Grace Cramer is one of the new smiling faces in our Engineering Department. Grace holds the role of Product Design Engineer and has been with Wessels for 6 months. She enjoys traveling, cats, and playing board games, and she can even be found coding her own video games in her spare time. Grace likes to root for her alma mater, Purdue, and she also watches the Colts during football season.
Grace’s fast facts:
Favorite Color: Purple Favorite food: Pasta Likes: Video games, cats, hot tea, and traveling Dislikes: Cold weather, peanut butter, needles Fun fact: She’s a pescatarian
Wessels Company’s student employee, Ashton Conley, has Won the Student Achievement Award from Central Nine Career Center in Welding Technology.
The Achievement Award is given to an outstanding Central Nine Career Center senior who is in the second year of their program and has exhibited outstanding work, good attendance, is a good citizen and has shown outstanding work ethic in the classroom and lab. Only one award is given in each program and Ashton earned the award within in the Welding Technology program.
Welding instructor Jason Wiley recalls, “The second year I got him, unfortunately he had some problems at home I didn’t realize, and it turned out, you know, his house burned down.”
But Wiley says, he didn’t let his issues at home stop him from
excelling.
“I thought right to myself right then, this guy is good enough to go out already, he’s worked hard enough he can do it, so I called Bob and Wessels is here to honor him,” Wiley said. “That’s how much they think about him there, and they gave him a job and the next thing you know, I’m seeing Bob and he’s telling me what a great guy (Ashton) is and how hard he works.”
“He’s a hard worker,” Bob says. “I’m happy he was selected
for this award.”
Ashton has worked at Wessels since September 2018 and plans to attend Hobart Welding Technology Institute in October to attain more welding certifications.
Wessels Company proudly congratulates Ashton Conley on earning this award.
Happy Earth Day! New requirements to repair and upgrade existing buildings and infrastructure in an effort to lower emissions and improve energy efficiency means greener energy for the planet and an opportunity to see green as HVAC equipment providers.
ASHRAE Standard 90.1 requires water-side economizers on almost all chiller installations in North America to reduce the high cost of running refrigerant compressors when making chilled water for commercial buildings. The water-side economizer cools or partially cools the chilled water loop with alternate sources to reduce electric consumption and save energy and money. The economizer takes the heat from the building chilled water loop to earth contact groundwater or to the air though an evaporative cooling tower.
The WesPlate plate and frame heat exchanger is the perfect water-side economizer. It consists of specially corrugated metal plates that maximize heat transfer. Gaskets are fixed between the plates to contain and separate two fluids. These fluids flow alternately between every other plate, counterflowing to produce the greatest rate of heat transfer and provide the closest temperature approach to the incoming cooling tower or ground water. The special surface of the heat transfer plates provides a highly turbulent flow that scrubs the plates clean to reduce fouling and creates the highest rates of heat transfer possible.
ASHRAE Standards are the specifications for engineers designing HVAC systems in North America. For ASHRAE 90.1 Energy Standard, the following requirement has been added:
6.5.1 Economizers. Each cooling system that has a fan shall include either an air or water economizer meeting the requirements of Sections 6.5.1.1 through 6.5.1.4
ASHRAE 90.1
Engineers are required to add water-side economizing plate heat exchangers to almost all of their building designs. Because the efficiency of water-side economizers is limited by climate, ASHRAE has broken the US up in to climate zones.
How does it work? When a building requires about 500 tons or more for cooling purposes you go from an air-cooled refrigerant condenser in the air conditioner to a water-cooled condenser in the chiller. With water-cooled, there is typically a cooling tower or ground contact heat sink to move the heat from the building to the outside. A plate heat exchanger water-side economizer can be added to do some or all of the heat removal required by the building.
Economics. The savings of using a water-side economizer vary based on climate conditions at the location and how much chilled water is needed year-round. Installations with data centers require year-round cooling. An older mechanical/compressor system may operate as high as 1 kw/ton of refrigeration produced, while a system with a water-side economizer installed may operate as low as 0.3 kw/ton. So the savings can be calculated by taking the difference in operating cost between the full mechanical system and the costs when the water-side economizer is operating.
Example: NYC. A water-side economizer using a cooling tower typically works best when the temperature outside is down to 45⁰. So to calculate the savings of a system we must get a temperature profile of the region to see how often the water-side economizer will be running.
Seeing Green: The only way to guarantee savings and performance is to use AHRI Standard 400 certified plate heat exchangers like the WesPlate from Wessels Company. Wessels heat exchangers go through rigorous testing to be certified. ASHRAE 90.1 requires heat exchangers be AHRI certified and listed at www.ahridirectory.org.
Margaret Chojnacki is a Wessels Company Vice President and the Western Regional Sales Manager. Margaret is the employee who has been with the company the longest, at 25 years and has been in her current position for over six. She lives and works in Hawaii where she enjoys spending time with her family as well as swimming, SCUBA diving and sailing. Margaret and her husband Don, who also works for Wessels, have 7 children, 7 grandchildren, and one great-granddaughter.
Margaret fast facts:
Employee
with the most longevity with the company at 25 years
Tristan Cochran is one of the new smiling faces in Wessels Company’s customer service department. Tristan has been with Wessels for about 3 months and is learning about all our customers and how to best serve them. She considers herself shy, but she has quickly become a friendly and fun part of the Wessels family. When she’s not in the office, she can be found shopping and painting. She loves pizza and enjoys watching the Colts during football season.
Tristan’s fast facts: Nickname: T Favorite color: Black Favorite food: Pizza Likes: Kids, kind people, love and food Dislikes: Rude people Hobbies: Painting and shopping
Pre-charged diaphragm and bladder tanks are necessary to protect systems from excessive pressure, energy, or water in a variety of scenarios. In this blog, we will discuss why you need to pre-charge, how to decide pre-charge settings, and the maintenance that should be done on this type of tank.
Pre-charge pressure is needed for bladder tanks which are used in HVAC domestic hot water, water well, pressure booster, and shock and surge applications. An engineer or maintenance person must first determine the application and pressure requirements of the system to determine the pre-charge setting.
For domestic water heating systems, the thermal expansion tank is positioned between the cold-water supply to the building and the water heater. The pre-charge pressure is set to equal the cold-water static or no flow condition. For example, if the supply line pressure is 60 psi, the pre-charge within the expansion tank should be set to 60 psi. As water flows, the flow pressure drops below static pressure. Thermal expansion protection is not needed since the expanded water is leaving the plumbing system. As flow stops and static pressure returns to the system, the pre-charged expansion tank is fully engaged to handle the expanded water.
A shock and surge arrestor accepts water at the quick closing valve to help dissipate the kinetic energy from the suddenly stopped water column. When water flows, every foot per second water flow velocity creates 65 psi of increased pressure over static. This spike will occur within a millisecond if the water is stopped suddenly. The kinetically created pressure reverberates through the pipe by increasing the pipe diameter to the point of relief, and as the pressure wave is reflected and returns, it constricts the pipe.
Most flow going through a pipe will be between 4 and 8 feet per second which equates to an increase of 260 to 520 psi. The pre-charge pressure for the arrestor should be set 10% below the flow pressure. The shock arrestor absorbs the excess pressure from the sudden energy surge. The pressure will equalize due to the energy absorption within the pipe. Instead of the buildup of the pressure damaging the pipe, the shock and surge arrestor takes the brunt of the pressure to ensure the safety of the pipe.
For a water well tank, or hydro-pneumatic system, a pressure switch controls the pump. The switch is normally set to a differential of 20 psi between the minimum required pressure for the building and the high pressure dictated by the switch. A home’s water well system is normally set to 2 psi below the pump cut-in to maximize the water stored, thus resulting in the longest pump run-time which helps extend the life and power of the pump. Within a commercial building, the normal pre-charge is set 10% below the pump cut-in pressure.
Yearly preventative maintenance should be completed to ensure your bladder or diaphragm tank is holding its pre-charge and thereby providing necessary system protection. The process of checking the tank begins with isolating the vessel from the system. A drain should be installed between the system isolation valve and the tank. If no drain is present, identify another means of discharging water from the tank. Often a plumbing union can be loosened to drain the tank water.
Check the pre-charge pressure and add pressure if needed. Note, it is best to keep the drain open when re-charging the tank so you can determine if air is passing through the bladder/diaphragm and leaving through the drain. If this occurs, the bladder/diaphragm is compromised.
Preventative maintenance will help extend the life of the tank and the bladder. It is important to check areas within the tank that might be subject to loss of pressure or air, such as any tapings or seams on the tank that may have corroded, or a malfunctioning air valve or plug. It is also important to remove the water from the bladder once a year to ensure there are no loss of pressure issues with the tank.
The pre-charge tank function ensures a minimum pressure. A designer will typically determine this based on building height, minimum pressure needed at each fixture, or what will result in the greatest system protection.
To learn about correctly sizing an expansion tank, check out this related article:
David Shirrell, or DJ as he is known at Wessels Company is in the Shipping and Receiving Department. He has been with Wessels for over 3 years and has held two different jobs. When he’s not at work, DJ can be found watching football and rooting for the Indianapolis Colts and Philadelphia Eagles. He also enjoys showing and building custom cars, truck and motorcycles. He enjoys upgrading and installing car audio systems and custom vehicle parts.
DJ Shirrell
DJ fast facts:
Favorite color: Red
Favorite food: Pizza
Likes: spending time with his family and the outdoors
Rosy Thlanem is one of Wessels Company’s human resources and interpreter. Rosy has been with the company for over three and a half years. She enjoys spending time with her family, attending church and church functions. She speaks several languages, including but not limited to English, Burmese, Lautu, Halkha and Falam. In her spare time, she enjoys dancing and teaching bible classes to children.
Rosy fast facts:
Favorite
color: red and purple
Favorite
food: Asian
Likes: spending time with family
and attending church
Hobbies: dancing
Hidden Talent: composing music
and writing songs.
Rosy fast facts:
Favorite
color: red and purple
Favorite
food: Asian
Likes: spending time with family
and attending church
