ebm-papst Fans, Blowers and Technology

By Joe Giacona, Market Manager - Transportation

Our nation's public transit (bus and rail) industry is constantly seeking new ways to minimize the environmental impacts of moving people who are escaping gridlock on the roadways. Fuel and operational efficiency and safety are key in a world where taking the bus or train can help save the planet, preserve our budgets and save our sanity.

To help public transit companies meet increasing demand, the American Public Transportation Association (APTA) welcomes innovative manufacturers and suppliers to their once-every-three years trade event. This year's APTA Expo, held October 13-15 in Houston, hosted about 800 exhibitors (up from 750 in 2011), including transit companies from Canada, Mexico and South America. The tools and products now available to those who design, build and maintain our bus, shuttle bus and rail systems are truly making a difference in how owners, operators, and transit agencies are achieving better efficiencies across the board

According to a recent APTA news release, this year public transit initiatives prevailed at the ballot box. 71 percent of voters believe in public transportation, and they are willing to invest in the bus, shuttle and rail systems that make their communities desirable places to live. Mass transit will become more and more of a necessity to link city and suburban dwellers in ways that reduce our energy outlay and grow our economy. The industry is leveraging both their market expertise and their predictions on future needs to promote adequate government funding that will build our future public transit infrastructure.

Because top original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) attend this event – as well as companies that sell HVAC systems to them – the APTA Expo offered a prime opportunity for us to demonstrate how ebm-papst transportation products are meeting their environmental, operational and safety goals. For bus manufacturers, the shift to alternate propulsion designs (CNG fuel, hybrid, and full electric modes) will continue. Rail systems will continue to upgrade and expand as automobile commutes grow longer and highways become even more congested.

Shows like the APTA Expo give ebm-papst an opportunity to understand how manufacturers and their components suppliers are helping buses and trains operate more efficiently, and how we can help them best meet their needs.  The ultimate goal is to keep public transit customers safe and comfortable while supporting reliability, efficiency and safety of the bus and rail systems that move them.

About Joe Giacona
Joe Giacona knows that HVACR components within transportation systems must deliver performance and reliability over the long haul. As Market Manager – Transportation at ebm-papst, Joe’s 30+ years of diverse experience in HVACR help him recommend the best ebm-papst products to heat and cool customers’ buses, trains, trucks and other vehicles across North America. Joe actively supports the company’s market development, forecasting, field sales coordination and customer relations. He holds a B.S. in physics from Brockport State College and a B.S. in industrial engineering from the University of Buffalo. In his free time, Joe enjoys cooking for his family, do-it-yourself projects, keeping his 1960 Corvette Roadster in peak form, and making wine from New York and California grapes.

by Tom Costello, Market Manager – Appliance & Heating Gas

As we sit down to dinner at night, most of us do not give any thought to what’s in our kitchen appliances or how they even work. We take for granted that our refrigerator keeps our food from spoiling, that our oven cooks the food to a perfect temperature, that our range hood removes all the odors and smoke from the room, and that the dishwasher cleans and dries our dishes at the end of the meal. We simply expect our appliances to work to free up our time for other interests!

To help meet that expectation, our R&D engineers are developing air moving solutions that allow your kitchen appliances to work better, longer, and safer. That's right, you may not be aware that each of the kitchen appliances listed above often includes a fan that improves the transfer of heat for cooling, heating, or simply air quality. For example, cooling insures the controls don't overheat in your oven or that the food remains cold enough to last for days or months in your refrigerator or freezer. Conversely, convective heating improves cooking performance in a range or wall oven and also improves the drying performance in your dishwasher.

Our fans are used in all types of kitchen appliances for cold, hot, and wet applications. In addition, now they are being designed to further improve the quality of your life by reducing the electrical energy consumption and, thereby, your "carbon foot print". A good example of this is a recent development program with one of our European appliance customers that manufactures one of the highest rated dishwasher products in the world market. The development was based on a strategic partnership between ebm-papst (supplier) and the appliance OEM (manufacturer) that resulted in both parties achieving their goals to grow sales with a progressive technology that also is environmentally friendly or "Green".

For many years, conventional drying technology would include a radial fan driven by an AC shaded pole motor in combination with a humidity valve and a custom scroll housing to remove the moist hot air from the dishwasher and then cool it to a safe temperature before venting into the kitchen.

Although effective at accelerating the drying process, energy consumption and drying time was still too high; however, recent advancements in motor technology and materials now allows for a new improved drying cycle. ebm-papst is a leader in electronically commutated (EC) motor technology in many markets and now recent  design advances allows us to bring this technology to kitchen appliances. In addition, since we design the impeller and scroll housing too we can optimize airflow, size, and material selection to provide a robust assembly that meets the demand of the application and operates with very low energy consumption.

This progress in air moving technology has now allowed the appliance OEM to introduce a new drying process that can further accelerate the drying time in an environmentally friendly manner. So in the end, advancements in technology applied in an eco-friendly manner result in lower energy consumption and reduced drying time!

By Tom Costello, Market Manager, Appliance and Heating

Selecting, purchasing and integrating parts from many suppliers is a really cumbersome method to create gas-air-control (GARC) systems. But as far as anyone can remember, that’s exactly the way many original equipment/appliance manufacturers (OEMs) have assembled condensing boiler systems for their residential customers.

Over the years, ebm-papst’s role in this process has been to supply premix gas blowers as part of the overall GARC assemblies.

Enno Vroljik, who runs gas valve production for ebm-papst’s European and North American operations, knew there had to be a better way. Enno joined ebm-papst in 2010 and brought with him more than 20 years of gas valve development experience from Honeywell, located in the Netherlands.

Enno Vroljik, Program Manager – Gas Valves, ebm-papst Landshut.

To make life easier for our OEM partners and speed delivery of condensing boiler systems to their residential customers, Vroljik and his engineering team have developed a pre-assembled GARC system called the NRV Series.

Developed for residential condensing boilers rated up to 150 MBTU/H (45 kW), the NRV Series includes an NRG118 premix gas blower, mutli-venturi and GB 055 E01 gas valve that can be configured, pre-adjusted and supplied to customers as a turn-key GARC assembly.

As shown below, the NRV118 GARC assembly allows for the gas valve to be mounted in three different positions and the venturi to be rotated into six positions.

 Vroljik and his crew aren’t done yet: They’re putting the final touches on NRV Series products for appliances rated up to 500 MBTU/H (150 kW). These will be launched in January at the AHR Expo 2013 in Dallas. Stop by our booth (#2967) to check out these new NRV systems, or contact us at sales@us.ebmpapst.com.

NRV118 Series
Gas-air ratio control assembly