Feature: Enclosures


Industrial enclosure cooling – air vs liquid


By Karl Lycett – Rittal UK’s Product Manager for Climate Control


react well to high levels of moisture, dust or heat in the atmosphere. This sensitivity in turn affects plant efficiency and will ultimately lower output and profitability. But moisture, dust and heat don’t


A


need to be a concern if an effective climate control solution has been implemented for the equipment. The first step is to consider what constitutes suitable cooling to meet the needs, bearing in mind that it may change with any future alterations to applications within the facility. When choosing a cooling solution, it’s common for managers to default to


lmost without exception, industrial environments are hostile spaces for electrical equipment: their components don’t


air cooling with fans and filters, because it’s familiar. Whilst air cooling is a good solution, it also has limitations that must be understood before installing it, otherwise there’s a risk of problems down the line.


Air cooling Air cooling is relatively self-explanatory: it is achieved by passing outside, cooler air across the enclosure’s warmer internal components. Shortcomings appear if the outside air temperature (i.e., within the facility) exceeds the maximum allowable temperature (setpoint) within the enclosure – clearly, this way cooling won’t be possible. A good example is the summer


months, when a combination of machinery-generated heat and high ambient temperatures can cause severe temperature spikes within the factory,


42 July/August 2021 www.electronicsworld.co.uk


leading to overheating components and unexpected tripping of critical equipment. This, however, is only an issue if the factory is prone to surges in temperature. For many organisations, general HVAC is installed to ‘take the edge’ off the temperature, allowing air cooling to create a protective environment for the equipment inside the enclosures. Dust is a constant irritant within a


factory and realistically it can never be fully removed. Even ‘cleanest’ industrial space will have a base level of detritus in the air that will be drawn into the enclosures by their fans. This dust enters wire connections and internal component fans, over time causing havoc, by either preventing thermal exchange or blocking and shorting wiring connections.


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