Ventilation area (opening) calculation for generator room

Hi,

I am also involved with more or less the same thing at present;it is a ship as compared to your building.If you can access ISO8861 OR go to the google book and type for "Engine room ventilation in diesel engined ships" , this shall lead you to a book where you can find ditto example for your case.I am sorry I could have helped more but the excerpts of the book can not be copied!!! At least I could not manage.

Sincerely,

jawad

I would suggest that you have a clear 6 feet space all the way around each of the generators.

That way you would have heat exchange and fresh air flow from the vents.

Plus the 6 ft would give maintance enough room to work or a forklift to pickup to remove.

where yhou mount the disconnects will make a difference too. I would mount the disconnect near the front but to the side of each generator.

Yes, you will need to allow for plenty of room between the generators for both ventilation and maintenance equipment.

There are some other things you may want to take into account.

1. Are you using an exhaust system or do you plan on using louvers to allow for airflow through the room?

2. How many walls will you be able to put louvers in?

3. How many walls you can use in addition to the airflow requirements of the generators will play a part in determining the size of the louver. You may need to talk with an Engineer to check out all these factors.

4. Do you want the louver to also keep as much water out as possible in case of severe weather?

Tclark,

1. No exhaust sytem, the radiator fan will do the exhaust as it is flush with wall.

2/3. Only one wall ( the wall opposite to the radiator will have louvers)

Cheers.

Chaterpilar,

I'm not sure on what size to recommend for the room. Dadw5boys recommended 6ft around each generator to allow for maintenance and forklifts. You will need to find out how much room is available to you for the generator room addition in order to design a proper layout of the room. You wouldn't want to design a room larger than the space allocated for it. Since the fan is only going to be on one wall you probably need to lay out the generators in such a way as to get the best airflow through the room once you find out what the maximum allowable size of the room will be. I also noticed that you are in Saudi Arabia, are the walls with ventilation going to be exposed to the elements such as wind driven rain or sand? If so you will need to take this into account because you don't want water or sand getting to your generators.

Hope this helps.

I prefer for this type application a forced air ventilation system, always maintaining a positive pressure differential in the room. Also, Caterpillar, in their documentation, provides minimal design requirements.

Rule of thumb:

Area of air intake, 150 % of the radiator surface area for each unit.

for normal ventilation :5 ACPH air flow is required for generator room

I prefere to provide positive pressure to avoid any dust entering the room

for operation time : Motorized damper and acoustic intake and outlet should be provide

the area of louvers should be applicable to pass the air flow under maximum velocity 600 FPM