ISHRAE DBCE Students Chapter Industrial Visit to IFB AC Unit, Verna-Goa

Residential and business space-cooling demands are constantly rising around the world, as what was previously seen as a luxury has become a necessity. Air-conditioning manufacturers have played a big part in making units more affordable by increasing their efficiency and improving components and technology. For newly graduating students, keeping up with the latest innovations is critical. In order to bridge this gap Indian Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air Conditioning Engineers (ISHRAE) chapter of Don Bosco College of Engineering, Fatorda had organised a field visit to the IFB Air Conditioner manufacturing unit at Verna, Goa.

A total of 48 student Members of ISHRAE DBCE Student Chapter, from the mechanical engineering department, accompanied by Prof Tanay Rege and Prof Sharad Shanbag had visited the state of the art facility at Verna. Line manager Mr.Jagannath and Mr. Keshav Bhat briefed the students about the various operations that took place in the plant. NC punch press machines were used to transform the sheet metal into their respective shapes. The Students learned how different components of the Air conditioner, such as the compressor, evaporator, condenser fins, and expansion valves, are manufactured and assembled to work as a single unit. For improved customer satisfaction, different tests were carried out under peak load conditions on the air conditioning unit, 80% of the inventory was locally sourced while the rest being imported. The plant had a capacity of producing 1500 units per shift, all manufactured units were invertible and used R-32 as the refrigerant. Students were exposed to the testing facilities and the procedures and practices for product under various ambient temperatures as well as part reliability.

Automated manufacturing lines and MES system was implemented to automatically integrate all production information from industrial plant, improving process efficiency by collecting real-time data, this helped the students in gaining various insights about the popularly discussed term ‘Industry 4.0’.