Walk In Coolers
If you take a closer look at the workings on your home refrigerator, you will see that most units operate in a very simple manner. The only section of a typical refrigerator/freezer unit that is being actively cooled is the freezer section. This section, in turn, passes cold air into the refrigerator section. Even though large scale refrigerators perform the same task, for commercial purposes, refrigerators work on a basis closer to that of your home air conditioner, rather than your home refrigerator. Such is the case with the large walk in coolers often found in restaurant or retail environments.
What Is A Walk In Cooler?
A walk in cooler is a large refrigerated unit, primarily found in retail and restaurant environments. They are designed to work just as your home refrigerator does, keeping the internal environment at a set temperature, designed to be optimal for the products stored within it. Some coolers have dual sections designed to cool foods on one side and keep them frozen on the other, similar to a home refrigerator/freezer unit. Others are simply designed for only one task or the other. They can vary in size from small walk in units, ideal for smaller restaurants, to extremely large units, as seen in grocery stores or food packing warehouses.
How Do Walk In Coolers Work?
With your home refrigerator/freezer unit, the temperature for the refrigerator is maintained by cold air being blown through the freezer unit and into the refrigerator. Therefore, there is no active refrigeration mechanism with the refrigerator itself. For walk in coolers, the cooling method is very different. Closer to an air conditioner in nature, a walk in cooler uses an external condenser unit to create cold air which is then blown into the cooler unit. The cold air, in turn reduces the overall temperature of the unit. The warmer air is then pulled back into the condenser to allow its temperature to be adjusted downwards.
Just as your home's A/C unit operates, the walk in cooler contains a thermostat that determines the ideal temperature the interior of the unit must be kept at. The thermostat will typically operate within a range both a few degrees higher than the set temperature, as well as a few degrees lower. Once either extreme is reached, the unit will cycle on or off accordingly to adjust the temperature back to the ideal readings. This is extremely important in locations such as grocery stores, where the doors to the unit are constantly being open and closed, affecting the internal temperature of the unit.
One of the key factors with a walk in coolers efficiency levels is the amount of insulation it has built into it. Because these units are so much larger than a typical home cooling unit, the amount of insulation has to be proportionately larger as well. Most walk in coolers contain several inches of some type of styrofoam insulation, designed to better maintain the temperature inside the cooler. The exterior of the units are typically made of aluminum, or some other type of metal, designed to further help keep the unit insulated.
What Are Walk In Coolers Used For?
If you have ever shopped at a convenience store, the long rows of glass doors protecting the sodas, beer, and other cold items, are simply the front facings of a large walk in cooler. There is an open space behind the rows of products that allow employees to stock the shelves from the rear, keeping newer products towards the back and older ones up front for quicker sale.
In restaurants, there are large walk in coolers used to store items requiring storage at lower temperatures. These include products such as milk, cheese, butter, meats, poultry, and other temperature sensitive food products. Unlike the coolers in a retail environment, the walk in coolers used n food establishments do not require glass access doors and resemble a large metal boxed room more than anything else.
In food processing plants, walk in coolers are used to keep items such as large cuts of meat, or even whole animal carcasses, frozen. They can also be used to store large quantities of products being held ready for shipment to local stores, such as cheeses or other dairy products. To some extent, the trucks and trailers used to transport these items from the plant to the store can be considered a type of walk in cooler as well, primarily since they are also required to be refrigerated in order to maintain low temperatures during transport.
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