Home Air conditioning - what to buy?
Vernon
We are looking for some air con for the house, mainly the spare
bedroom(office) and the main bedroom, what do you chaps suggest and what
should we avoid. Oh and where to buy from?
many thanks
Vernon
Dave Liquorice
> what should we avoid.
The evaporative type. These create cool air by evaporating water into
the air stream, this makes their output rather damp. Running one for a
while without the window open (which somewhat defeats the object IMHO)
makes for a rather damp room...
--
Cheers new...@howhill.com
Dave. Remove "spam" for valid email.
Andy Hall
"Vernon" <big_...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:102019911...@eos.uk.clara.net...
How much do you want to spend?
The portable ones as sold by the sheds in the £200-300 range are reasonable
provided that you can take the vent hose via a very short route to the
outside. They will make an improvement, but since all the works are inside
the house, any heat generated by the motors, fans and compressors is
released into the house in the space you are trying to cool.
The fixed ones which are professionally installed start, IIRC ,at £600-700
and have a small wall unit inside the house with a fan, but the main stuff
in a box outside. Thus, there is little heat from the motors and
compressors released into the room. These are a great deal more efficient.
.andy
Paul A Brown
Cheers
Paul
"Andy Hall" <an...@hall.gl> wrote in message news:3ccf2ff7$1...@nt1.hall.gl...
The Service Manager
wrote:
>Any ideas on suppliers of the outside ones?
>
There is a half way house you could consider, which is a portable
split unit connected with flexible lines. The compressor and heat
exchanger sits outside, a portable fan coil unit sits inside, this
looks like a big domestic fan.
Go to www.rswww.com and search for: air conditioner
Plenty on there.
The Service Manager
Andy Hall
"Paul A Brown" <pa...@fowlmere.com> wrote in message
news:aaof1v$c8g8q$1...@ID-108001.news.dfncis.de...
> Any ideas on suppliers of the outside ones?
>
> Cheers
>
> Paul
>
Panasonic, Mitsubishi, Toshiba all make them and sell through aircon
installers. Yellow Pages will give you a selection.
.andy
Simon Crabb
>
> > what should we avoid.
>
> The evaporative type. These create cool air by evaporating water into
> the air stream, this makes their output rather damp. Running one for a
> while without the window open (which somewhat defeats the object IMHO)
> makes for a rather damp room...
Ooh, I didn't know such types existed!
I'm actually like the sound of something like that, as I find normal air
conditioning isn't good for the eyes - especially if you are a contact lense
wearer, or suffer with 'dry eyes'. It could especially be useful at night,
in the summer in a bedroom, eyes tend to dry a lot at night, as there isn't
much blinking going on!
How damp are you talking about exactly - enough to cause problems?
Simon.
simonr_uk
"Simon Crabb" <lists...@simoncrabb.com.S-P-I-M> wrote in message
news:1020274379.21087....@news.demon.co.uk...
proper air-con (a bit like england is) one method was to soak sheets in
water and then hang them near to open windows. The water evaporated cooling
the air, I think they called them swamp coolers or something!
Hugh Jampton
I've heard that these units are not as effective in this country as,
say the Australian outback or Arizona as they work best when the
relative humidity is low. Then you can get mucho evaporation (and
therefore cooling) without increasing the humidity in a room to an
unacceptable level. I've only experienced this type of machine once,
in a log cabin in Australia. It worked OK (very low humidity) but was
very noisy and spat drops of water out through the grill.
Don't forget that in this country, the humidity tends to be on the
high side; and our hottest weather is often also combined with very
high humidity. The higher the humidity, the more difficult it is for
water to evaporate.
That portable split unit seems to be a good idea.
Hugh.
Andrew Gabriel
"Dave Liquorice" <new...@howhill.com> writes:
> On Tue, 30 Apr 2002 21:39:13 +0100, Vernon wrote:
>
>> what should we avoid.
>
> The evaporative type. These create cool air by evaporating water into
> the air stream, this makes their output rather damp. Running one for a
> while without the window open (which somewhat defeats the object IMHO)
> makes for a rather damp room...
In the UK, heat tends to come with humidity.
You body's ability to stay comfortably cool actually has a
lot more to do with humidity than with temperature. Your
body is a large wet surface which is trying to cool by
evaporation. The very last thing you want to do is raise
the humidity in this case - this will make the room feel
warmer, even if it isn't, because your body will find it
harder to cool by evapouration. Evaporative swamp coolers
work well in hot dry climates, but we never have those.
Actually, dropping the humidity and not changing
the temperature will still make for a room which feels
very much more comfortable. Ceiling fans also work by
improving evaporation from your body by increasing wind-
chill, in spite of the fact that they are blowing hotter
air at you which had naturally floated up to the ceiling,
they feel cooler than when switched off.
If you want to measure the comfort level of a room, use
a thermometer with a wet bulb (thin wet cloth around the
bulb which is free to evaporate moisture, and is kept
moist by wicking moisture from a nearby container).
The ceiling fan is a good demo of this. Put an ordinary
thermometer under a ceiling fan, and from its baseline
value, it goes up by several degrees when fan is on, but
the area under the fan feels cooler, demonstrating the
actual temperature is not a good measure of what you feel.
Now try it with the wet bulb thermometer. The initial
baseline temperature in free air will be lower - ignore
that difference (which depends on the humidity - add that
difference to the reading so you start with the same baseline
value). Switch on the fan and watch the wet bulb thermometer
drop several degrees, better mimicking what you 'feel' the
temperature to be doing. The more humid the air, the less
this effect will be. At 100% humidity, the temperature under
the fan will raise just like the dry bulb temperature as
it can't cool by evaporation any more, just like you.
Clever control of humidity can be used in environments
where you have equipment which wants one temperature,
and people who would not like that temperature. You can
change the temperature people 'feel' higher by raising the
humidity, or lower by reducing the humidity. This trick
is often used in computer rooms where the computers
prefer a temperature which would be too cold for the
people, so the humidity is increased to compensate and
make the room feel warmer than it is. Within limits,
the computers don't much care what the humidity is.
(Just don't let the room get near the dew-point, or it
suddenly turns very foggy - that happened in one I was
in some 20 years ago when some aspect of the aircon
control system broke. Within about 20 seconds, you
could only see about 2' in front of you, and the people
who could see it through the glass from outside thought
the room had filled with smoke from a major fire ;-)
--
Andrew Gabriel
Consultant Software Engineer
Owain
| > bedroom(office) and the main bedroom, what do you chaps suggest and what
| > should we avoid. Oh and where to buy from?
reasonable
| provided that you can take the vent hose via a very short route to the
| outside. They will make an improvement, but since all the works are inside
| the house, any heat generated by the motors, fans and compressors is
| released into the house in the space you are trying to cool.
Especially if there is no fixed vent outlet and the hose has to go out the
open window - letting all that hot air from outside back in again.
Owain
The analyst
competitive prices and quick delivery. I have just ordered at 17:00 and have
been told that I will receive it tomorrow.
Iain
--
Remove my shoes before replying (but no email reply necessary to newsgroups)
Vernon
"The analyst" <020773711...@ukonline.co.uk> wrote in message
news:hSdA8.5055$C5.11...@monolith.news.easynet.net...
>
> "Vernon" <big_...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
> news:102019911...@eos.uk.clara.net...
> > Summer is I am assured just around the corner.
> >
> > We are looking for some air con for the house, mainly the spare
> > bedroom(office) and the main bedroom, what do you chaps suggest and what
> > should we avoid. Oh and where to buy from?
> >
> > many thanks
> >
> > Vernon
> >
> >
> If you decide on a Delonghi buy online at www.shop.delonghi.uk.com -
> competitive prices and quick delivery. I have just ordered at 17:00 and
have
> been told that I will receive it tomorrow.
>
> Iain
Which model have you ordered, please post an appraisal of the unit.
Many thanks
Vernon
Dave Liquorice
> Ceiling fans also work by improving evaporation from your body by
> increasing wind-chill, in spite of the fact that they are blowing
> hotter air at you which had naturally floated up to the ceiling,
> they feel cooler than when switched off.
Agreed ceiling fans are very good. And have the advantage of being
quiet unless set to "hurricane". Just the lowest gentle stiring will
make an very uncomfortable room really nice very quickly.
The analyst
I am replacing a Andrew Sykes portable (model ET9) which lasted almost 4
years working constantly. I am effectively upgrading to a unit with a higher
cooling power and cheaper than replacing like for like. The model chosen is
the PAC FX140 eco and is supposed to be suitable for a room size approx 4 x
5 metres - I have not received it yet (allegedly due today) and will post an
appraisal in due course.
Regards