Hail Storm wrote:
I moved into an apartment in January and wasn't giving a/c too much
thought; I should have. I'm in a suburb of KC on the top floor, flat
roof, 1 bedroom, probably about 850 sq. feet.

The sliding glass doors get blasted with the afternoon sun living room
faces west. I put up "supposedly insulated" draperies. Things weren't
too bad until about 3 weeks ago when the temps really soared and the sun
has been relentless. The entire side of the apartment has no windows,
but faces south.

The ancient no-name a/c does OK until it hits the mid 90's and if the
sun is shining all day, by about 3pm the temp in the area towards the
sliding glass doors is 83 and 80-81 in the interior. It helps a bit to
shut off the vent to the bedroom (and shut the door) until the evening
to try to force a little more towards the "sunny side" but even at that,
if it's a 93-100 degree day, and the sun is shining all day, the a/c
runs continuously from about 10-11am until 7-8pm, then cycles (and
cools) very well even on recent very hot nights. If it's a cloudy day,
there is no problem; the a/c cycles all day, maintaining 75 with no
problem and seemingly not a lot of run time. This is my first summer
here and I don't know the climate, but I used to live in the Washington,
DC area and remember some top-floor garden units having the same problem.

The weather has moderated just a bit, down perhaps 5 degrees, resulting
in 78-81 in the living room with the a/c running nonstop until sunset
where it quickly attains 75.

The engineer here says the a/c units are old, undersized, and there's
nothing I can do. He says they are 1 1/2 ton units, probably very, very
old. There is no question that the a/c works under reasonable
conditions, but it seems to really lose it past a certain point. I'm
used to living in apartments since the 70's that had individual heat
pumps, and they seemed more resilient with extreme temps; this unit is
still cooling on these hot days, but either due to the extreme heat load
from the sun/top floor/flat roof/etc. OR the vintage equipment, it has
to run a lot to keep it cool. He says the unit is functioning as well
as it can, pressures checked and all that. I did what I could as a
"tenant" - I was amazed to see the electric furnace/ac coil on top unit
tucked into a little closet with a bifold door with tiny slits that
can't possibly pass enough air, and in fact the unit rumbled and got
quieter when I just started leaving the door open a few inches. I
figured that another bad thing about starving it for air is that it
would pull more from the small but still-there spaces around
wiring/duct/refrigerant lines going up through the ceiling... that it
would pull down hot air. The engineer is trying to get me a new bifold
door with real air intake vents on the bottom (furnace built up on a
wooden platform, draws air underneath from the front).

So the bottom line is the engineer says this is the best I can do, my
electric bill will no doubt be tremendous next month. I'm having some
health problems, and my landlord is looking into "waiving a move charge
before my lease is up" to another unit in the complex. Should I expect
more from the a/c or was I spoiled by the shady trees and powerful heat
pumps back east?

Thanks - Bill

I wonder when your AC unit was last cleaned professionally.
It can improve the performance of any HVAC unit by quite a
bit especially if has gone a long time between cleanings.
My guys and me recommend cleaning once a year for a home AC
and twice a year for a commercial AC or any heat pump. The
amount of dirt that comes out of a unit would surprise you.

[8~{} Uncle Monster