A wood products company had issues with its compressor room. Despite installing good filtering, the compressor oil and air coolers would clog up with sawdust — and the compressors would constantly overheat. The maintenance manager, remembering something from one of his previous jobs, decided to move his compressor coolers outdoors.
This worked great in the summertime. However, in winter the temperatures at this site reached as low as -40°. It wasn’t long before reports started coming in about low plant pressure and compressor problems. It turned out that his outdoor compressor cooler had frozen up, blocking the flow of compressed air from exiting the compressor.
When remoting compressor coolers, it is important to realize that water will condense within the air cooler as the temperature of the compressed air drops. Subjecting the cooler to freezing temperatures is just asking for troubles due to ice blockage. If this is a risk, the coolers need to be protected by proper ducting and automatically controlled dampers.
