Diagnosing And Repairing Liquid Water Buildup In Your Cold Room

An industrial-strength cold room is a necessary piece of equipment for many businesses, and keeping your cold room in perfect working condition is equally necessary. As such, any signs that your cold room may be malfunctioning should be attended to immediately, and this includes the sometimes-mysterious accumulation of liquid water inside your cold room.

Liquid water can appear in a number of areas inside your cold room, but is usually found accumulating around stored products and collecting in puddles on floors. Determining the source of this unwelcome moisture can be difficult, and calling in professional cold room repair services to find and fix the source of moisture is always advisable. However, there are a few problems that can lead to water ingress which you can attempt to diagnose yourself:

Excessive ariborne humidity

Virtually all cold rooms feature integrated dehumidifiers, which are vital for keeping humidity at adequately low levels. Excessive airborne humidity can cause water to accumulate on products and surfaces in the form of condensation, leaving your floors dangerously slippery and potentially taintining non-waterproof stored products.

As such, if you notice moisture accumulating in your cold room your first step should be to make sure that the room's dehumidifiers are still in working order. Even if they are running well, vents clogged with dirt and detritus can dramatically undermine their effectiveness (as well as providing a haven for mould and fungal growth), so having your cold room's vents professionally cleaned is also a good idea.

Warm products placed by cold products

Products and objects which are newly introduced to a cold room should be kept separate from products that have been inside the cold room for some time, and have frozen. If they are placed in close proximity, the latent heat contained within the new products can cause nearby products to defrost and leak water, a particularly unpleasant problem if your cold room is used to store perishable food goods.

Leaking pipes

If the moisture accumulating in your cold room has no obvious cause, you may be dealing with a hidden leak in one of the cold room's pipes. Depending on the pipe that is leaking, this can be a minor or serious problem:

• Leaking defrost drain pipes can be caused by rust, physical damage or perishing as a result of age. However, they can be repaired or replaced relatively easily by cold room repair services, and do not pose a significant health hazard.
• Leaking refrigerant pipes, on the other hand, are a far more pressing problem. Liquid refrigerant is toxic, and can cause deterimental health effects to people inside the cold room as well as contaminate products. If a leaking pipe is leaking liquid refridgerant into your cold room, close off the cold room immediately and have the problem diagnosed and repaired as soon as possible.