Reefer Container & Truck Refrigeration

Refrigeration that travels with the cargo — where the load changes every time a door opens and the power source changes at every leg of the journey.

  • 1,403products across this application
  • 584verified manufacturers
  • 5equipment groups

WhatA cold room that moves

Transport refrigeration keeps a cargo space within band while it travels — a reefer container moving between vessel, quay and road, or an insulated truck body running multi-drop delivery. The equipment is compact, self-contained and designed to switch between power sources: ship or terminal supply, road generator, and mains at the depot.

WhoWho buys it

Shipping lines and container lessors, reefer truck and trailer body builders, cold chain logistics operators, and the service networks maintaining fleets.

WhyWhy multi-drop is the hard case

A container on a vessel runs a steady load with the doors shut for weeks. A delivery truck opens its doors twenty times a shift, each time admitting warm humid air onto cold product, and each opening produces a temperature excursion the system must recover from before the next stop. The equipment is the same class; the duty cycle is completely different, and sizing a multi-drop body from a container-style steady load is why so many delivery vehicles run out of band by mid-afternoon.

HowSpecifying for the duty cycle

Establish the real door-opening pattern and size for recovery between stops, not for steady holding. Design air distribution so the whole body is served — a chute or ducted delivery keeps product at the far end in band, which floor-level discharge alone will not do. Insulate the body properly, because insulation is the cheapest refrigeration you will ever buy. And specify data logging: for chilled food and pharmaceutical cargo, evidence that the band was held is part of the delivery, not an extra.

Equipment this application needs

Condensing Units Transport packs Condensing Units429 Compact units built for vibration, multiple power sources and rapid recovery. Evaporators Body & container coils Evaporators74 Corrosion-protected coils with air distribution that reaches the far end of the body. Blowers Air distribution Blowers416 Chutes and ducted delivery — the difference between the whole load in band and only the front of it. Heat Exchangers Auxiliary cooling Heat Exchangers364 Engine-driven and secondary circuits on larger vehicles. Refrigeration & Heat Exchange Parts Fleet spares & controls Refrigeration & Heat Exchange Parts120 Controllers, sensors and data loggers — a fleet lives on parts commonality.

What to check before you order

Corrosion Resistant 266
Road salt, sea air and constant washing.
24V DC 115
Vehicle electrical systems; native DC avoids an inverter in the chain.
12V DC 125
Smaller vans and light commercial bodies.
IP55 / IP68 308
Sealed against weather, road spray and pressure washing.
R404A Refrigerant 455
Still dominant in transport, with service support available everywhere.

Products for this application

Questions buyers ask

How is a multi-drop delivery body sized differently from a container?
On recovery rather than on steady holding. A container runs with doors shut for weeks; a delivery body opens repeatedly through the shift, and each opening admits warm humid air that must be removed before the next stop. Sizing a delivery vehicle from steady-load figures is the usual reason a body drifts out of band as the round progresses.
Why does air distribution matter so much in a truck body?
Because without ducted or chute delivery, cold air short-circuits back to the evaporator near the front and the product at the rear runs warm. The temperature at the control sensor looks correct while part of the load is out of band — which the data logger will show and the customer will act on.
Is insulation or refrigeration capacity the better investment?
Insulation, almost always. It reduces the load continuously for the life of the body, costs nothing to run, and cannot fail. Adding refrigeration capacity to compensate for a poorly insulated body means paying for the same heat twice — once to let it in and again to remove it, every hour of every trip.

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