New heating/cooling units installed at Eufaula Courthouse

Barbour County Commission Chairman Earl Gilmore watches Tuesday as an old water-source heat pump is removed from the roof of the Eufaula Courthouse.

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Published: July 16, 2008

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As drivers passed by the Eufaula Courthouse Tuesday they craned their necks to get a view of a large crane that was blocking East Broad Street.

The crane was hoisting two old water-source heat pumps from the top of the courthouse and lowering two new Trane heating and cooling units into place.

“Those units were so old we couldn’t get parts for them anymore,” Barbour County Commission Chairman Earl Gilmore said while pointing to the water-source units sitting on the ground nearby. “We had a time keeping them running.”

According to Gilmore, the units failed during the first week of July. Gilmore said both employees and citizens doing business at the courthouse were suffering from the lack of air conditioning in the building.

The old units were installed in 1986.

“These things were run for seven years without a water-treatment system,” Gilmore said. “That’s really where the trouble started. The rust got them.”

According to Gilmore, the new units will reduce the strain on the courthouse’s chiller, which will increase the chiller’s capacity to cool the approximately 69 units still in service throughout the courthouse.

“It should help keep things a lot cooler in there,” he said.

The new Trane units were installed by 1st Mechanical Services out of Columbus, Ga.

Tribune General Manager Ed Trainor contributed to this report.