Hot spot - Airflow/Aircon

Elinore

Hi everyone,

We have a three-storey townhouse made up in a conversion of an old Victorian hospital building. Its laid out in an H shape the long parts are the rooms and in the middle is bathrooms, landings cupboards and the staircase. It has very high ceilings and wooden windows with solar glass.

The rest of the house is cool in the summer and adequately heated in the winter, despite the fact it has floor to ceiling windows in most rooms. The sun falls on the back of the house through most of the day.

We have one problem room which also happens to be the main bedroom at the top of the house - it's boiling hot all the time. it has a huge set of patio doors (to the back) which remain open nearly all year but the room sits at a steady 24 most days. In this heat, it has been unbearable in the mid-30s. Over the last few years, we have experimented with shutting/opening different windows, closing and opening different doors to see if we can disperse the hot spot but nada. The other room on the same floor with the same layout and equidistant to the top of the staircase is cool and pleasant. (why dont we move into that room? - because we had our office/snug fitted in there before we realised, which is a shame)

In the problem bedroom, I was looking to have a portable good quality air conditioner fitted vented by a pipe to outside. A nosy coworker saw what I was researching on my lunch break started spouting off about 'double pipes' airflow dynamics and I will just make the rest of the house hotter by cooling the hot spot as it will be drawing air in - it was a total recipe for disaster and the type of air conditioner I was looking to buy should be banned because of this.....and so on.

He does have some background in engineering but also is a bit loose with his facts and has a habit of overstating his knowledge in areas. He got really quite het up that I was considering doing such a thing and waggled his finger at me telling me I would regret it if I went ahead with such a foolish plan.

So I was just checking with you guys, what do you think? anyone clued upon such issues?

missile

This would appear to be a serious issue for you and worth spending a bit of cash to resolve?

Although more expensive I would suggest you consider a permanent installation. I won't bore you with why an inverter unit is more efficient and cheaper to run. Make sure you choose a quiet unit for a bedroom. I was very happy with the Panasonic units I had installed in a property in Spain. https://www.orionairsales.co.uk/panasonic-air-conditioning-wall-mounted-etherea-heat-pump-inverter-294-c.asp

Elinore

Thanks for the reply Missile.

Long term that's what we are likely to have done (we have the quote)

Sadly budget-wise that's a fair ways off and I just got an award of Amazon vouchers from my work that would pay for the portable as a temporary measure. the perfect solution - so I thought.

But i didn't want to solve one problem to create another. Irritatingly the engineer didn't feel the need to advise a solution only espouse dire predictions!

missile

A portable air conditioner might work for you. Perhaps buy from JL and if it doesn't satisfy you, make use of their no quibble money back guarantee.

If money is tight, a bowl of ice in front of a fan might give you some temporary relief.

coffeehound

Elinore wrote: »

We have one problem room which also happens to be the main bedroom at the top of the house - it's boiling hot all the time. it has a huge set of patio doors (to the back) which remain open nearly all year but the room sits at a steady 24 most days. In this heat, it has been unbearable in the mid-30s. Over the last few years, we have experimented with shutting/opening different windows, closing and opening different doors to see if we can disperse the hots spot but nada. The other room on the same floor with the same layout and equidistant to the top of the staircase is cool and pleasant.

Any idea why this room gets so warm? Is there a heat source below?

Elinore

Hi coffeehound,


The room below is the living room - currently empty whilst we slowly make our way round to getting it renovated. Its all nice n cool in there. Below the living room is the integral garage.


So there is nothing that would cause the room to be hotter than any other?


The only difference from the same room on the same level is that in the loft above the hot spot there are huge water tanks.


When we got a quote to have the heating redone the engineer did mention that they were surprisingly and rather unnecessarily large as well as two of them, which he seemed to think was unusual.


Would that account for any difference (clutching at straws here)


if not I'm just going to get the aircon anyway!


On a hilarious side note - My friend is absolutely convinced its a ghost from the old hospital being that it did have a burns unit somewhere in this end of the original building lol - so maybe I need to get the ghostbusters rather than an aircon.

coffeehound

Ha, I thought ghosts were meant to make a building cold

Strange about the tanks; are they hot or cold tanks? Suppose hospitals get through a lot of water.

Anyway it sounds like you've exhausted all the ventilation options so aircon is the answer.

Rodders53

If the tanks are the source of the heat into that room you'd feel it radiating from the ceiling into the room.

Hot air rises, cold air drops, so keeping the room shut up, with blackout blinds and curtains during the day may help a bit? Only opening windows at night, and using large fans to cool you down.

We have fitted blackout solar blinds to our patio doors due to excess heat gain from the, allegedly, solar glass. Closing the curtains helps, too.

But we have a modern house and our bedroom is hot summer and winter. We fitted Fujitsu LUCA split-pack heat pumps to cool the room and on tickover are quiet @ 21 dB(A) indoor... the Panasonic one suggested is 19dB.

Portable room units are (often very) noisy. The few hundred pounds they cost would be better used towards a proper split pack unit. Sell the vouchers to someone you know who wants to buy from Amazon?

coffeehound

Yeah if it is the tanks on the floor above causing the extra warming, then it would be worth using insulation and reflective foil to cover the floor above plus any accessible pipework to reduce the amount of radiated heat.

Elinore

The tanks are coldwater for the heating and plumbing. Tried to check the ceiling in that room against the other - but couldn't really tell if it was any different (a rather unscientific method admittedly)

We are saving hard for the aircon so will get a proper unit asap.

But as we have the means via the vouchers we will get a portable, that way if it does cause any issues in the rest of the house there has been no outlay.

Mee

I have a similar problem, but with a kitchen/lounge dinner which gets the full force of the sun most of the day. It has a French style window and two smaller windows, and I have the windows closed and curtains closed during the day. I'm short on space and on limited funds, but wondered whether some of the heat control window film solutions may be the best option for me...? Has anyone tried heat control window film? Or would recommend investing in thermal blackout curtains?