I spent Monday morning with John Manousaridis, owner of Cornell Logistics Services, to find out about a refrigeration technology he has imported from Italy. John has eight trucks and most of them haul ice cream for Nestle, so you understand why refrigeration is an important subject to him. Nothing makes a kid – or ice cream hauler – sadder than a puddle of Neapolitan flavoured goo on the ground.

Unhappy with the reliability and cost of running conventional refrigeration units, John has been running cold plate technologies in the form of Johnson bodies for several years. But he found it was difficult to maintain consistently cold temperatures while making frequent drops.

John found out Nestle was using Cofi bodies in Europe and he set out to investigate. He brought two bodies over in June and is running them on Kenworth T370 chassis. He couldn’t be happier with the results. John told me they hold -40 C, even when the ambient temperature is as hot as +30. The body has side doors, providing access to compartments and reducing the need to open the main doors, which lets in heat with each opening. The system is charged overnight using a 240-volt power supply and is good to run for about 14 hours.

John said he’s on pace to save about $7,000 in fuel per year compared to a conventional reefer, and the body itself was about $8,900 less than other bodies that use cold plate technology, even when including the cost of shipping the bodies from Europe. They’re also about 400 kgs lighter weight than competitive models. John couldn’t say enough good things about the Cofi body. He’s encouraging them to enter the Canadian market and they’re looking at doing so. Currently, John has the only two Cofis in Canada, and he heard of one making its way to New York. It could be a company to watch for.