy
You may see competitors claim that Enagic has a 3 day return policy. Kangen™ offers a 30 day return policy with a 10% restock fee for the SD 501, where most of the competition charges a 15% to 20% restock fee. Enagic does in fact also offer a 100% “buyers remorse” refund within 3 days for unused machines (as required by Federal law).
Some companies are very particular about having to have their machine returned in original packaging, I know of one person who tried to return a Life machine within the return period, and they refused it because it did not have the original packaging.
Below is the language in the actual Kangen™ return policy:
1.A full refund minus shipping fees will be granted only if a machine is returned both
unused and within 7 days of receipt*.
2. A restocking fee of $100 will be charged when:
➡ A machine is returned used (water runs through the machine even once) within
7 days of receipt.
➡ A new machine is returned after 7 days but before 1 month after receipt.
3. A used machine returned after 7 days but before 1 month of receipt will be charged a
processing fee (in lieu of a restocking fee) as follows:
| MODEL | SD501 | DXII | JRII | ANESPA | SUNUS | SUPER 501 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PROCESSING FEE | $380 | $310 | $310 | $320 | $200 | $700 |
4. A machine in any condition may NOT be returned for a refund after 1 month
following receipt.
➡ In the event of financing, the buyer is accepting the responsibility to fulfill their
monthly payment obligations in totality if the machine is not returned within
the 1 month return period.
5. Shipping fees are never subject to a refund. Installment charges are refunded on a
prorated basis.
6. It is the owner’s responsibility to pack the machine in safe, secure condition.
* Receipt refers to the date of pickup or date of signed delivery of the machine. Days are
counted from that date (day of receipt), not the purchase date of the machine.
Now that you know what to look for in a good ionizer, you can apply the facts in this article to any unit on the market.
Still have questions? Please feel free to contact me!
If you enjoy this article, you may share it, as long as you include the information and link below:
Boel Stoddard
(888) 551-6982 (503) 682-4553
www.kangenwatermachine.info
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