Your Cooling Tower Fan is Important, Treat it Right
With summer fast approaching, it is essential that you make sure your cooling tower is ready to handle the heat. While there are a wide variety of maintenance checks that will need to be completed to make sure that your tower is running as efficiently as possible, checking the fan in your cooling tower is one of the most important components to check. The fan inside of your cooling tower does a lot of work. Without this fan, your cooling tower is unable to function so it is in your best interest to make sure that it is in good shape. Here at Industrial Cooling Solutions Inc., we want all of our readers to be as informed as possible when it comes to topics relating to cooling towers and, in today’s post, we are going to cover a few essential maintenance tips that need to be performed to ensure that the fan blade in your cooling tower is working as efficiently as possible. Continue reading below to learn more.
Fans Need Maintenance as Much as the Cooling Tower
When it comes to cooling tower maintenance, there are a wide range of issues that need to be checked in order to be sure that the tower is performing as optimally as possible. From spray nozzles to fill material, a cooling tower is composed of many parts that need to work in conjunction with each other to make sure the tower is doing its job properly. Below, we have listed a few maintenance tips in relation to the tower’s fan blade system.
- Check Blades: One of the first things to check when performing routine maintenance on a tower’s fan system is to check the fan itself. Cooling tower fans rotate at thousands of RPM and during that fast rotation even the smallest bits of debris can cause damage if they come in contact with the blades of the fan. Check the blades for any dings or cracks that may have formed and also use this time to clean the blades of any dirt that may have accumulated on them. It is important to keep the blades of the fan in good repair because even the smallest ding can develop into a crack. If one of the blades cracks while the fan is spinning, the results could not only result in damage to the cooling tower but could be potentially harmful to workers in the areas surrounding the tower.
- Check Alignment and Balance: After you have checked the blades of the fan to make sure that they are in good repair, it is important to make sure that the fan is properly aligned and balanced. As we mentioned briefly in the previous bullet, industrial cooling tower fans rotate thousands of times every minute. As a result of this near constant rotation, the fan can sometimes become unbalanced. Like an unbalanced ceiling fan, the cooling tower fan will start to wobble as a result of its unbalanced state and create vibrations. Anyone who has at least a basic understanding of cooling tower fans knows that vibrations are never a good thing and should be avoided at all cost.
- Check for Wear: As with any cooling tower component, it is essential to check for wear on any and all components relating to the fan. This includes the drive shaft, motor, and couplings that keep the fan physically attached to the rotator plate. Check these areas for rust or any other signs of degradation. While rust shouldn’t be an issue if the fan assembly has been properly maintained if you come across any make sure to address the situation. Rust can be handled if it is caught early, however, if it is left to grow it can cause major damage to the fan assembly and potentially cause the fan to break down.
If you would like to learn more about industrial cooling tower fan maintenance, or you would like to schedule an appointment to have us come out and inspect your cooling tower, please visit our website today or contact us at (303) 462-2000 . At Industrial Cooling Solutions Inc., we have years of experience in the cooling tower industry and we are confident that we can handle whatever job you may need to be done. Contact us today and let’s get started.