Since the pandemic and in almost every enclosed commercial and public environment, air quality has become a significant issue for organisations to address. Commercial kitchens are no exception and have their own unique requirements. Not only do they have to remove the steam and cooking odours from the kitchen, but they also need fresh, temperature-regulated make-up air in quite large volumes to ensure the kitchen operates at maximum efficiency.
Today, many restaurant chains and restaurant groups have a development and central production kitchen. Côte, the well-loved French Bistro chain is a prime example and recently opened a central kitchen in West London.
Sarum Electronics were approached by Aircraft Air Handling to help with the design and manufacture of control panels for an AHU system, that would be capable of supplying upwards of 20 kitchen stations with fresh filtered air for the new Côte.
Working with our client, Sarum designed controls for a bespoke AHU system that incorporated five large internally-located AHUs, four of which were indirect gas fired units serving fresh filtered air to the kitchen stations, with a delivery rate of approximately 60 cubic meters per second when running at maximum speed.
The five units’ temperature-controlled warm air indirect gas fired AHUs were fitted with BMS-compatible control systems.
Sarum’s AHU control solutions incorporate and manage:
• Fitted inverter drives, enabling the fan speeds to achieve the required air volume during commissioning.
• Temperature sensors that provide feedback to a NeOSS building management controller, to accurately measure the kitchen’s fresh air and duct air.
• Efficient heating and cooling with heat recovery.
• POWRMATIC gas burners interlocked with the ventilation system using airflow switches, to ensure the highly-ventilated space is sufficiently heated.
• NeOSS controllers supporting BACnet communications that provide an interface to the overall BMS system.
• Damper controls to programme heat recovery.
• Emergency stop button for extra safety measures.
All five control panels were fully tested before site delivery and subsequently, AirCraft Air Handling engineers undertook on-site testing and commissioning of the controls.