Air blast water coolers

Many industries still rely on mains water supplies to fulfill their cooling requirements. However, this has become increasingly impractical and expensive; water metering, effluent charges and a need to be independent from disruptions to mains supplies by drought make the purchase of an industrial cooling system an essential, attractive and economical proposition. Air blast water coolers otherwise known as dry air coolers are the most cost effective way of cooling process water. Some companies have recently started to refer to them as “free cooling”; this is a little misleading as they incur both capital costs and ongoing electricity charges – however, they do bring significant savings in ongoing running costs. Let us explain how. Although the cost of a dry air cooler can be greater than evaporative cooling towers, the maintenance costs are minimal. Evaporative cooling towers have a legal requirement to be cleaned twice per year which puts the system out of use while it is cleaned, as well as requiring expensive chemical treatment used to prevent legionella within the water plus ongoing system monitoring requirements. Dry air coolers have no such requirements leaving them in operation all year round and not incurring costly maintenance. Dry air coolers are able to cool water to within 3°C of ambient, but it should be noted when designing or specifying those units that the greater the approach temperatures (difference between ambient and water that is being cooled temperature) the more economical they become. Air blast coolers have an added advantage over open circuit cooling towers in that the water is contained within a sealed system, does not come into contact with air borne containments and so remains clean. All contact surfaces within F&R’s air blast coolers are non ferrous so providing the external pipework is also of non ferrous material, the water will remain clean and uncontaminated. F&R Products are able to supply dry air coolers as a boxed unit, one assembly supplied with heat exchanger, pump, tank and all necessary controls or as a free standing heat exchanger, fan and motor assembly with pumps, tanks etc., being supplied separately by the supplier or end user. F&R Products range of boxed air blast coolers can be supplied in various sizes from 1.5kW up to 200kW for a variety of small commercial through to major industrial applications. Boxed coolers start with just a pump but can have many options depending on the complexity of the project. These include:- * Tanks * Electrical controls * Pressure gauges * Temperature gauges * Level switches * Manual or auto filling options * Flow switches * Emergency mains water supply * Thermostats for temperature control * Frost protection systems * Pressure relief valves The free standing air blast coolers can be supplied with horizontal or vertical air flow with the heat exchangers on the larger units formed into a ‘V’ formation to reduce their footprint. All models are efficient, economical and easy to operate with special attention having been given to their design to achieve optimum thermal efficiency as well as allowing for low noise and low energy criteria to be met. Duties range from 10kW to 1000s of kW. F&R Products are able to provide many options for this range also including fan stage control, fan speed control, a variety of materials of construction including stainless steel and all copper, plus a variety of pump and tank systems to suit specific customers’ requirements. A further option is slow speed fans to give low noise levels. All dry air coolers can be configured as a pressurised system of up to 15 bar or be fitted with open tanks. Whilst dry air coolers will only cool water to within 3°C of ambient, there is a further option which allows this form of cooling to achieve water off (water leaving the system) temperatures as low as to within 5°C of wet bulb ambients. This is known as an a

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