On Jul 25, 8:32 pm, "Don Young" wrote:
"mg" wrote in message

ps.com...



I have a shed with extremely small windows that I use mostly for
storage, but I do have a small area with a work-bench, etc. I also
have a window-mount air-conditioner that I received from a friend
basically free (on a trade). The unit is probably old, but my friend
said it hadn't been used much. This is not an evaporative cooler, by
the way. It's a regular, 220-Volt air conditioner.

I'm planning on building a stand for it (out of treated lumber) next
to an outside wall of the shed and even putting a little roof over it.
Then I'll route the air through the wall of the shed using a round air
duct(s) -- Maybe use an 8 or 10-inch duct(s), I guess.

I'm a complete novice with A/C and the front bezel is missing from the
air-conditioner, so I'm not sure exactly how it works. I assume that
the top area of the unit intakes air and the bottom outputs air. So,
I'm wondering if I need two separate ducts or if I can simply run
everything through one duct? If I use two separate ducts, does it
matter if the ducts are physically close together inside the shed?
Could I simply set it up to suck air from outside the shed and then
open a window?

The air conditioner is much, much larger than what I actually need.
It's rated at 28000 BTU and the shed is about 300 square feet with
open rafters and very little insulation and 4 small air vents in the
roof. I don't use the shed a lot, maybe 20 or 30 hours a year. So, the
electric bill isn't an issue. In the hot weather, like we're having
now though, the shed gets close to 100 degrees, So, I would like to be
able to cool it and cool it off fast when I do need to do a small
project, etc.

I'm guessing I'll have to go down to the local sheet-metal shop and
have something fabricated, but I'm wondering if I might be able to
simply make something out of canvas and PVC pipe, for instance. The A/
C unit will be behind the shed where it doesn't show, so it doesn't
matter if the setup looks a little bit kludgy.

That's an unusual approach but I think it would work if you use 2 separate
ducts similar in size to the inlet and outlet areas of the unit and make
them reasonably short. I am not going to address the efficiency, safety,
practicality, adviseability, or other aspects of your idea.

Don Young

Thanks Don.

In doing some Google searching, I found this old post:

----------------------------------------------------------------
"Adding ducts to an AC window unit
.. . . if you will get with G/E and Whirlpool and you will find out
they have a duct adaptor kits to tie on to window units on 16K, 24K ,
and 29k window units to use duct work on the units to use in
commercial applications. Also even Sears has a adapter kit for
the 24K & 29K window unit to be put on trailor houses. Now of course
my sheet metal man can make them cheaper than buying them . . . about
5 years ago I did a job with 3 G/E 29K window units and did have to
order the duct kits to install them and get the pattern for my
sheetmetal man to look at and start making our own duct adaptor
kits. . ."
----------------------------------------------------------

So, it does look like this sort of thing has been done before.