Hi
just back from trip to France & Spain- visited local DIY shed (BricoDepot)
saw a split aircon unit for 199 euros. It's a heating/cooling type with two
units. At that price I couldn't resist. I'm now planning the install, and
despite the instructions and instructional DVD being in French it seems
fairly straightforward.
My question is : is it possible/advisable to mount the compressor unit (that
would normally go on an outside wall) in the loft space? We have a largeish
house (6 bedrooms) with a correspondingly large loft.
Aside from making the installation easy, it saves mounting an ugly box on an
outside wall.
The aircon would be used rarely, to heat or cool a bedroom at times, so
wouldn't be running anywhere like 24/7.
Any thoughts?
TIA
Neil

Gripper formulated the question :

My question is : is it possible/advisable to mount the compressor unit (that
would normally go on an outside wall) in the loft space? We have a largeish
house (6 bedrooms) with a correspondingly large loft.
Aside from making the installation easy, it saves mounting an ugly box on an
outside wall.

Generally, no....

Most loft spaces become extremely hot in the summer just from the heat
of the sun on the roof. I have seen them loft mounted, but they have
been well insulated from the sun's heat and well ventilated.

--

Regards,
Harry (M1BYT) (L)
http://www.ukradioamateur.co.uk

"Gripper" wrote in message
...
Hi
just back from trip to France & Spain- visited local DIY shed (BricoDepot)
saw a split aircon unit for 199 euros. It's a heating/cooling type with
two units. At that price I couldn't resist. I'm now planning the install,
and despite the instructions and instructional DVD being in French it
seems fairly straightforward.
My question is : is it possible/advisable to mount the compressor unit
(that would normally go on an outside wall) in the loft space? We have a
largeish house (6 bedrooms) with a correspondingly large loft.
Aside from making the installation easy, it saves mounting an ugly box on
an outside wall.
The aircon would be used rarely, to heat or cool a bedroom at times, so
wouldn't be running anywhere like 24/7.
Any thoughts?
TIA
Neil

it puts out hot damp air and maybe even a stream of water, it also relies on
cooler air to take the heat away, so no, the loft is not suitable.

mrcheerful (6 air con units at home, plus giant ones at work)

In article ,
"Gripper" writes:
Hi
just back from trip to France & Spain- visited local DIY shed (BricoDepot)
saw a split aircon unit for 199 euros. It's a heating/cooling type with two
units. At that price I couldn't resist. I'm now planning the install, and
despite the instructions and instructional DVD being in French it seems
fairly straightforward.
My question is : is it possible/advisable to mount the compressor unit (that
would normally go on an outside wall) in the loft space? We have a largeish
house (6 bedrooms) with a correspondingly large loft.

As others have said, no because it won't be able to get rid of
the heat. Another factor is there are usually relative height
restrictions between the indoor and outdoor units. Check the
instructions as you may well find the outdoor unit has to be
lower than the indoor unit. (They can be made to work the
other way round, but the DIY ones don't seem to be.)

--
Andrew Gabriel

In message , Andrew Gabriel
writes
Check the
instructions as you may well find the outdoor unit has to be
lower than the indoor unit. (They can be made to work the
other way round, but the DIY ones don't seem to be.)
That very point had put me off buying a DIY one for some time until I
had a word with an air con' engineer. He said that the main reason for
this in the DIY ones was because they relied on gravity to take the
water that collected in the inside unit down to the outside where it was
evaporated off. Apparently this isn't essential for the operation of the
kit, so as long as you can find away of getting rid of the water from
the inside unit the outside can be above it. I haven't followed this up
yet but it seemed to make sense at the time.



--
Bill

In article ,
Bill writes:
In message , Andrew Gabriel
writes
Check the
instructions as you may well find the outdoor unit has to be
lower than the indoor unit. (They can be made to work the
other way round, but the DIY ones don't seem to be.)
That very point had put me off buying a DIY one for some time until I
had a word with an air con' engineer. He said that the main reason for
this in the DIY ones was because they relied on gravity to take the
water that collected in the inside unit down to the outside where it was
evaporated off. Apparently this isn't essential for the operation of the
kit, so as long as you can find away of getting rid of the water from
the inside unit the outside can be above it. I haven't followed this up
yet but it seemed to make sense at the time.

I don't think this is the reason. I installed a couple this summer,
which required the outdoor unit to be at least 1m (IIRC) below the
indoor unit. They didn't pipe the condensate between the units.
Also, when buying a non-DIY pre-charged split unit about 10 years
ago, I had to specify the relative height of the inner and outer
units, and if the outer unit wasn't lower than the inner unit, there
was something like an extra £100 cost (and the internal ceiling-
mounted cassette evaporator had a condensate pump built in regardless
of this). I don't know the reason, but it may be something to do with
the gas and liquid phases of the refrigerant, and whether or not they
will naturally stay in the right places or need some extra part to
force this.

Unfortunately, I don't think many aircon engineers understand the
physics/engineering behind the kit they install nowadays (based on
the rather few I've spoken to, admittedly). It seems that when they
need anything which isn't off-the-shelf, a consultant is brought in
to design the system. Then the aircon folks just follow the
instructions provided and are completely clueless if the resulting
system has a problem (seen this a number of times).

--
Andrew Gabriel

In message , Andrew Gabriel
writes

I don't think this is the reason

OK thanks Andrew I shall tread carefully then. My situation is that it
would be very easy to have the outside unit 1m above the inside due to a
flat roof but it would need 10m of piping and a drop of 7m to fit a
lower outside unit.
I shall keep researching.


--
Bill

The message
from "Gripper" contains these words:

My question is : is it possible/advisable to mount the compressor unit
(that
would normally go on an outside wall) in the loft space? We have a largeish
house (6 bedrooms) with a correspondingly large loft.

Where would the heat go?

--
Skipweasel
Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.

"Andrew Gabriel" wrote

As others have said, no because it won't be able to get rid of
the heat. Another factor is there are usually relative height
restrictions between the indoor and outdoor units. Check the
instructions as you may well find the outdoor unit has to be
lower than the indoor unit. (They can be made to work the
other way round, but the DIY ones don't seem to be.)


The unit in question is this one:
http://www.airton.fr/produits/ASW%20...f%20403749.php

In the FAQ is this:
http://www.airton.fr/questions%20frequentes/faq06.php

so the two units may be up to 2 metres difference in height.
The 2 units have separate drains for condensed water. I plan to install the
inside unit on a partition wall between the bedroom and ensuite bathroom, so
the drain from that one can fall to the drain from the sink on the other
side of the partition.
If I do place the other unit in the loft, it will be able to drain into the
c/h header tank. I would place it on rubber to isolate noise and vibration.
I think the compressor/heat exchanger will be able to dump heat, but
obviously not as efficiently as an exterior mounted unit.
The loft has good ventilation, and in view of the low usage I think I'll
give it a go. If it fails miserably I'll let you know, but it may not be
stressed till next summer now.
Thanks to all for troubling to reply.
Neil

On 2006-09-24 13:36:32 +0100, "Gripper" said:

If I do place the other unit in the loft, it will be able to drain into
the c/h header tank.

Not a good plan because the tank will eventually fill and overflow.
More to the point, the corrosion inhibitor will become increasingly
diluted.

On Sun, 24 Sep 2006 13:36:32 +0100, "Gripper" wrote:


"Andrew Gabriel" wrote

As others have said, no because it won't be able to get rid of
the heat. Another factor is there are usually relative height
restrictions between the indoor and outdoor units. Check the
instructions as you may well find the outdoor unit has to be
lower than the indoor unit. (They can be made to work the
other way round, but the DIY ones don't seem to be.)


The unit in question is this one:
http://www.airton.fr/produits/ASW%20...f%20403749.php

In the FAQ is this:
http://www.airton.fr/questions%20frequentes/faq06.php

so the two units may be up to 2 metres difference in height.
The 2 units have separate drains for condensed water. I plan to install the
inside unit on a partition wall between the bedroom and ensuite bathroom, so
the drain from that one can fall to the drain from the sink on the other
side of the partition.
If I do place the other unit in the loft, it will be able to drain into the
c/h header tank. I would place it on rubber to isolate noise and vibration.
I think the compressor/heat exchanger will be able to dump heat, but
obviously not as efficiently as an exterior mounted unit.
The loft has good ventilation, and in view of the low usage I think I'll
give it a go. If it fails miserably I'll let you know, but it may not be
stressed till next summer now.
Thanks to all for troubling to reply.
Neil

Might be worth checking the manual to see if there is any limit on the inlet air temperature - could
maybe have an effect on efficiency if it's too hot coming in

On Sat, 23 Sep 2006 20:05:48 GMT, "mrcheerful
.." wrote:

mrcheerful (6 air con units at home, plus giant ones at work)


What? 6 air conditioners in one house...?

Gripper wrote:

If I do place the other unit in the loft, it will be able to drain into the
c/h header tank. I would place it on rubber to isolate noise and vibration.

In our climate, these things can kick out several litres per hour. Won't
take long to overflow the tank, or cause corrosian in your CH system.


--
Cheers,

John.

/================================================== ===============\
| Internode Ltd - http://www.internode.co.uk |
|-----------------------------------------------------------------|
| John Rumm - john(at)internode(dot)co(dot)uk |
\================================================= ================/

In article ,
"Gripper" writes:

"Andrew Gabriel" wrote

As others have said, no because it won't be able to get rid of
the heat. Another factor is there are usually relative height
restrictions between the indoor and outdoor units. Check the
instructions as you may well find the outdoor unit has to be
lower than the indoor unit. (They can be made to work the
other way round, but the DIY ones don't seem to be.)

The unit in question is this one:
http://www.airton.fr/produits/ASW%20...f%20403749.php

In the FAQ is this:
http://www.airton.fr/questions%20frequentes/faq06.php

so the two units may be up to 2 metres difference in height.
The 2 units have separate drains for condensed water. I plan to install the
inside unit on a partition wall between the bedroom and ensuite bathroom, so
the drain from that one can fall to the drain from the sink on the other
side of the partition.
If I do place the other unit in the loft, it will be able to drain into the
c/h header tank. I would place it on rubber to isolate noise and vibration.

The outside unit only generates condensate when you are using
the unit to heat the house.

I think the compressor/heat exchanger will be able to dump heat, but
obviously not as efficiently as an exterior mounted unit.

It wouldn't work in my loft, which runs at 10-15C higher than the
outside temperature in summer. Also, unless you have very thick
loft insulation, it would just increase the heat radiating back
from the upstairs ceilings, not helped by an additional 2766W
it dumps into the loft space.

I wouldn't like to try lifting one of those into the loft either;-)

--
Andrew Gabriel

On Sun, 24 Sep 2006 13:36:32 +0100, "Gripper"
wrote:

The loft has good ventilation,

Not good enough to disperse the heat one of thoes fukrs gives off!

marvelus wrote:
On Sun, 24 Sep 2006 13:36:32 +0100, "Gripper"
wrote:

The loft has good ventilation,

Not good enough to disperse the heat one of thoes fukrs gives off!

It would have if you put it next to a grill and used it as an extracter fan.
It would cool the loft by extracting the warm air from it.

On 2006-09-25 08:37:13 +0100, "dennis@home"
said:

marvelus wrote:
On Sun, 24 Sep 2006 13:36:32 +0100, "Gripper"
wrote:

The loft has good ventilation,

Not good enough to disperse the heat one of thoes fukrs gives off!

It would have if you put it next to a grill and used it as an extracter fan.
It would cool the loft by extracting the warm air from it.

There are units specifically intended for this application where
everything is in one box, including the compressor and evaporator
units. There are then fans to force air from outside the house
through the compressor section and out again. Ducts on the cold side
connect to and from the rooms.

The message
from contains these words:

It does get a bit hot up there, but no
worse than it would anyway from the solar gain.

Where that idea would fall down in my mind is that the intake air
temperature to the "external" unit would get very high on a hot day,
which reduces the efficiency of the system. And not just a bit, but a
lot.

--
Skipweasel
Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.

On Mon, 25 Sep 2006 07:37:13 GMT, "dennis@home"
wrote:

marvelus wrote:
On Sun, 24 Sep 2006 13:36:32 +0100, "Gripper"
wrote:

The loft has good ventilation,

Not good enough to disperse the heat one of thoes fukrs gives off!

It would have if you put it next to a grill and used it as an extracter fan.
It would cool the loft by extracting the warm air from it.


Agreed if he has a grill that allows a good flow, I thought he just
proposed venting into the loft space in which case the efficiency
would slowly drop untill it stopped working.

"Pete C" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 23 Sep 2006 20:05:48 GMT, "mrcheerful
." wrote:

mrcheerful (6 air con units at home, plus giant ones at work)


What? 6 air conditioners in one house...?

Not quite, one big one that cools upstairs and falls downstairs, one that
runs in the living room, one for the lean to, one in the garage, one spare
portable unit, and one huge MF that I intend to put in one day that will
have outlets in each room and be fed with fresh outside air rather than
recycle the inside air, but to put that in I will need to have had three
weatabix and a month clear.

So in real terms we run two air con units in the warmer weather, another if
it is hot in the garage and I am working there, and one for when there are a
lot of people visiting or it is really warm.

The real advantage is that even in mid summer we still sleep comfortably
wrapped in a duvet, rather than all the windows open, gnats biting our
sweating bodies, which is what most of the population seem to be happy
doing.

Mrcheerful