We are used to buying products on someone’s recommendation or by reading about the products’ information displayed by manufacturers or customer reviews. But when we need to buy some high performance and expensive products, we need to refer to consumer reports. A consumer’s report is an unbiased magazine that makes no advertisements and their goal is to give a good and honest opinion about the product. By using a consumer report’s rating, we can select best products. In the case of HVLS fans, Air Movement and Control Association (AMCA) standards are made for testing fan performance using some great techniques and to provide the best fan performance report.
AMCA Standard
AMCA stands for Air Movement and Control Association. AMCA International is an association created to support fan manufacturers through education, performance standards and testing methods. This standard can be used for testing air circulating fans, ceiling fans, box fans, table fans, and portable coolers. There are different revisions of AMCA standards which include AMCA 230-99, AMCA 230-12 and AMCA 230-15. AMCA 230-15 is the latest updated standard released. The last two digits in the standard represent the year of the standard published.
Image 1: AMCA Standard Logo
AMCA 230-99
This standard was published in the year 1999. According to the standard AMCA 230-99, with running the fan with full speed, the following measurements are taken:
- Wet-bulb temperature
- Dry bulb temperature
- Thrust
- Air pressure
The density of air can be calculated by using dry bulb temperature, wet bulb temperature, and air pressure. According to AMCA 230-99, airflow(CFM) can be calculated using a formula,
Where,
Q= Airflow rate in CFM,
A= Fan circulated area,
F= Thrust (the difference between the hanging weight of fan and weight during the running of a fan),
⍴= Density of air.
“2” in the equation is added due to improper assumptions regarding the airflow of the fan.
AMCA 230-12
This standard was revised and updated in the year 2012. In this standard, AMCA introduced a new equation to find airflow of the fan,
Also by recorrecting the formula, they introduced the efficiency equation of the fan. This equation helps consumers to understand how electrical energy is used by fans. This efficiency is calculated by formula,
This efficiency is calculated by dividing the airflow of the fan by the power used. Also in this standard, AMCA restricts the size of the fan less than 6 ft diameter.
AMCA 230-15
In 2015, AMCA expanded the scope of standards for the fans to include up to 24 ft diameter. In this standard, they determined the formulas for Energy Efficiency and Fan Energy Index(FEI).
In this standard, a new equation was found to define the Department Of Energy(DOE) efficiency with the help of airflow of the fan, operation power of the fan and power consumption by the fan at a particular speed. The equation for the DOE efficiency,
Where,
(Airflow)i= Airflow at speed i,
(OH)i= Operating hours at speed i,
(W)i= Power consumption at speed i,
Wsb=Power consumption at standby mode,
(OH)sb= Operating hours at standby mode.
The above equation is useful to find out the Department of energy efficiency in terms of CFM/Watt.
Also by using this standard, we can find out Fan Energy Index(FEI)
Baseline fan electrical input power calculated by using the formula,
Where,
Qi= Selected fan airflow,
Q0= 250 CFM,
P= selected fan total pressure,
P0= 100 Pa,
The United States adopted AMCA 230-15, which means all power consumption and energy efficiency requirements will be based on these standards.
Reference