Portable Air Con Units?

The1nonly1

The1nonly1

The1nonly1

Associate
Joined
24 Jul 2009
Posts
2,380
Location
-
Are they worth the money? Do they cool a room down effectively or would it only be a slight noticable difference?

Can anyone who has one, or used one, offer any recommendations?
 
Quite expensive to buy and even more expensive to run. Loud when running and awkward to properly vent. However, they can definitely cool a room down to temperatures you'd expect from an AC unit... in fact, I had mine running in my son's bedroom for a few hours before bed and he was complaining the room was too cold :cry:

If positioned in the right spot and ran for long enough (couple of days) they will even do a good job of keeping the whole house cold, but it does come at a cost (electricity spend, noise and leakage of waste heat).

Mine's a Black & Decker unit but the portable units are all pretty much the same thing. For me, they are a stop gap to a full split AC system rather than a long term solution.
 
Last edited:
They make a huge difference, but setting them up is difficult. You either want a vent drilled in the wall, or something in the window to stop the hot air getting in. I've used velcro fabric kits and they've worked just fine.

TBH, I tend to run them in a single room if I'm working from home in the summer, or overnight (when my electric is cheap anyway) so how efficient they are is almost irrelevant. I'd happily spend £5 to sleep for a night in the summer.

Obviously fixed units are better, but the install for that would cost me thousands so it's not going to happen.
 
I’ve got 4 units, all ‘12000btu / 3.5kw’ units, one for each person in the house, mainly for summer cooling…

They work fantastically in terms of cooling, absolutely will chill the room and take all the heat out of everything until you are freezing cold..

The down side is you need them near a window (unless you core drill some big vents in each room), and they are noisy in operation.. all 4 of us are fine getting to sleep with them on, but they are not silent, however it’s a white noise which most people can deal with.

I deliberately bought them all when on offer and bought 4 different ones to see which are most practical..
The most compact and useful is the Rhino ac12000, this is slimmer yet cools identically to the others and has motorised vents etc so easier to control without getting out of bed..
 
Last edited:
We have a goodhome unit which absolutely cools down a large room, however they are noisy.

I've bought a smaller unit to see how that will be for keeping our room a bit cooler at night, it's only a few thousand BTU and for 3-5m2 spaces but it is much quieter.
 
Yup got a 12,000 btu unit, put it at the top of the stairs in the landing.

Life saver.

Our solar panels cover the energy use.
 
They help but they're noisy AF, bulky and awkward to setup with the venting for temporary solutions. I've tried venting mine out the window but it doesn't work very well as all the other hot air leaks in. Tried blocking the open bit of the window with pillows and helped but a bit of a dodgy setup. Often falls down.
If you have sash windows it works better as comes with a vent kit that suits them. We don't.

I tried hooking up to the vent in our ensuite extractor fan with a ridiculous amount of gaffer tape and it also peeled off in the night.
Seems there's just no easy vent solution. I'm not drilling a massive hole through the wall for a few nights a year so. I'll just continue to complain about the heat on ocuk forums. Thinks that's for the best and will help the most.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom