Re: What is the best solution for microscopy room cooling?

Posted by Dan Focht on
URL: http://confocal-microscopy-list.275.s1.nabble.com/What-is-the-best-solution-for-microscopy-room-cooling-tp7582697p7582703.html

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Oliver

Yeah, that is a small room for three high end scopes!
Why can't you use a scavenger system or transfer the excess heat to another location or to water to be disposed of or recycled?
That would take the burden off of the main air handler system.
It would also reduce the amount of air movement in the room to a level that would have minimum effect on the scopes stability.

 Dan





On Oct 1, 2014, at 12:03 PM, Oliver Biehlmaier wrote:

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Dear all,

Around the end of 2018 our light microscopy facility will move into a new building. Even though the date of the move is still quite far in the future, I have to provide the planners with numbers. Whereas the number of electronic and internet plugs as well as IT connection speed etc is no problem, it seems to be quite difficult to find an adequate solution for room cooling / air conditioning.
I searched the list for the topic and only found a thread from 2009. As this is a quite important issue for any microscopy facility, I’d like to take the opportunity to ask for some feedback and if possible images of your solutions. All comments on what to do and what definitely not to do are very welcome!

The new Biozentrum building will be a low-energy-consumption building (Minergie: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minergie) which means that there will only be a minimal exchange of air in the rooms.
The new rooms will be approx. 20sqm large (215 square foot) and I am planning to put 3 systems max. into each room. A confocal with an argon laser generates approx. 4kW, so in a worst case scenario we will have to be able to cope with 12kW/room. Referring to this calculation, I told the planners that we will need 15kW of cooling capacity per microscope room.

So far the planners offered 2 solutions for cooling:

1) the conventional convection cooling solution:  3 big boxes at the ceiling, each with a center inlet and 4 surrounding lamellar outlets
=> very loud, cool air “falling down”, difficult to reach homogeneous temperature distribution.

2) a more sophisticated version: based on roller-type fans with long textile tube outlets
This solution can be combined with a diffusor covering the entire room ceiling thereby providing a more homogeneous air distribution and less noise.
However, to accomplish this, we will have to agree to a room height of 230cm (7.55ft). Except for our 2PH system this should not be a problem.
I think that solution 2) could be a reasonable solution.

Please let me know how you solved your room cooling, especially in relation to low-energy-consumption buildings with little air volume exchange.

Cheers,
Oliver


Oliver Biehlmaier, PhD | Head of Imaging Core Facility  | Biozentrum, University of Basel | Klingelbergstrasse 50/70 | CH-4056 Basel
Phone: [phone] | Email: [hidden email] | www.biozentrum.unibas.ch | www.microscopynetwork.unibas.ch

Dan Focht
Bioptechs, Inc.
3560 Beck Rd.
Butler, PA 16002
www.bioptechs.com
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