State-of-the-art air conditioning units made from aluminium for use in buses are on the rise. The latest example comes from Spheros GmbH based in Neubrandenburg, Germany: the manufacturer has rigorously reduced the weight of its air conditioning units by using aluminium and its Aerosphere World series only weighs 159 kg. The light metal accounts for 98 per cent of the refrigerant loop of the Aerosphere World.

In recent years, Spheros has built up a first-class machine park to process aluminium. Its product portfolio includes not only air conditioning units, frontboxes and other accessories but also advanced heating systems for all the internationally established bus manufacturers. Components made from aluminium tubes having the widest possible range of nominal bores are manufactured in series using computer-controlled tube-bending machines, automated tube-processing machines and special brazing techniques.

All components such as screw connections and tube unions are made from aluminium. The aluminium tubing systems are mainly used in the refrigerant loop of the latest generation of bus air conditioning units; for example, in the Aerosphere World Alu, which has been produced in series in Neubrandenburg since October 2009. The weight of a unit with a cooling capacity of 32 kW was reduced by 23 per cent to 159 kg.