Air conditioning/portable/air cooler

givememoney

This awful temperature we've just experienced if 39° has made me think of getting some form of cooling for the house. Please any info on what to buy

FreeBear

How much money fo you have to burn on electricity bills ?

Neighbour insists on running one every night during the summer, and is around 10,000KWh p.a. on electricity. Although, with the recent price hikes, I think she has realised it is an unaffordable luxury.

If you want a lower cost method of cooling, have a look at an evaporative cooler. It won't chill the air as much, but the running costs will be a lot lower.

Lomast

That's a crazy amount of electricity how big is their ac unit? my portable draws around 600watts average so is around £2 to run all night but normally I only have it on for 2-3   hours a night during a normal summer

markin

They start at £260 on Amazon, A lot more for a name brand, Don't get a cheaper one where you fill it with ice or water with a fan that just blows that around.

Mine is around 7kwh a day when its working hard all day/night in a heat wave, So for 5 months would cost 1050 kwh = £304, But IF we had a 5 month heat wave, we are all in trouble!  In reality the fan/blower on low will use around 2kwh a day so on light duty maybe 4kwh /day £274.  Or only use it for 2 weeks a year for 100kwh / £29 


Search term  AC 10,000btu
https://www.amazon.co.uk/NETTA-8000-BTU-Portable-Conditioner/dp/B07SH2RQXX/
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Portable-Conditioner-Dehumidifier-Cooling-Digital/dp/B09MT3YJLG/

If you have a big freezer 2l bottles filled with water and a fan over it would have the same affect as the ones you fill with water or ice, I tried it years ago and then got a real ac unit, And then i got a second unit after last years heat.

markin

Lomast said:

That's a crazy amount of electricity how big is their ac unit? my portable draws around 600watts average so is around £2 to run all night but normally I only have it on for 2-3   hours a night during a normal summer

When i got a second unit last year i monitored it for an hr with a plug in watt monitor, It started out at around 600w but withing 20min it slowly came down to around 250w - 300w while still blowing cold out, And daily electric meter readings show it to be using closer to 7kwh for 21hrs of use.

Doozergirl

I have just purchased a big portable air con unit.  I ran it for about 2 hours to help me get to sleep the last couple of nights.  

I do worry about the running cost, which is why I didn't run it for that long, but my quality of sleep was better than it would have been! 

I think it's nice to have as an occasional thing.  We have somewhere to tuck it away when it's not needed.  

Next time I think I'll move it downstairs where it's a bit cooler anyway.  No real point trying to cool the hottest part of the house, just stay downstairs.  

shiraz99

For the money it would be cheaper booking into a hotel with air con for the handful of days we actually see this sort of extreme heat.

Doozergirl

shiraz99 said:

For the money it would be cheaper booking into a hotel with air con for the handful of days we actually see this sort of extreme heat.

Not sure about that!  Even for the cheapest hotels, you're only talking about a few nights.   

This kind of weather will be getting more regular too.  

And different houses behave differently.  Anyone sleeping in a loft is going to be uncomfortable, even when its insulated as you've then got warm air rising that is trapped.  

givememoney

Thanks everyone it will have to be a portable. Any recommendations of makes if this is allowed.

ComicGeek

Doozergirl said:

I have just purchased a big portable air con unit.  I ran it for about 2 hours to help me get to sleep the last couple of nights.  

I do worry about the running cost, which is why I didn't run it for that long, but my quality of sleep was better than it would have been! 

I think it's nice to have as an occasional thing.  We have somewhere to tuck it away when it's not needed.  

Next time I think I'll move it downstairs where it's a bit cooler anyway.  No real point trying to cool the hottest part of the house, just stay downstairs.  

The advantage of cooling the upstairs is to reduce the amount of heat migrating downstairs. Heat will also try and flow from hot to cold areas, so just cooling downstairs while upstairs gets hotter and hotter just eliminates that helpful buffer. Cold air doesn't naturally travel around the house, the cooled room actually draws in heat from elsewhere.

I run our portable air con unit in the hottest room upstairs, and use a tower fan in front to blow cold air into the landing. I try and prevent that heat moving around the house. The trick is to prevent internal temperature from rising as much as possible - so external shading, closing blinds/curtains to block direct sun, closing windows when its hotter outside than in.

This is a major advantage of a 2-storey house rather than a bungalow - you can use the upper floor as a thermal buffer. Our downstairs was still 'only' 25 degrees when outside was 36 degrees.

I found that running the air con unit in a bedroom for about 30mins each evening was enough to precool the room for the night. That would only cost me about 50p normally, but I actually ran it for free from my PV charged battery. That is the brilliant bit about cooling and PV, the two work really well together.

vic_sf49

I bought a Goodhome one in 2020. It does a good job of cooling a room, but I couldn't run it at night as it's extremely loud in aircon mode.

I had it set to 23 in my bedroom, which it was achieving, and I'm not too far away from where the hottest temp was set.

I'm in a bungalow, so have no cooler downstairs spaces to escape to.... and solar panels installed by the previous owner make it free to run.

It's very effective just in fan mode, and I think it has a dehumidifier setting too.

givememoney said:

Thanks everyone it will have to be a portable. Any recommendations of makes if this is allowed.