In pharmaceutical warehouses and food warehouses, management of temperature and humidity is a challenge. In order to limit the inflow of air from the outside environment, many measures are taken.
Door interlocking system for shutters of warehouses
Normally there will be two sets of doors in the loading and unloading area. One set will be opening to the outdoor where the van or trucks are docked to load the goods. The second layer will be to the indoor area and there will be a space between these two layers of doors. A typical arrangement will be as shown in this drawing.
In order to limit the flow of external air into the warehouse, it is ideal to control the opening of the doors. This can be achieved through different means:
1. Door interlock system preventing simultaneous opening of doors
As mentioned earlier, there are two layers of doors. If any of the doors of one layer is opened, it should not be possible to open any doors of the other layer. As an example, in the drawing shown above, if door 5 is opened, it should not be possible to open any of the doors on the opposite side ie. Door 1,2,3 or 4. Similarly, if door 2 is opened first, the door 5,6 or 7 cannot be opened. This is a door interlock system.
We will explain through an operational example. Suppose a van is waiting at Door 5 for loading. Now all the doors are closed. First open any of the door nos. from 1 to 4. eg. Open the door 1 and bring the medicine boxes to the space between the doors in a forklift. Now close the door 1 and thereafter open door 5. Now load the goods to the van. Thereafter close door 5 and open door 1 and the forklift can return to the warehouse.
The customer can open all the doors of one side simultaneously. eg. we can open Door 1,2,3 & 4 simultaneously. Similarly, Door 5,6 & 7 can be opened together. However if any one door on one side is opened, the doors on the other side cannot be opened.
Also if you want to limit simultaneous opening of doors on any one side this can be achieved. eg. if you want to limit so that only 2 doors should be opened together this can be achieved. So if Door 1 and 3 are opened, the customer cannot open door 2 and 4 and so on.
2. Siren system to alert simultaneous door opening
If you do not want an interlock system, you can provide a warning system. In this case, if anybody opens doors on opposite sides, there will be an audible alarm. This is mainly to alert the operators especially when you have a huge warehouse. In this system, any number of doors can be opened simultaneously. But the operator will be aware that doors on opposite sides are opened and they should close one of them as quickly as possible.
We are supplying these door interlocking systems for pharmaceutical storage warehouse, food storage warehouses etc. where temperature and humidity control is essential.