On 6/24/2014 8:51 AM, micky wrote:
On Tue, 24 Jun 2014 12:02:38 +0000 (UTC), Tegger
wrote:

micky wrote in
:

A friend's air conditioning has failed and she doesn't have the money to
replace the compressor etc.

So she's looking at so-called portable AC One unit she saw looks nice,
has the right controls plus remote, but only has an output hose.



I've had two of those single-hose portable A/C units.

They work just fine -- for one room only. They don't have the volume to
cool two rooms.

One room would be enough. That's pretty much all she uses anyhow,
except for the bathroom, and I called her this morning and she said a)
the bathroom was never a problem. Being hot for a while is not a
problem. The problem was sleeping all night in the heat, and having no
refuge to go to in the daytime except the basement, whether there is no
place good to lie down. b) if she has to, she can start using the
bathroom that connects with her bedroom. It's small (~30 sq. ft. as I
think I said) and will probably cool off when the room does if the door
is left open.

They do take longer than a window unit or central A/C to cool that one
room, but they do work, even at ambient temperatures of 100F.

It is important that the exhaust-hose be sealed where it meets the window
to prevent the hot exhaust air from re-entering the room, which would
increase cooling time. For me, this meant cutting up some corrugated
cardboard to fit, and stuffing some Kleenex in the gaps left over. The
units came with some hardware to seal-off the exhaust hose, but this
hardware didn't fit my windows, hence the cardboard.

Okay. She was also worried about the noise, but suggested herself that
she could turn it on in advance and maybe not have to run it at when
she's sleeping. Some of them have sleep timers or On timers or both.

Thanks, and thanks to all.


I'm thinking most of the air will enter through the open basement window
-- 200 times as big as the openings in the mail slot -- where it will
be cooled by the constant 64 degrees in the basement before it
eventually gets upstairs.

In fact I met a guy who said he got good results cooling his upstairs
just by letting his furnace fan run, bringing up cool air from the
basement. I suggested that years ago hear and got shot down by
everyone, but he says it works.

If this was addressed I missed it (sorry) - does she own the house? If
so, would she consider doing a "through the wall" unit? My last (row)
house had two of those in the two main bedrooms and I really liked them
because I could still use the regular windows if I wanted. Someone had
made an a/c sized hole in the wall under the window, put in a window
unit and just framed in somehow around it. Of course, someone would have
to make the hole in the wall, but at least it's a one time deal. When I
had to get one replaced, I could just buy a regular window unit and the
appliance store I bought it from installed it. They really only worked
for one room each, although when I felt clever, I'd hang a tension
curtain rod at the top of the stairs and hang a piece of plastic, which
actually did a decent job of keeping the cooler air on the second floor
when I ran both units.

Otherwise since the basement is cooler, is there a way to configure a
whole house window fan and have it pull air from the basement? I lucked
out in that house because I had a laundry chute that I left open as a
big air duct. (I don't mean a regular window fan; they make/made window
exhast fans that sounded like small airplanes and were pretty powerful).

I hope you can figure something out to help her. Nothing worse than
being hot and sticky while you're trying to sleep.