Within every sensory room, the sensory equipment plays a vital role in creating engaging, supportive environments for individuals across a range of sensory processing needs and abilities. Whether in schools, care homes or your own home, ensuring that sensory equipment remains in top condition is essential for safety, longevity, and overall effectiveness.
In this guide, we’ll outline some key maintenance steps for keeping your sensory equipment in excellent condition, and highlight the importance of ensuring that maintenance is carried out in the correct way, to prevent further issues and ensure longevity of your equipment.
Regular Cleaning and Hygiene Practices
Sensory rooms and their equipment are used frequently by multiple users, therefore cleanliness is important in providing a safe, accessible space for all. Regular cleaning not only helps maintain the hygiene levels for users, but the aesthetics of the space too.
How can you maintain regular cleaning and hygiene practices?
Although it is recommended for professional maintenance of your sensory equipment, there are several practices that you can carry out yourself to maintain effective performance and visuals.
Bubble Tubes and Bubble Screens
Bubble tubes and bubble screens are recommended to have the water emptied, refilled and treated every 6-8 weeks to prevent bacterial growth (algae) and ensure smooth bubble flow. Typically within schools, this is done outside of term time whilst the room is not in use.
When carrying out the refill, you can use either de-ionised water or regular tap water as a preventative measure to discourage algae growth. When treating, it is recommended to use BCB treatment fluid.
Although the 6-8 week period is recommended, you can easily tell when a bubble tube or bubble screen requires a refill/treatment, as green algae can appear, or product function may alter with algae blocking the pump.
For easy use, our bubble tubes and bubble screens have an emptying valve which provides an efficient way of emptying, which most providers don’t.
Water Beds
Typically with water beds, unlike the water based tubes and screens, these products don’t need to be re-filled. However, you can add conditioner to the water to prevent the growth of bacteria / algae.
This is something that can be carried out yourself, however it is recommended to get a professional maintenance person to carry this out due to the complex method of gaining access.
Soft Play Furnishings and Soft Padding
Soft Play Areas, furnishings and padding are easy to wipe down and maintain, with items such as soft padding, mats, and ball pits requiring simple antibacterial wipes / general detergents to remove any surface level dirt or marks.
However, with this in mind, it is still advisable to avoid items such as pens (especially biros and markers) that are commonly found to make irreversible marks. Encouraging users to also remove their shoes (when possible) is helpful in avoiding markings such as rubber from the soles or dirt from outside.
With made-to-order items such as soft furnishings and padding, the importance of regular cleaning will be cost effective in the long-run and prevent the need for a full replacement.
Interactive Panels and Switches
Interactive panels and switches come into frequent contact, so it’s important to clean them regularly to prevent buildup from hands and fingers, ensuring responsiveness and good hygiene.
Similar to the above, providing a simple wipe over antibacterial wipes / general detergents between room uses is sufficient enough to maintain cleanliness and the appearance of the items.
Routine Equipment Checks
To ensure all the equipment and features continue working correctly, conducting regular inspections helps identify potential issues before they result in any costly repairs or replacements.
Generally, in most cases, you can recognise if a piece of equipment isn’t performing at its regular capacity from visual and auditory signs. Such as changes in lighting and projections or intermittent sound frequencies.
If you suspect any faults to your sensory equipment, it is recommended to seek professional help, in order to receive the correct guidance and effective fixes. Although sometimes it may seem like a quick fix to attempt to rectify equipment errors yourself, there is a risk that this can cause further damage in the long-run. This is why we have a maintenance service, where our experienced engineers can provide both onsite call-outs, regular servicing and remote support.
Our Professional Servicing & Repairs
At Sensory Technology, we have extensive expert experience in designing and maintaining sensory rooms and equipment. Our team provides tailored servicing, ensuring that every piece of equipment functions optimally and meets safety regulations.
Our service plans are available across several levels which include a selection of varying visits, callouts, assistance and more. The key benefit to a professional maintenance plan is the peace-of-mind that should any issue arise, an experienced engineer is on hand to assess, advise and repair. Here’s a few features included within the plan itself:
- Between 1 – 3 maintenance visits, depending on the level of plan taken out.
- A functionality test of all sensory products at every visit, including electronics.
- Up to 2 Fault Call-Out Visits per year, depending on the level of plan taken out.
- A thorough inspection and clean of products, including lenses and fans.
- Empty, clean and refill of bubble tubes and bubble screens.
- Both onsite and remote assistance
For those who don’t have the capacity to commit to a plan, we are still here to help with any individual call-outs or service requests.
Not Bought From Us? We Can Still Help!
Sensory Technology has a wide experience of working with many manufacturers of sensory equipment. Even if your original sensory equipment has not been provided by ourselves, our highly trained electrical and electronic engineers are committed to providing you with a sensory maintenance solution for all ranges of equipment.
Whether you’re looking to maintain an interactive room, a sensory garden, or a custom-built bubble screen, our servicing solutions ensure that your equipment continues to provide a fully immersive and engaging experience for all users.
Get in touch with us today to get started!
