5 Reasons Why Your Old Cold Storage Doors Aren’t Cutting It

The traditional way to approach controlling the temperature in refrigeration spaces is to install heavy, slow, and rigid doors. Refrigerated spaces are designed to trap cold inside and keep heat and humidity out, after all. However, there are five key reasons why these traditional doors are no longer cutting it.

1) Long Cycle Times

The biggest cost in a freezer door is really when it’s open and you let all the heat in and then have to remove it. Basically, the faster you can get your door open and then closed, the more money you’re going to save. Slow-moving doors result in longer door-cycle times and higher rates of air infiltration, making maintaining temperature control inside the freezer more difficult.

2) Higher Susceptibility to Forklift Damage

Traditional slow-moving, hard-core doors are also more susceptible to forklift damage, which can lead to substantial energy losses if poor sealing results. The potential loss of a door due to collision, also means that your facility can no longer use it to load and unload trailers. Loss of productivity means loss of income, as well as warehousing personnel that are standing around doing nothing and getting paid for it.  And then on top of that is all the regular maintenance costs.

3) Poor Sealing

Some solid cold-storage doors have poor sealing characteristics either due to damage or just a cheap door, so the increased rate of air infiltration and difficulty maintaining environmental control further makes them an expensive choice in the long run.

4) Often Have Low R-value

Other traditional approaches including comparatively inexpensive strip curtains and air systems, have such a low R-value, that ice build-up on the strips and floor is commonplace, and the vision of forklift drivers can be obscured, and the floor slippery, making them not only ineffective at maintaining temperature control, but also creating a safety hazard.

5) Wasted Money on Temporary Defrost Measures

In order to combat ice build-up, many of you have probably installed Defrost Systems and whilst this may be effective for a time, it costs significantly and in the long run, isn’t solving the real problem. Likewise, you may also have employees whose sole role is to chip the ice off in your freezers which is also costing you big.

So, before settling on a door, we suggest you do your research. You should take a look at what you’re doing currently in terms of door designs and whether or not it’s working. You should also review how much use each door is getting, as well as the amount of damage they are subject to. Then consider what it is they wish to achieve with each door.

Ask about our Free Energy Saving Calculator Tool

Getting the right door installed at your plant is crucial, but every facility is different. We’ve been assisting people in the cold storage industry for over 25 years, and know what works and what doesn’t. We have the solutions you need.

Get in touch with Ulti Group and we provide a free report from our custom-designed energy-saving calculator designed by an NZ professor to compare traditional methods to an efficient high-speed freezer door. The program has shown that by installing the right doors into a facility, you can save thousands per year in energy costs.