ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, April 23, 1996 TAG: 9604230105
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: B6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: GREG EDWARDS STAFF WRITER
Thirty-three air-conditioning units - each the size of a mobile home - will roll through the Roanoke Valley this summer and fall on their way to California, representing the continued expansion of a Rockbridge County manufacturer.
Des Champs Laboratories Inc. of Natural Bridge Station said Monday it has received a $1.3 million order for 33 two-stage evaporative cooling units to be used at a large prison near Corcoran, Calif. One of the units will be shipped in June and the rest in the fall, regional sales manager Keith Dunnavant said.
The company, which moved to Rockbridge County Industrial Park from New Jersey in 1990, recently completed a 30,000-square-foot expansion for research and testing. And it has plans for another 77,000-square-foot addition to house its industrial manufacturing operations and offices, spokeswoman Vicki Layne said.
The company had sales of $15 million last year, Layne said. Sales in 1993 were about $10 million.
The cooling units for the California prison employ the effects of water evaporation in conjunction with Des Champs' heat-exchanger technology. They avoid expensive mechanical cooling, the company said.
This type of unit works very well in the low-humidity California climate, where summer temperatures often reach 100 degrees or more, Dunnavant said.
The units use a water spray to cool one side of a heat exchanger that removes air from the interior of a building. On the other side of the exchanger, outside air is cooled first without the addition of moisture. The air then passes through a 12-inch-thick wet pad, which cools the air further and adds moisture, Dunnavant said.
The system requires no supplemental refrigeration, eliminating the need for compressors and chemical refrigerants, he said.
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