What The Tech: What to consider during instal­la­tion of venti­la­tors?

The instal­la­tion situ­a­tion, oper­ating speed, reso­nance behavior and noise emis­sions should be consid­ered before installing venti­la­tors. Every instal­la­tion situ­a­tion is indi­vidual and needs to be planned in advance. The system’s instal­la­tion situ­a­tion may have an impact on the oper­ating point. Opti­mizing your oper­ating point can bring energy consump­tion and noise levels down to a minimum.

You also need to take the instal­la­tion envi­ron­ment into account. Corro­sive substances such as dust, gas, vapors, and mist, plus high temper­a­tures, conden­sa­tion, special turbu­lence, and unfore­seen air flows all affect the oper­ating life of the indi­vidual compo­nents and the fan. This means that special fans are also required for partic­u­larly extreme condi­tions. So you should always consider which fan suits which envi­ron­ment.

Vibra­tions can also be a risk factor and should there­fore be taken into account during instal­la­tion. As with bridges, vibra­tions also occur in fans. Each fan has its own reso­nance char­ac­ter­is­tics from the factory. Imbal­ance due to cont­a­m­i­na­tion can also cause vibra­tions. Although fans are precisely balanced by manu­fac­turers when they are produced, their indi­vidual instal­la­tion situ­a­tion creates a new oscil­la­tory arrange­ment. This can result in damage to the drive motors’ bearing system or prema­ture fan failure. With intel­li­gent EC motors, inte­grated vibra­tion sensors detect reso­nances and the soft­ware prevents fans from being oper­ated in the crit­ical ranges detected.

Fans are a source of noise during normal oper­a­tion. The instal­la­tion space – in other words, the width, height and walls of the room – also have an effect on the noise gener­ated. While noise emis­sions may not be a factor in some appli­ca­tions with a loud envi­ron­ment, it is espe­cially impor­tant for fans to be quiet in appli­ca­tions that operate close to people.