Air conditioning units?!

Vertigo · 1 Jul 2009 at 19:16

We've had a 9000BTU Amcor unit for a couple of years now but never been that impressed with it tbh. That said the pipe isn't long enough to reach the window so we've usually just stuck it out of the door into the landing (the temp of which we don't care about) but then we have trouble blocking off the rest of the open doorway.

Contemplating having a proper hole put in the wall for it but loads of hassle to do and not sure how much it would help. The room is the main office bedroom with two computers and people in there and the sun gets on it in the afternoon so not sure if the lack of cooling is more down to the unit being overwhelmed rather than the lack of a "proper sealed" exhaust from the room.

Any thoughts?

e36Adz · 1 Jul 2009 at 20:37

I've never even contemplated buying an AC unit before, but since I've moved up into the loft, can't see any other option really.

Might just go get one of them £100 argos ones and hope for the best, its roasting up here! The loft has a bedroom, a bathroom and a small PC room, well thats not really a room more a space but it's just too damn hot. I have a feeling in winter I'll be complaining how cold it is up here.

cheets64 · 1 Jul 2009 at 20:45

Problem you have lowrider007 is that you have an open window and its letting in the warm air so you are 1 step forward 2 steps back.

tang0 · 1 Jul 2009 at 21:03

lowrider007 said:
First up, these things are noisy, be prepared, oh, and heavy, 22kg's , this particular system is rated @ 900btu cooling capacity and the power consumption is rated @ 815watts @ 4 Amps, so not too bad.

Setting up was pretty easy, all I had to do was whack in the supplied carbon filter in the top rear filter compartment of the unit, screw in the supplied outlet hose (extendible to 1.5m) into the rear of the machine and then place the hose out of the window, switch on the machine, and then adjust the thermostat controls to my desired temperature.

I switched on the machine @ 13:30, set the temperature on the unit to 18c, my rooms temperature at the time was 28.7c measured by a digital thermometer, after approximately 3 hours of use with the compressor running for 100% of that duration and the fan @ full power the rooms temperature is now 24.5c.

So, am I happy with the unit, ummmmmmmmmmmmm, not really, but at the same time I'm not really unhappy with it either, the room does feel a lot cooler, and the humidity has dropped significantly which is nice, a couple of concerns I have is a) The noise factor, and b) the running costs due to the fact that the compressor is on all the time as the unit is not cooling the room to a low enough temperature for the compressor to auto shut down, and 815watts 24/7 is going to be costly.

At the end of the day it only cost me £99.99, I've have always wanted to know how these units function/perform and have found this to be an interesting learning experience, whether I keep the unit yet (I can hear the polar bears crying now ) or throw it down the local tip is yet to be decided.

I bought one of these last summer, and the bloody thing wouldnt work properly. It blew out air but it wasnt cooled, so either the compresser was messed up, or it ran out of gas or something.

mrbios · 1 Jul 2009 at 21:29

our air conditioner at work is having a bit of a problem, it is a bit old now so it's possibly low on gas, but the cooler kicks in for about 5minutes, then turns off and doesn't come on again for about 15 minutes and repeats that throughout the day, we set it to 22oC and it never manages to get below 27oc in the office (at best)

Sound like the gas has run out?

Dave85 · 2 Jul 2009 at 00:21

the humdity up here in fife is unbearable its still 23c outside now and with 95% humidity. I have the aircon on for 2 hours now and its got the room down from 26c to 22c and with less humidity but this weather better booger off soon.

Will Gill · 2 Jul 2009 at 10:50

anyone got any experience with units like these

http://www.airconworld.co.uk/easyfitsystems

?

my room is currently 47c and quite unbearable, cant be arsed with a cheap unit which will look out of place, might as well go the whole hog and install a permanent solution, just wondering

a) how much of a ball ache the install will be
b) how noisy they are
c) if 9000 BTU is enough or whether I should go for a 12k+ unit?

any advice would be awesome

Dave85 · 2 Jul 2009 at 13:34

looks good but a bit pricey im thinking of going permanent install aswell will gill, im looking at this seems like a bargain 299 half price.

http://www.diy.com/diy/jsp/bq/nav.jsp?action=detail&fh_secondid=9271803&fh_view_size=10&fh_start_index=10&fh_eds=%3f&fh_location=%2f%2fcatalog01%2fen_GB%2fcategories%3C{9372015}%2fcategories%3C{9372041}&fh_refview=lister&ts=1246538131592&isSearch=false

Sagalout · 2 Jul 2009 at 14:24

Typical, I started a thread about this in May and was told to speak to an aircon specialist lol. Must be the way I type...

Anyway, we ended up getting one of these: http://www.climachill.co.uk/acatalog/Climachill_15000btus_Portable_Air_Conditioners.htm

Our office is about 200 sq ft but gets red hot in summer because its a flat roof and contains 6 PCs, 12 screens and loads of other electrical stuff which is on 24/7. We got one from argos initially, which was ok but died in 2 weeks. This one feels much more substantial, and is defintiely a lot colder. Service was excellent aswell - next day delivery.

Sagalout · 2 Jul 2009 at 14:26

Will Gill said:
anyone got any experience with units like these

http://www.airconworld.co.uk/easyfitsystems

?

my room is currently 47c and quite unbearable, cant be arsed with a cheap unit which will look out of place, might as well go the whole hog and install a permanent solution, just wondering

a) how much of a ball ache the install will be
b) how noisy they are
c) if 9000 BTU is enough or whether I should go for a 12k+ unit?

any advice would be awesome

How big is your room? 9000BTU wopuld only be suitable for somewhere pretty small. We have a 15K btu and thats just about right for a room about 12x16ft

Will Gill · 2 Jul 2009 at 14:40

Sagalout said:
How big is your room? 9000BTU wopuld only be suitable for somewhere pretty small. We have a 15K btu and thats just about right for a room about 12x16ft

oh, my room is bigger than that, I guess I can just buy more units and place them around the room? I dont really want a wind tunnel!

Sagalout · 2 Jul 2009 at 14:48

Ours gives an initial blast to get the air temp down, but is then reasonably quiet, with a thermostat to maintain temp.

Personally I'd get one good one rather than 2 others, which would mean 2 lots of exhausts etc

Will Gill · 2 Jul 2009 at 14:52

Sagalout said:
Ours gives an initial blast to get the air temp down, but is then reasonably quiet, with a thermostat to maintain temp.

Personally I'd get one good one rather than 2 others, which would mean 2 lots of exhausts etc

only prob being my bedroom has a mezannine area so the unit would possibly struggle to heat both levels?

at the moment I cant go anywhere near my bed till about 4am when it gets to a cool 25c!!

Hyper · 2 Jul 2009 at 15:12

The advantages of my room in the loft, both velux windows wide open given me a nice cool breeze

Danger Phoenix · 2 Jul 2009 at 23:21

I just remembered this in my room, which goes into the chimney:

We get crap coming down the chimney sometimes, so I am guessing it is not sealed from the top, which is ideal for me.

I was thinking, I could take the grill off and get something like this:

or

This would save me opening the window

Things change I've changed · 3 Jul 2009 at 03:46

Well my system is working a lot better now as I've got some cardboard and made a basic window kit to help stop the cool air escaping, I think I'll use it as a template and cut some foam/plastic to the same size for a semi-permanent installation.

Also running the a/c unit on manual mode @ the lowest temperature settings helps cool the room a lot better than auto mode, I find in auto mode the compressor turns off too early.

The unit is also running a lot quieter now as well, I didn't realise it at first but most of the noise I was originally experiencing was the chassis/casing vibrating, I've fixed that now though, it's not quiet but it sounds a lot better than before, I've had the unit on for a couple of hours now on full power, it was 27c in my room at the time and now it has just hit 21c and still dropping so very nice cool temperature indeed.

eggyoke · 3 Jul 2009 at 09:12

I ordered one from argos on monday but its not coming until next monday

I thought I'd survive until then, but last night I just couldn't sleep... I was lying in a puddle of sweat with a fan on full blast and my window wide open. It must have been about 35 degrees in my room.

I think I'm going to sleep downstairs tonight if its bad again. By the time the air con comes the weather will probably get cold

Margaret · 3 Jul 2009 at 09:15

Finally got one yesterday, came with a pipe to stick out the window, my room is actually bearable now and I can finally sleep.

woohoomoo · 3 Jul 2009 at 23:40

Would love a portable air con for my bedroom, but my bed is right beside the double-window as the room cannot really be arranged any other way. That said, the only place it could sit is at the bottom of my bed which I have a feeling will give me really cold tootsies... plus, the distance to the window is about 2m, which always seems to be 0.5m too short for the length of hose most of these ~£100-150 units come with.

I guess my fate is to suffer through these unbearable summer days

Howard · 4 Jul 2009 at 18:33

I've just been and bought an 8kBTU "Duracraft" one from Focus and it's doing a good job of cooling down my little study so far

Has a remote too which will be useful when I use it in the bedroom, and came with a 'thin' exhaust hose tip which you put out a window, to save having it open further for a round pipe.

I, like lowrider will probably fashion some cardboard/foam insert I can use for the gap that the window has to be open