In some restaurants, filters are forgotten until the ice machine stops making ice or the combi oven displays a “Scale Build-Up” error. Read on to learn what really happens when you treat your filters as an afterthought — between the explosive belly aches and financial loss, we’re betting you will never forgo proper filter maintenance ever again.
Bacteria, Parasites, and Viruses
When your filter isn’t maintained according to manufacture specifications, you’re welcoming in pathogens that thrive in the warm, damp internal architecture of your equipment. Next, we outline the most common unwanted guests.
Bacteria
The first category of unwanted guests is bacteria, which quickly begin to multiply exponentially. Here are the types you’d most likely attract as well as the risks they pose to the human body.
Legionella
Legionella bacteria love the warm water found in the reservoirs of steamers and combi ovens and thrives on neglect. In a human, they hijack the white blood cells meant to kill them and turn them into incubators to clone themselves. The infected person’s lungs fill with a slurry of fluid, dead white blood cells, and cellular debris. The lungs become heavy and soggy and oxygen can no longer pass through.
The infected individual will experience a massive amount of watery diarrhea and nausea as well as kidney and liver failure. They’ll also have to contend with being severely confused and may even hallucinate, as oxygen levels plummet and the infection attacks the central nervous system.
This person will essentially drown from the inside out in bacteria and their own immune system’s waste. Not worth the risk.
Pseudomonas Aeruginosa
If you see a green or brownish tint on the plastic components of your ice maker or notice a sickly-sweet odor similar to rotting grapes or corn tortillas, you are likely looking at Pseudomonas, bacteria that liquidizes people from within.
In a human, Pseudomonas aeruginosa secretes a thick, sugary sludge called alginate, which creates a protective shield that smothers cells. Then, enzymes dissolve the proteins and elastin that hold our lungs, skin, and eyes together, turning solid tissue into a runny, necrotic soup. Eventually, the infected person develops skin lesions where the center turns black and dies, creating sunken, crusty pits of rotting flesh.
If it reaches the eyes, it can dissolve your corneas and cause total blindness in as little as 24 hours. You are essentially being digested alive by bacterial waste products. Best to avoid this one.
Parasites
Parasites live in or on another organism in order to obtain nutrients, grow, and multiply. Filters are designed to catch the cysts that encase the parasite. If a filter is bypassed or becomes saturated, these cysts pass directly into your ice and cooking water.
Cryptosporidium
Cryptosporidium is resistant to chlorine. Once ingested, the cyst breaks open in the small intestine and releases sporozoites that burrow into the intestinal wall. Then, they begin reproducing inside the host body. This results in life-altering explosive diarrhea that can last for weeks. The output of watery, foul-smelling stool can reach up to four whole gallons, per day. We wouldn’t want to clean up that mess!
Giardia Duodenalis
When Giardia duodenalis enters an individual, the parasites use large ventral sucking disks to attach themselves to the intestinal lining which interferes with the body’s ability to absorb fats and nutrients. This leads to room-clearing, foul-smelling gas, greasy stools, and intense abdominal cramping. At this point, the infected person is a pressurized tank of fermenting grease and sulfur gas, leaking foul-smelling oil. Not ideal.
Viruses
Filters act as collection points for viruses. An old, brittle filter is essentially a wide open door for two viruses you do not want to contract.
Norovirus
A clogged filter harbors this pathogen and when it enters a human, it initiates an aggressive and violent takeover, turning the person into a pressurized bag of waste.
Norovirus arrives in the small intestine and immediately begins hijacking the lining. Because the damaged intestines can no longer absorb fluids, the body becomes a pressurized vessel of liquid waste. In a desperate purging effort, the victim experiences a series of involuntary, high-intensity muscle spasms that result in projectile vomiting and hyperactive bowels. It’s just torture.
Hepatitis A
While often associated with poor handwashing, waterborne transmission through contaminated ice is possible.
Hepatitis A attacks the liver in a slow-motion demolition. This attack triggers an immune response so aggressive that the body essentially begins to digest its own liver. The liver swells against the ribs, creating a dull, throbbing ache and agonizing itching as the body is poisoned from the inside out, all because a mechanical filter was left to fester with microscopic filth.
Equipment Damage
Now that we’ve established the microscopic terrors poor filtration is bound to produce, it’s time for the financial part, which creates a different kind of mess.
Equipment like combi ovens, steamers, and ice machines are precision instruments with narrow internal plumbing designed for specific flow rates. When you let a filter expire, you are initiating a mechanical countdown toward total equipment failure.
Filters Prevent Mineral Accumulation
The destruction starts with dissolved solids like magnesium and calcium. As water heats up in a steamer or freezes in an ice maker, minerals drop out of the solution and anchor themselves to your pipes’ interiors. Scale buildup is relentless and as it accumulates, the internal diameter of the pipe constricts, making it much more narrow and less efficient. Because these internal lines are already narrow, it doesn’t take much to choke the flow.
Output Suffers First
A clogged filter affects your machine’s output. When flow rates drop due to a saturated filter or scaled-over lines, your 500-pound capacity ice machine, for example, starts underperforming. Suddenly, you are yielding 250 pounds a day, forcing your staff to make frantic runs to the grocery store for bagged ice during a Friday night rush. In a combi oven, restricted water flow prevents the unit from maintaining the exact humidity levels required for high-volume cooking, leading to uneven results and increased cook times.
Corrosion Is the Endgame
Efficiency is the first casualty, but corrosion is the permanent one. Filtration systems are designed to remove chlorine and chloramines, which are added to municipal water for sanitation. If these chemicals pass through an old filter, they become corrosive agents and eat away at the metal components inside your machines. For instance, you may see rust on ice cube cutters and pitted surfaces inside steamer cavities. At this point, unfortunately, no amount of descaling can reverse the structural damage.
Miss a Filter Change, Lose the Warranty
Manufacturers look for any reason to deny a claim and view water filtration as a non-negotiable condition of sale.
If a service technician opens your machine and finds scale buildup on the sensors, probes, or heating elements, your warranty is effectively void. You will pay full price for the service call, the parts, and the labor, all because the filter wasn’t swapped on schedule.
It’s Time to Look Inside
A well-maintained filtration system is the physical barrier that prevents equipment damage from occurring, and viruses, parasites, and bacteria from infecting staff and customers. If you haven’t seen the inside of your filter housing lately, you are likely serving more than just food and drinks.
