Separating hot and cold air within the rack

One of the simplest ways to separate hot and cold airflow within the rack is by using a blanking panel. Without blanking panels hot exhaust air can re-circulate back into the computer intake. This can take place right inside the rack cavity. Hot air convection can draw the warm air around the equipment and back into the intake side of the rack. To prevent this, blanking panels were designed to fill in the blanks for missing equipment.

The Bend N’ Snap™ blanking panel comes in a 27U sheet that bends and snaps at every 1U increment. Simply bend and snap the amount of U’s that need to be covered. Studies have shown up to a 20-degree reduction in hot spots with the introduction of blanking panels alone. This relatively small investment can pay huge dividends along with increased cooling efficiency.

Blanking Panels

Higher efficiencies are achieved when a higher degree of separation between the cold air supply and hot air return can be maintained. Blanking panels placed in open locations in a rack will prevent the computer equipment’s hot exhaust air from the back to the front inlet of the computer equipment. When open space is not blocked by the use of blanking panels, computer equipment fans uniformly pull air from the front of the rack, as well as pull heated exhaust air from the rear of the rack, adversely increasing the overall temperature at the inlet of the computer equipment.