DCES Insights

As part of our effort to de-install 10 computer rooms from a former Sun Microsystems campus in the South San Francisco Bay area, we removed 19 chillers from the roofs of 6 buildings. These machines provided chilled water to the Liebert Air Conditioners in each computer room. Since the computer rooms were being deinstalled and the Liebert Air Conditioners were being removed, the chillers were no longer needed.

The chillers were detached from the plumbing for the chilled-water-loop and unbolted from their frames. The chillers were then lifted from the roof using a large 265-ton crane and onto flat-bed trailers. The trailers then transported all 19 chillers (2 per trailer) to a facility in Louisiana where they will be refurbished and used as part of a rental fleet.

The three photos here show the process of lifting the chiller from the roof. In the first photo, you can see the chiller just as it clears its steel base. Workers guide the chiller as it is lifted so that it doesn’t swing and bang into other machines on the roof.

In the second photo, you see the chiller as it is lifted towards the flat-bed truck onto which it will be landed. The flat-bed has another chiller already loaded.

In the third photo, you see a chiller from ground-level as it is lifted from the roof of the building. The arc in the crane boom is an artifact – the result of using a wide angle lens to make the photo.