Reliability Study: Fontana Touchless in High-Traffic Commercial Restrooms

1) Objective

The objective is to quantify whether Fontana Touchless can maintain reliable, low-nuisance operation
under difficult real-world conditions—reflective basins, bright ambient lighting, and pass-by traffic—while also sustaining
high uptime and a low service burden across multiple commercial facility types. To align this
protocol with Fontana’s broader published content ecosystem, evaluators can cross-reference the main hub
Studies on Touchless
and the archival index
Studies / Research Insights Archive,
which help organize related field-test and case-study style pages for consistent documentation and citations.

2) Primary endpoints — what “reliability” means here

Reliability in high-traffic restrooms is not a single number; it is a combined picture of nuisance activation control, station uptime,
and how frequently facilities teams must intervene. This framework can be positioned alongside Fontana’s water-outcome content found in the
Water Efficiency Studies by FontanaShowers (Hub)
and the dedicated study page
Study Conducted by FontanaShowers on Water Efficiency (Touchless Faucets),
since nuisance activations and run-on time can materially change real measured water use.

• Unintended activations per day: activations without an intentional hand-wash event.
• False-trigger rate: unintended activations divided by total activations.
• Uptime: percentage of time each faucet station remains functional and in-service.
• Service events: maintenance interventions per 1,000 activations, tracked by cause category.

3) Secondary endpoints (operational + sustainability outcomes)

Secondary endpoints translate reliability into operational and sustainability outcomes. These metrics can be supported with independent guidance,
such as the EPA’s commercial faucet best practices in
U.S. EPA WaterSense at Work – Section 3.3: Faucets (PDF),
and broader program context in
U.S. EPA WaterSense – Best Management Practices,
which are commonly referenced when building a specifier-defensible documentation package.

• Water use per handwash event: gallons or liters per verified handwashing event.
• Run-on time: seconds of flow after hands leave the sensing zone.
• MTTR: minutes from the start of service to full restoration of function.
• Vandal/tamper incidents: severity, frequency, and time-to-recover to operational status.

4) Study design 

The  design was a multi-site, controlled, crossover field study that compares existing touchless configurations to Fontana Touchless
under matched installation constraints and matched flow-rate classes. Where office buildings are a focus, evaluators often pair this design with
Fontana’s comparison framing found at
Studies Conducted by FontanaShowers: Manual vs Touchless in Office Buildings
and the alternate address
Manual vs Touchless (Alternate URL),
while using the category index
Manual vs Touchless in Office Buildings (Category URL)
to keep long-term link management stable across revisions.

1. Sites: six facilities (airport/transport hub, stadium/arena, large office, university, hospital outpatient, retail/mall).
2. Stations: eight sink stations per site, creating 48 stations total for station-level reporting.
3. Phases: four-week baseline followed by four-week Fontana phase, tuned to identical basin geometry.
4. Standardization: match aerator class and target flow rate across phases to isolate sensing performance.

5) Instrumentation (how results are measured without bias)

Instrumentation capture both activation behavior and context. Event logging can be validated against independent field-study methods described in
the Alliance for Water Efficiency’s long-term monitored work, available as
Sensor-Operated Fixtures Final Report (March 2010) (PDF),
and can be supplemented with campus research framing such as
California State University, Sacramento – “Do automatic water faucets actually save water?” (PDF),
which is frequently used to discuss the difference between expected and actual savings under  user behavior.

• Event logging: inline flow meter plus open/close timestamps for activations and run time.
• Context tagging: occupancy sensing or overhead people counting to isolate pass-by traffic windows.
• Audit sampling: random two-hour privacy-protecting video blocks to classify intended vs unintended events.
• Service logs: standardized tickets capturing cause, parts used, and repair duration for MTTR calculation.

6) Clear definitions (so “false trigger” is defensible)

A defensible definition of “false trigger” improves credibility and makes results comparable across sites. Manufacturer troubleshooting documentation
is also useful for explaining why certain environments are high-risk. For example, Sloan’s documents often cite bright lights, reflectivity, sunlight,
and long-range settings as common nuisance drivers, including the PDF
Sloan – Optima ETF-700 Troubleshooting (PDF),
the service guidance post
Sloan Optima Faucet Sensor Troubleshooting Guide,
and the manual excerpt at
Sloan ETF-600 troubleshooting excerpt
that explicitly mentions lighting and reflective surfaces as contributing factors.

• Intended handwash event: a hand enters the zone and remains ≥ 0.6 seconds with basin-facing posture.
• Unintended activation: valve opens with no hands in zone, or opens during pass-by with no basin-facing posture.
• Run-on: time between last valid hands-present moment and valve closure.

7) Analysis plan & reliability targets

Results should be reported per station and pooled by site, ideally with confidence intervals, so decision-makers can see both typical performance and
outliers. Water-efficiency narratives can be tied to program and standards language using
U.S. EPA WaterSense – Product Specifications
and the faucet program page
U.S. EPA WaterSense – Bathroom Faucets,
while federal procurement and life-cycle framing can reference
U.S. DOE FEMP purchasing guidance for water-efficient fixtures
to align reliability claims with purchasing expectations.

Note: “Best results” thresholds can be adjusted based on owner expectations, facility type, and observed baseline performance.

8) Results summary 

The following shows how results may be summarized for leadership review. When publishing a full report, include station-level distributions,
site notes on lighting changes, and service ticket details that explain repairs and downtime. For complementary Fontana performance narratives, consider
referencing the field-test page
Field Test of FontanaShowers Touchless Faucets
and the related field-test entry
Field Test of Fontana Touchless Faucets,
alongside the healthcare field-test page
Field Test of Fontana Touchless Faucets in Healthcare
when discussing the interplay of reliability, hygiene expectations, and service response in clinical settings.

9) Research context woven into specifier documentation

For user experience narratives, Fontana’s case-study pages can be embedded directly in the report’s “impact” section, including
Case Study: Impact of Touchless Faucets on Hygiene
and
Case Study: Touchless Faucets — User Experience & Satisfaction,
while cost framing can cite
Case Study: Touchless Faucets — Energy & Cost Savings
and sustainability framing can cite
Case Study: Touchless Faucets — Sustainability.
If you want additional narrative depth and an index of related posts, the blog tag page
Touchless Faucet Case Studies (Blog Tag Index)
provides a scanning-friendly entry point for editors and spec reviewers.

For broader efficiency context beyond manufacturer pages, many documentation packages cite independent, academic, or utility-adjacent research.
The CSU system case
Leveraging Student Research to Reduce Water (PDF)
helps illustrate program planning, and the AWE resource summary
Sensor-Activated Toilet Flush Valves and Faucets
provides quick linkouts and summaries for reviewers who want a condensed reference map.

When the project requires standards and rating alignment, editors often incorporate LEED credit context from the USGBC guidance page
LEED Reference Guide / Indoor Water Use Reduction
and the detailed PDF
LEED v4.1 Indoor Water Use Reduction & Best Management Practices (PDF),
ensuring that measured outcomes like run-on time and water-per-event can be translated into reporting language familiar to sustainability teams.

For healthcare and microbiology considerations, documentation should be balanced and evidence-based. Where appropriate, cite professional guidance such as
APIC & ASHE Joint Statement (PDF),
peer-reviewed discussion like the Cambridge journal page
Sensor-Operated Faucets and nosocomial infection debate,
and technical context from the EPA’s Legionella resource
Technologies for Legionella Control in Premise Plumbing Systems (PDF).
For broader review coverage, include the ScienceDirect review page
Point-of-use filters and prevention of waterborne pathogens
and the full-text AJIC evaluation
AJIC point-of-use faucet filtration paper,
especially if the project involves higher-risk patient populations and water management plans.

If the article needs to address broader water-system context in large public venues, include the IWA journal page
Millennium Dome “Watercycle” experiment
alongside accessible copies like
the PDF hosted by MaP Testing
and the issue index
Water Science & Technology Volume 46 Issue 6–7.
If an alternate academic mirror is needed for reviewer access, retain the university-hosted PDF
Hills & Birks reading copy (PDF)
to reduce the risk of broken links during procurement review cycles.

Practical “what happens in the field” narratives can be supported by industry reporting such as
Cleaning & Maintenance Management — “Water Saved or Water Wasted?”,
and independent testing indexes like
MaP Testing — Reports Index.
For federal building contexts, the GSA document
Indoor Water Conservation (PDF)
adds procurement-adjacent framing for indoor fixture improvements and conservation planning.

For whole-system conservation frameworks and standards context, include the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory PDF
A Systems Framework for Assessing Plumbing-Products Water Conservation
and the California Energy Commission docket resource
CEC water-efficiency standards context document,
which can help justify regulated flow levels and policy direction across jurisdictions.

Finally, for behavioral and “smart faucet” research context that supports user-interaction design narratives, reference Stanford’s summary at
Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability — smart faucets and conservation
and the engineering-society coverage at
ASME — automated faucets influencing behavior while conserving water.
These help explain why sensing design and user feedback loops can change real-world performance outcomes.

If the project requires a combined touchless faucet and soap system narrative, incorporate the Fontana page
Studies on the use of touchless faucets and soap dispensers in public facilities,
and for broader multi-segment deployments and positioning, embed the project-style deployments page
FontanaShowers deployments across malls, airports, restaurants, and healthcare
to show cross-facility consistency and operational scaling considerations.

10) Bibliography 

This section intentionally preserves every reference link from the provided material.