The question we actually get asked

Most calls about racks, lifts, and cots do not start with a new cooler order. They start with a cooler that is already bolted to the floor. The rack system inside a fifteen-year-old Mopec walk-in has corroded. A facility inherited a Mobi unit and wants more tiers than the original layout allowed. A funeral home is adding a second removal cot and needs it to load into a roll-in cooler another manufacturer built. The question is always some version of: will your equipment work inside what we already have?

The honest answer is that most of the time it will, and the times it will not are predictable if you measure first. Mortuary cold rooms are not standardized across brands, but they all obey the same handful of dimensions. This guide covers what those dimensions are, how to take them, and how our team confirms fit before we quote anything.

What actually determines fit

Brand names matter less than five measurable conditions inside the room.

Interior clear dimensions. Not the nominal size on the original invoice. A cooler sold as an 8 x 10 walk-in typically loses 4 to 8 inches in each direction to panel thickness, and evaporator coils, drain lines, and light fixtures can cut into usable height. Racks are sized to the clear space between finished interior walls, measured at rack height, not at the floor.

Door opening width and height. A rack section or a loaded roll-in cot has to pass through the door in one piece. Walk-in doors across the industry commonly run 34 to 48 inches clear width, but older units and retrofitted panel doors vary. Measure the clear opening between the door gaskets, not the frame.

Tray and rack rail spacing. If you want to keep existing trays and replace only the rack frame, or keep a frame and replace trays, the rail centerline spacing and tray lip style have to agree. Common tray widths run 23 to 30 inches, but other manufacturers' rail spacing and tray support details are not published in a way we can rely on, so measure and confirm.

Cot deck height ranges. A roll-in cooler only works with a cot whose deck height matches the cooler's tray or shelf elevation. Our mortuary cots and stretchers have published minimum and maximum deck heights; the shelf heights inside another brand's roll-in cooler are the unknown, so measure and confirm from the floor to the top of each loading surface.

Floor-level vs. elevated thresholds. Coolers installed on a slab with a floorless panel system load at floor level. Units with an insulated floor panel present a step of roughly 2 to 4 inches, sometimes ramped, sometimes not. That threshold decides whether a cot rolls straight in, whether a ramp is needed, and how much lift travel a transfer requires.

Measure before you order: the checklist

Take these eight measurements with a steel tape, and write down where each one was taken. Photos of the tape in place are even better.

1. Interior clear width and depth — wall to wall at 36 inches above the floor, where racks actually sit, not at the base where coved corners or heater wire channels intrude.
2. Interior clear height — floor to the lowest overhead obstruction, usually the evaporator housing or drain line, not the ceiling panel.
3. Door clear opening — width between gaskets with the door fully open, and height from threshold to header.
4. Threshold height — from the exterior floor to the interior floor surface, noting whether a ramp exists.
5. Rail centerline spacing — on any existing rack you intend to keep, the horizontal distance between the centers of the two rails that carry one tray.
6. Tier heights — floor to the top of each existing rail level, if you are matching a lift or cot to an installed rack.
7. Existing tray dimensions — length, width, and depth of the tray lip or channel, plus the material if you can identify it.
8. Path of travel — the narrowest hallway, doorway, or turn between your receiving door and the cooler. Equipment that fits the cooler still has to reach it.

Which of our products care about your cooler, and which do not

Some equipment classes are effectively dimension-agnostic. Our scissor lifts and body/casket lifts operate in open floor space; as long as the lift's lowered height clears your lowest rack tier and its raised height reaches your highest, the brand on the cooler wall is irrelevant. Church trucks and body transport carts are the same — they interact with the floor and the tray, not with the cooler structure.

Racks, trays, and roll-in cots are the dimension-dependent classes. A rack system has to fit the clear interior, pass the door, and land its rails at heights your lift or cot can serve. Trays have to sit on rails at the right spacing with the right lip engagement. Roll-in cots have to match shelf elevations within the cot's deck height range. None of that is guesswork once the eight measurements above are on paper, and because our racks are fabricated to order, non-standard interiors are usually a matter of cutting to length rather than a compatibility failure.

How we confirm fit before quoting

Send us the checklist numbers along with three or four phone photos: the door from outside, the interior from the doorway, any existing rack with a tape across the rail spacing, and the threshold. Our team compares those against the fabrication drawings for the equipment you are considering and flags conflicts before a purchase order exists. Where an existing component's spec is unverifiable from photos — a tray lip profile, a rail gauge — we will tell you exactly which additional measurement settles it rather than assume.

This costs you nothing and routinely catches problems that are expensive after delivery: a rack section 3/4 inch too wide for a door, a cot that tops out an inch below a third-tier shelf. Start with the contact page, or call and ask for a fit review.

Related planning guides

For rack configuration and procurement detail inside our own cooler line, see the Cooler Rack Compatibility Guide. For tray materials, load ratings, and RFQ documentation, see the Body Tray Compatibility Guide. This page is the cross-brand companion to both: use it whenever any part of the installation was built by someone else.