Blog

Understanding your swamp cooler is vital for a comfortable kitchen

When it comes to keeping a commercial kitchen cool and smoke-free, most people immediately focus on the exhaust system, which is designed to whisk away hot, smoky, smelly air. However, we also need to think about how cool, fresh air is going to get into the kitchen. That’s where the swamp cooler comes in. If you own or operate a commercial kitchen, you need to know these four things about your swamp cooler.

Is It Properly Sized?

In order to function efficiently and effectively, swamp coolers need to be appropriately sized, not just for the size of the kitchen but for the volume of air that will be removed by the exhaust system. If the swamp cooler doesn’t introduce enough air to replace the removed air, you’ll end up with a vacuum effect in the kitchen, which can cause slamming doors and discomfort for employees. If the swamp cooler produces too much air, it can potentially cause air currents that affect the ability of exhaust hoods to suck up hot, greasy air.

Is It Bringing Clean Air Into The Kitchen?

Of course, it’s important to confirm that the swamp cooler actually is bringing clean air into the kitchen. If the unit is drawing outside air, there could be the possibility of it drawing contaminants like pollen or exhaust fumes into the kitchen. And if the unit has mold or mildew inside, it will certainly be putting out smelly air that may also be laden with allergens.

Where Are Water Lines Located?

Leaking water lines or drains can cause serious damage to your property if not noticed and corrected quickly. Knowing where your water lines are located is quite useful because it allows you to check for signs of water damage regularly.

When Was the Last Time It Was Serviced?

Industry standards dictate that swamp coolers be serviced every six months. It is very important to stay on top of your swamp cooler service schedule to ensure your unit gets the attention it needs to perform its best. At Flue Steam, our technicians can provide expert swamp cooler service, including inspections, cleaning, and repairs. You can rely on us to catch any incipient problems early and recommend the necessary repairs so you can hopefully avoid an emergency situation where your swamp cooler suddenly fails, leaving your kitchen hot, smoky, and stuffy.

Watch out for these three problems to avoid unnecessary loss of revenue at your restaurant

Running a commercial kitchen involves juggling many different responsibilities. Besides making sure the food tastes good, you have to keep the kitchen clean and safe. Here are three possible restaurant-ruining problems to watch out for.

Flooding

Water from a burst pipe or a backed up drain could potentially cause a restaurant closure. Depending on the nature of the problem and the extent of the damage, you could be looking at a few hours or a few weeks of lost business. Drainage problems may be particularly worrisome, as a backed up drain could result in unsanitary water soaking into the carpet or furnishings and requiring total replacement. You can help reduce the risk of water damage closing your restaurant by contacting a plumber for regular inspections and drain cleanings.

Health Code Violation

A health code violation can not only potentially shut your doors but also damage your restaurant’s reputation for months or even years to come, depending on how highly publicized the violation may be and how deep of a mark it makes on online review sites. In order to prevent health code violations from costing you customers, make sure employees understand and comply with all health code requirements. Also, do whatever you can to make it easier for them to stay in compliance—such as setting up chemical dispensers so that cleaning chemicals are always at hand in the proper dilutions.

Kitchen Exhaust System Fire

A fire in your kitchen exhaust system has the potential to cause a minor disruption or a major incident at your restaurant. Best case scenario, the automatic fire suppression system will snuff the fire before your customers even realize anything has happened. However, you may still need to stop cooking on that appliance until the system is inspected and reset. Worst case scenario, the fire could spread through the duct work and into other parts of the building. Even if the fire department arrives quickly and puts out the fire, you’ll still have significant smoke, fire, and water damage to repair. Fortunately, you can prevent kitchen grease fires with help from Flue Steam.

Three Ways Flue Steam Can Help Prevent Fires

Flue Steam specializes in commercial kitchen fire prevention. We offer three important services to help protect your restaurant from losing business due to fire damage.

Kitchen Exhaust System Cleaning: We can provide a combination of kitchen exhaust hood scraping and exhaust duct steam cleaning to remove the grease deposits that could fuel a fire.

Automatic Fire Suppression System Maintenance: We can install and service automatic fire suppression systems to ensure they meet relevant local fire code requirements and can extinguish fires in the exhaust hood quickly.

Grease Filter Exchange Service: We can also come to your restaurant on a regular basis to swap out your dirty grease filter for a clean one, to further help reduce the risk of greasy buildup causing a fire.

Please contact us now to learn more about these important services.

Recent news items highlights the importance of proper exhaust system cleaning protocols

Last November, a fire broke out around the exhaust duct in the kitchen of Pizzeria Toro in Durham NC, causing significant damage to the building. The pizzeria and two neighboring businesses were forced to close, and the three apartments located above the restaurant were also rendered uninhabitable. One of the upstairs tenants has filed a lawsuit against the pizzeria and the company hired to clean its kitchen exhaust system, seeking punitive damages against both companies as well as compensation for emotional distress related to the fire.

The tenant claims that both Pizzeria Toro and the cleaning company, Exhaust Clean, were negligent in their performance of the tasks required to ensure that the kitchen exhaust system was free of fire hazards. However, at a cleaning three weeks before the fire, Exhaust Clean notified Pizzeria Toro that some areas of the exhaust system were inaccessible and therefore impossible to clean. The pizzeria declined to act on this advice, which seems to place responsibility for the resulting fire squarely on the restaurant.

Pizzeria Toro should have known better than to ignore the advice of their exhaust system cleaning company. After all, the pizzeria had already suffered a minor fire in April. This fire, which was in the kitchen ventilation duct, was quickly extinguished and caused little damage, but it still should have served to open the restaurant owner’s eyes to the need for more thorough and frequent cleaning.

This story serves to highlight two important facts about kitchen exhaust system cleaning, namely that it is vital to hire a reputable company and to follow that company’s advice promptly.

Many kitchen exhaust system cleaning companies focus only on cleaning the visible parts of the exhaust system, which provides an eye-pleasing result while leaving hidden dangers lurking deep within the exhaust system. Flue Steam, however, provides truly comprehensive kitchen exhaust system cleanings using steam cleaning equipment that can reach to places where hand scraping tools cannot.

Flue Steam can also assist with the creation of additional access points to facilitate total cleaning of the kitchen exhaust system. This offers our clients a tremendous advantage, because if we identify an inaccessible area we can also offer a solution, rather than leaving restaurant owners at a loss for how to proceed, as perhaps happened in the case of Pizzeria Toro. Any access panels we install are guaranteed to be in compliance with relevant safety standards and will not compromise the integrity of your duct work.

If you’d like to learn more about how Flue Steam can help prevent a dangerous fire—and perhaps a lawsuit—from affecting your restaurant, please contact us any time.

Make sure your duct access panels can facilitate cleaning without compromising duct integrity

Kitchen exhaust ducts have many important functions to perform. First of all, they must effectively carry hot, smelly, greasy air out of the kitchen and the building. Secondly, in the event of a grease fire, they must be able to contain the fire and prevent other parts of the building from being consumed. Keeping your ducts clean is a very important part of ensuring their continued safe and proper operation, and this task requires expert assistance and properly placed kitchen exhaust duct access panels. Flue Steam can help on both counts.

Do You Have Enough Access Points?

While grease builds up fastest on your kitchen exhaust hood, grease can also slowly accumulate on every surface of the ductwork over time, making it very important to get a thorough exhaust system cleaning that reaches into all the areas you can’t see.

When your ducts were installed, they should have been equipped with various access panels to facilitate deep cleaning. Specifically, horizontal ducts should have at least one 20×20 inch opening so that maintenance personnel can crawl inside, or, failing this, they should have smaller access panels every 12 feet. Vertical ducts should have access panels on each floor.

If you do not have enough access points to clean your ducts properly, Flue Steam can install additional access panels for you.

Are Your Access Panels Code-Compliant?

In order to avoid compromising the integrity of your ductwork, access panels must be installed carefully and in compliance with all relevant code requirements. NFPA 96 sets forth the following requirements for duct access panels:

• Rated to 1500 degrees Fahrenheit
• Grease-tight
• Equipped with signage reading “Access Panel – Do Not Obstruct”

When you trust Flue Steam to install your additional access panels, you can rest assured they will meet the high standards necessary to protect your safety.

Is It Time for a Kitchen Exhaust Duct Cleaning?

Of course, access panels won’t do much good unless you actually use them for frequent and thorough cleaning. Flue Steam can provide this service. We offer a combination of hand scraping and steam cleaning techniques to remove dangerous grease deposits from the visible and hidden portions of your ductwork. As a bonus service, we will also inspect your exhaust fan at every cleaning visit to help ensure that it draws properly and keeps your ducts cleaner longer.

A kitchen fire can strike at any time, but an automatic fire suppression system can provide protection

Bradley’s Fern Park Restaurant in Muncy PA is closed on Mondays. But that didn’t stop a three-alarm blaze from destroying this eatery on Monday, February 17. Though the cause of the fire is unknown, neighbors on the scene did report that the heaviest part of the fire appeared to be coming from the kitchen.

The blaze was first noticed by a motorist who happened to see sparks flying off the roof of the restaurant while driving past on the Susquehanna Trail. Firefighters from three counties were called to the rural restaurant, where they began trucking water from a nearby pond into order to fight the flames. It took over an hour to extinguish the fire, which ripped through the first and second floors of the building. One firefighter was reportedly treated for an unspecified injury, perhaps as a result of his or her efforts.

The moral of the story here for owners of commercial kitchens is that a kitchen fire can occur at any time, even when the kitchen is not open. While we do not know what caused the fire in this case, if it did in fact originate in the kitchen it could perhaps have been prevented by an automatic fire suppression system, which would have kicked on when temperatures inside the kitchen exhaust hoods rose to unacceptable levels due to the fire.

Can You Count on Your Automatic Fire Suppression System?

A kitchen grease fire can happen fast, spreading deep into the exhaust system and potentially causing thousands of dollars in damages before your employees have time to react. That’s just one reason that a functioning automatic fire suppression system is so vital for any commercial kitchen. Another reason is that they are required by law in California.

Do you want to risk a fire in your business or a citation from the city just because you neglected your automatic fire suppression system? Of course not. That’s why you’re going to call Flue Steam to handle all your kitchen air control and fire prevention needs. We can provide all the necessary services for keeping your kitchen code-compliant and your workers and guests safe, including automatic fire suppression system installation, testing, resetting, and inspections. We can also provide and service hand held fire extinguishers as an additional line of defense for small fires. Call us today to learn more about our fire prevention services.