Speedy Jim wrote:
Nate Nagel wrote:

Hi all,

well, it's finally summer here in DC. Yay. House has no A/C. Yeah,
I know, but I loved the place and there's lots of trees for shade.
Here's the problem; it gets up over 90 degrees outside during the
day. With the windows closed and blinds drawn it gets up to about 80
in the upstairs (rest of house is comfortable when I get home from
work.) As soon as the outside temp drops below the inside temp, I
will open all the upstairs windows and turn on the cheap floor fan
that the PO's left for me to try to blow some outside air through the
house. It doesn't seem to be working - outside temp will drop to 65
degrees or cooler overnight but the bedroom will still be 75 degrees
or so when I wake up in the morning. I suspect if I could get the
ambient temp. of the upstairs down to the same temp as the outside and
then shut everything up when I left for work, it wouldn't even be as
hot when I got home, but I seem to be getting little or no cooling
from having the windows open.

To those of you who also persist in living without A/C, what's the
best way to deal with this - get a bunch of window mount fans to try
to set up an artificial cross breeze, or would installing ceiling fans
provide enough circulation? (the girlie wants to do the latter
anyway, and the only reason I haven't done it yet is because I still
need to get up in the attic and install the heavier boxes and drop
some 14/3 switch legs to the wall boxes.)

I've also thought about tricking the furnace fan into running to
circulate cool air up from the basement, but I haven't really dug into
it that much yet. Would that be a worthwhile modification?

thanks,

nate


Invest in a couple of very powerful window fans.
Not the $20 box fan, real window fans.

While you're in the attic, survey the insulation level.

Insane. Previous owners got almost too jiggy with the insulation. I do
believe that the walls are uninsulated however, not a big deal up to the
2nd floor (all masonry) but probably ought to be insulated at some point
above that (sticks covered with asbestos shingle)


If windows receive sun, do *something* to prevent that
heat getting in.

yeah, just put up heavy curtains in the bedroom in the SE corner, the
one in the SW corner has none as of yet (only used as an office/computer
room) all other rooms have blinds which are closed during the day

nate


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