I heart free food

Last Monday we took a trip down to the E.H. Price factory. E.H. Price designs and produces ventilation systems, and it was cool to see all the steps that go into making something as seemingly simple as a floor register.
After a FREE lunch (resulting in the blog entry title), we learned about the history of E.H. Price as well as the three major types of ventilation systems:

1) Overhead - this is the typical North American system - it forces air from the ceiling downward, mixing the air in the room and bringing the entire room to a constant desired temperature.

2) Displacement - I found this system to be SUPER cool. Previously, this system was used in Europe, and only lately has it made its way to North America. Displaced air systems make SO much sense that it is hard to understand why overhead systems are ever used. Displacement systems deliver cool air at the bottom of the room. As the air warms up, it rises and displaces the air above it. The used air is exhausted out through a vent in the ceiling. The great part about this system is that it only conditions the lower two-thirds of a room, which is all that humans occupy anyway. It also requires much less air speed (40-50 ft./min.) for distribution than other systems (which require 400-800 ft./min). A downfall of this system is that it can only be used for cooling.

3) Under-floor - like displacement, this system delivers air at a lower level. With this system, a raised floor is constructed to produce a plenum space under the room. This space acts as a giant duct, and air is forced from this plenum upwards into the space. Although they have a higher initial cost than overhead ventilation, under-floor systems are more efficient, and offer adjustability, as floor panels can be removed and shuffled as desired to move vents. This system can also be used for heating AND cooling, which offers an advantage over displacement systems.

Once we had learned (or attempted to learn) the major types of ventilation systems, we went on a tour of the production facility. We were guided first to the testing area. This space was comprised primarily of a testing room, which was equipped with heated mannequins(to simulate people), a variety of ventilation systems, and other testing equipment. By blowing drama smoke through the different HVAC systems, differences between the systems could be observed in the room.

















In the testing area we learned about "thermal plume". This is the heat given off by humans and things like computers or other running equipment. This heat attracts the cooler air distributed from HVAC systems. Notice the plume given off by the mannequin in the picture below...

After this, we were given a tour of the factory floor. It was cool to see just how many different steps go into making the parts for a ventilation system. Having worked in a small heating/ cooling warehouse before, it was nice to see the production level at a larger scale.

The factory tour concluded our trip to E.H. Price. As much as we didn't want to leave, we were forced to settle with conversation about HVAC with each other on the drive home, followed by dreams about HVAC as we slept that night.
Maybe not. Even still, I found the trip to be quite interesting, and it was good to build on my knowledge of HVAC.