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Food Refrigeration

Precooling Room

Forced Air Precooling

Pre-cooling refers to the rapid removal of field heat shortly after the harvest of a crop. Field heat can be defined as the difference in temperature between that of the harvested crop and the optimal storage temperature of the product. It should be removed as fast as possible since, for most produce, an hour delay at field conditions of about 35°C will lead to a loss in shelf-life of about 1 day – even at optimal storage conditions

Mech-Air is one of the profound manufacturers and suppliers of forced air precooling chambers that are designed to extract field heat from fresh fruits and vegetables. High humidity levels are also maintained inside our chambers to retain the freshness of fruits and vegetables and also to avoid weight loss.

Forced Pre-cooling benefits include:

  • Lowering the required workload of a cold storage since optimum storage temperature is reached more quickly
  • Restricting and minimizing respiratory activity, thereby conserving the weight of the produce, and enzymatic degradation of the produce harvested; thus preventing softening, water loss and wilting
  • Preventing microbial growth, such as bacteria and fungi thereby decreasing the rate of decay
  • Decreasing rate of ethylene production and the impact on ethylene sensitive produce
  • Delaying chilling injuries for certain fruits
  • Increasing the daily intake into storage facilities which should not exceed 10% of its cooling capacity if produce is not pre-cooled

Hydrocooler

Hydrocooling is used for many fresh market products, including many types of tree fruit, melons, root vegetables and stem vegetables. Built to suit your specific vegetable hydrocooling needs, Mech-Air’s hydrocoolers offer rapid cooling of fruits and vegetables. Ensuring optimum shelf life and product freshness, our hydrocoolers are suitable for manufacturing using high-quality stainless steel and are majorly recommended for radishes, cherries, peaches, sweet corn, mangoes, celery and more.

There are 3 types of Hydrocooler :

  • Continuous flow immersion Hydrocooler
  • Batch hydrocooler with product in bins
  • Continuous flow shower hydrocooler

Mobile Container Type Precooling

Mobile Pre-coolers take the cold chain directly to the harvest site. By doing this, we make it possible for picking crews to load fresh fruits and vegetables into the pre-cooler as crops are harvested. Portable, easy-to-use, and versatile, Mech-Air’s mobile container type precoolers are the first link in an efficient cold chain, one in which postharvest pre-cooling begins in the field.

Mobile pre-coolers chill fresh produce from its ambient temperature to its desired storage temperature within an hour or less.

Benefits: Early and rapid pre-cooling reduces the cull rate, improves the quality, and extends the shelf life of fresh produce while enabling faster delivery to the end customer.

Suitable produce:

  • Strawberries
  • Raspberries
  • Blackberries
  • Blueberries
  • Cherries, Peaches, (stone fruits)
  • Grapes
  • Snap Peas
  • Tomatoes
  • Peppers

Other fruits and vegetables with medium to high respiration rates.

 

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