Cork insulation; a complete illustrated textbook on cork insulation ...

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CORKBOARD INSULATED REFRIGERATOR 347
no greater and was frequently less than the rate of evapora-
tion. Then, too, in the case of an ice-cooled refrigerator,
moisture condensed out of air entrapped within the walls of
the refrigerator would usually be in intimate contact with
the <strong>insulation</strong> in such walls, and would be absorbed by it if
the <strong>insulation</strong> possessed capillarity in any degree whatever.
as is well known, is very susceptible to tainting;
glass of water standing on a dining-room table will pick up
odors at a rapid rate, and become unfit for human consump-
tion. Place a glass of water on a kitchen table during the
preparation of a meal, and two hours later the water will have
an odor. The water of meltage coming from an iced refrig-
erator has an odor; because as the air in the refrigerator cir-
culates over the melting ice, the water of meltage extracts
the food odors and carries them away through the refrigerator
drain. Condensed water on the back of an exposed interior
lining of a refrigerator will quickly become foul, by absorption
of odors from the air ; and thus we have the explanation for
the so-called "cork odor" in the structure of the early mechan-
cooled household refrigerator insulated with corkboards
so loosely installed as to leave the exterior surface of the
interior lining exposed. For unless some material with a cer-
heat insulating value is in intimate contact with the
entire outer surface of a refrigerator lining, such surface must
be thought of and dealt with as being exposed to the sur-
rounding atmosphere, at least in so far as the condensation
moisture on its face is concerned.
within the food compartment of a mechanical re-
frigerator are usually accounted for by the foods stored, or by
coming in through dry bell-trap or goose-neck of the
drain pipe from which all water has evaporated. An ice-
cooled refrigerator is constantly at work to keep its air purified,
by absorption of odors by the water of meltage and discharge
to drain ; but a mechanically-cooled refrigerator frequently has
little or no water of meltage, and other provision must be made
for the purification of its air. This has been variously accomplished
by ventilation through dry drain pipe, where such
terminates low enough to escape the odors from the
refrigerating machine, by ventilation through loosely fitted
doors, and bv still other means entirely. These items do not