When a service technician or the like performs maintenance of a mechanism in an indoor unit, the service technician may accidentally detach a refrigerant gas sensor and the refrigerant gas sensor may be broken. To prevent this, communication pipes (regulating members) configured to regulate the detachment of a refrigerant gas sensor are provided on the side toward which the refrigerant gas sensor is detached (front side) when a casing provided on the side toward which the refrigerant gas sensor is detached (front side) is open.

A method (19) of cooling a heat generating device (2) where the cooling rate (17, 18) of the heat generating device (2) is determined using the rate of change of the temperature (16) of the heat generating device (2).

Air conditioner units and methods for operating air conditioner units are provided. A method includes determining an operational state of each heater bank of a plurality of heater banks of the air conditioner unit, and determining a speed of a blower fan of the air conditioner unit when the operational state of every heater bank is active. The method further includes comparing a blower fan input voltage to a voltage threshold value when the speed is a low speed, and deactivating one of the plurality of heater banks when the blower fan input voltage is less than the voltage threshold value.

An air conditioning system includes an inlet duct, supply duct, return duct and exhaust duct: a heat exchanger for providing heat transfer between air from the inlet duct and air from the return duct: a cooling coil position in the supply duct: a pan for collecting condensate from the cooling coil; a pump to pump condensate from the pan: and a sprayer coupled to the pump, the sprayer spraying condensate into an air path to increase efficiency of the air conditioning system.

A temperature-control system includes a temperature-control device (3), (n2) temperature-control assemblies (5, 5) which are designed for conducting a temperature-control fluid (2) through a component (4) to be temperature-controlled, (n2) individual return line parts (7, 7) and (n2) return temperature sensors (8, 8), a controller (9) having (n2) valves (10, 10) and control elements (11, 11) which are designed to adjust the respective associated valve (10, 10), and a room temperature sensor (12) for determining and reporting an actual temperature (13) in an immediate environment of the component (4).

An air-conditioning apparatus includes a refrigerant circuit including a low-pressure shell structure compressor into which a refrigerant flowing through an injection pipe flows, a first heat exchanger, a second heat exchanger, a first expansion device, a refrigerant flow switching device, and a second expansion device configured to allow the refrigerant which has passed through the first expansion device and flows from the second heat exchanger to the first heat exchanger to have an intermediate pressure, the compressor, the first heat exchanger, the second heat exchanger, the first expansion device, the refrigerant flow switching device, and the second expansion device being connected by pipes to constitute the refrigerant circuit, and further includes a controller that controls an amount of refrigerant flowing through the injection pipe into a compression chamber. A part of a high-pressure refrigerant flowing from the first heat exchanger to the second heat exchanger flows through the injection pipe.

A valve and actuator assembly that includes a valve configured to control a flow of liquid into a coil or heat exchanger. The valve and actuator assembly further includes a valve actuator configured to control opening and closing of the valve via positioning of a valve closure member. The valve actuator is further configured to provide both a maximum flow rate and a minimum flow rate of the liquid through the valve. In an embodiment, the valve actuator includes a valve closure member position sensor configured to determine the position of the valve closure member based on a flow rate of the liquid through the valve.

An engine cooling system includes a liquid-to-air heat exchanger having an associated fan and a pump forcing convection and a controller communicating with the fan and the pump, the controller increasing fan speed in response to a first gradient in heat transfer rate to power exceeding a second gradient in heat transfer rate to power for increasing pump speed, and increasing pump speed when the second gradient is greater than the first gradient. The controller may increase the pump speed in response to a desired increase in heat transfer rate. The first gradient may be based on a gradient in heat transfer rate to air flow from a map of heat exchanger performance. The second gradient may be based on a gradient in heat transfer rate to coolant from a map of heat exchanger performance.

Integrated air conditioning and water-harvesting systems are disclosed. In these systems, one subsystem (air conditioning or water-harvesting) may be a primary subsystem and the other subsystem may be a secondary subsystem. As load on the overall system increases to the point the cooling demands for both subsystems cannot be met simultaneously, the system automatically reduces output of the secondary subsystem. In certain embodiments, an atmospheric water-harvester may be connected into the (potentially pre-existing) chilled-water system that provides cooling throughout a building, either via distributed fan-coil units or a centralized air-handling unit. Additionally, providing cooled-air exhaust from an atmospheric water-harvester to a building's cooling system allows substantial quantities of water to be produced at nominal incremental operating cost over a simple, straightforward air conditioning system.

A vortex-producing fan controller uses a variable-speed vortex-producing fan to create a helical airflow within a server rack that couples with cooled air entering a data center through a floor opening situated near a bottom of the server rack and that draws the cooled air up through the server rack in a helical pattern. An input air temperature of air entering the variable-speed vortex-producing fan is measured using readings from a fan input air temperature sensor positioned above the server rack. A speed of the variable-speed vortex-producing fan and a flow rate of the cooled air coupled within the helical airflow up through the server rack are adjusted responsive to changes in the input air temperature of the air entering the variable-speed vortex-producing fan.