Air cooled and water cooled chiller, what's the difference?
Air cooled or water cooled chiller, which is
suitable for my case? This is a question put in front of many people. Here we
will talk about the differences between them from these aspects: performance,
installation, maintenance and cost.
1. Performance
Air cooled industrial chiller is with
aluminum fin type condenser, which allows it to discharge the heat to the air. In
other words, the heat is removed by the ambient air.
Water cooled chiller is normally
with shell and tube condenser. The heat from the chiller is removed by water
that goes into and out from the condenser.
As we know, for a chiller, if you
can get lower condensing temperature, you can have better performance.
Actually, the difference of condensing temperature is the reason of different
performance between water cooled and air cooled chiller. In our daily life, if
we want to cool something, for example a glass of hot water, do you prefer
putting the glass in a container with cold water or put it in front of a fan?
The answer is easy, we prefer to cool object with water, as water has larger
specific heat value, and lower temperature than ambient air most of the time.
When it comes to chiller, the
common sense is still applicable. With water cooled condenser, water cooled
chiller can get lower condensing temperature than air cooled chiller.
Here comes the result, for same
model size, water cooled chiller has relevantly better performance than air
cooled chiller.
2. Installation
a. Location
Air cooled chiller needs an open
and drafty space, so the heat exhausted from it will not stay around. If the
hot air stay around, the performance will get lower and lower, even cause
shutdown of the chiller.
On the contrary, water cooled chiller has no strong requirement for ventilation, because its heat is
discharged by the water.
b. Dimension
Condenser size of air cooled chiller is large, as it needs larger heat transfer surface of aluminum fin, and
fans to make the air flow. While water cooled condenser can manage the same
heat transfer task with much smaller size.
The size of condenser decides
that dimension of air cooled chiller is bigger than water cooled chiller.
c. Piping
and connection
For an air cooled chiller, we
need to do the piping between chiller and the object to be cooled only. But for
a water cooled chiller, we need to do two more step, that is to install a
cooling tower, and connect the chiller condenser to cooling tower.
3. Maintenance
It is commonly known that chiller
performance will drop down without proper maintenance. Here we are talking
about cleaning of condenser, if condenser’s heat transfer surface is dirty,
performance of chiller will be seriously harmed.
For an air cooled chiller, the dust
covered on the condenser is visible, you can easily know when to clean it. The
cleaning of air cooled condenser is quite simple, you just need to remove the
filth on it with water and non-corrosive additive. For an water cooled chiller,
you can not see if there is something wrong in the condenser. Cleaning of water
cooled condenser needs professional devises, and it is not so convenient as
well.
4. Cost
As far as unit cost is concerned,
air cooled chiller is more costly than water cooled chiller.
But the comparison need to be
comprehensive. As we know that water cooled chiller needs a cooling tower to
work together, which is extra cost comparing to air cooled chiller. With the
cost of cooling tower, the cost difference between them is smaller. On the other
hand, we also need to consider the maintenance cost. In this aspect, air cooled
chiller has obvious advantage.
In short,
both air cooled and water cooled type industrial chiller have their own advantages. When
we talk about that, we need to consider our own conditions, so to make the
right choice.
Note: This article is from official website of Senho Machinery Co., Ltd http://www.senho-chiller.com. All rights reserved.
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