General Features & Uses

Silent-Aire CRAC units are used to manage the environments of large scale data centers owned by wholesalers, co-location providers and cloud service providers as well as major corporations. Our CRAC units feature:

• Heavy duty construction
• System redundancy/reliability
• Variable speed operation
• High static pressure applications
• Ease of maintenance
• Fully packaged for ease of installation
• Energy efficient cooling
• Single point electrical and water connection
• Customizable to site specific needs

Construction Details

As a custom manufacturer Silent-Aire systems is capable of producing CRAC units as specified by our clients. Our standard construction features the following:

• 18 gauge steel outer casing with satin finish (heavier gauges are available)
• High Efficiency MERV13 filters
• Doors with gas shock supports for ease of maintenance
• High quality door hardware
• Full on board controls
• Compact, high efficiency air foil plenum fans on VFD

Controls and operating systems

Our control solution is based on pCO Sistema: the CAREL range of programmable logic controllers. This consists of programmable controllers, user interfaces, communication and remote management interfaces to offer HVAC/R market flexibility and easy integration with commonly-used building management systems. Supervisory communication protocols supported are: Modbus®, LonWorks®, BACnet™, and SNMP. Units can operate independently on their own control strategy or can be remotely operated by a supervisory system or master PLC. An optional Field-Bus communication port for control of RS485, CANbus, tLAN industrial devices can be added. Our control solutions can also be customized to flexibly adapt to a client’s control scheme. Further, we can implement a variety of interface terminals from alphanumerical monochrome to color HMI touchscreen. Our units can be built to any CEC, NEC or IEC electrical standards for various loads and power systems.

Cooling Options

Silent-Aire Systems is able to provide our clients with a variety of cooling options including:

Free Cooling

Free cooling CRAC control systems analyze the outdoor air conditions and will use outdoor air when temperature and humidity conditions permit. When free cooling is engaged all other cooling is turned off; only unit fans are active. Most geographic locations’ climate conditions permit the use of free cooling during off-peak temperature and humidity conditions to maximize energy efficiency

Chilled Water

In using a chilled water option, air is cooled by passing through a chilled water coil within the CRAC unit that utilizes the DATA center owner’s central chilled water plant.

This allows for full recirculation of data center aire during peak outdoor humidity and temperature air conditions, where evaporative air cooling is not possible. This usually occurs during peak temperature hours during the summer. Water pressure drop through Silent-Aire CRAC units is typically half that of an equivalent off the shelf CRAC unit.

Direct Expansion (DX) Cooling

DX cooling is a traditional mechanical refrigerant based cooling system that is available in air cooled and water cooled systems. Available in a wide range of environmentally friendly HFC based refrigerants.

Direct Evaporative Cooling

Silent-Aire Systems is the only manufacturer to incorporate direct evaporative cooling into CRAC units. This cooling method utilizes the evaporation of water in the airstream without the need for compressorized refrigerant based systems. Evaporative cooling consumes up to only 5% of the energy than a traditional compressor based cooling system. It is most effective when high temp and low-medium humidity outdoor air conditions exist.

Non-Traditional Cooling Methods

As a custom manufacturer of CRAC units Silent-Aire Systems has the engineering and manufacturing capability to work with clients to implement non-traditional and novel cooling methods. Our in factory research and development allows for prototype testing and performance tuning.

Performance Data

Our CRAC units are capable of cooling performance measures up to a nominal 60 tons. As a standard we achieve between 2,000 and 48,000 CFM. The CRAC units use down flow and up flow configurations. As a custom manufacturer we can accommodate many configurations and sizes.