Air conditioning
 

so it's fkn hot!! great cause the booty shorts girls are coming out :thumbsup: but shitting when u are rolling in bed trying to sleep

so I'm looking for a portable air conditioner and want to know if I should go for 7000 BTU vs. 12,000 BTU.

I know the higher the BTU the stronger/colder the air con is, but is 7000 enough? the price is about double for 12,000 so if 7,000 is enough i rather just get 7000. Can't find anything on google how exactly how strong a BTU is, I get this scientific non-sense :confused:

thanks in advance

It depends on how big your room is and whether it's facing the sun. For me my old 6500 BTU could barely keep it under 28 degrees in the afternoon. With my new 13000 BTU unit I can get the room to 24 degrees.

Yup, depends on the room size. I got AC installed in my entire house last year and it was fairly cheap. I got fed up with portable AC units, it's good for a small room but for larger rooms it's not worth it.

12,000 btu = approx. 550 sq. ft room

I saw a pretty good deal for one in the province newspaper today. Its. 4-1 portable AC unit, 12,000 btu for 450$.

You don't need A/C. It's Vancouver. Temperature peaked today, and it's going to cool down, for at least, the next week. Save your money and buy some frosty beers instead. I've only got window fans setup, and with some clever flow control, and closing the blinds, my condo is reasonably cooler than outside.

Good point but remember it's only June, it usually gets hotter in July/August so we still have a good 2 maybe even 3 months of hot, dry weather.

climate change / global greenhouse emissions!!

my room faces west and there is only one window... the 12inch I got isn't cutting it when I have my laptops and computers on.... well even just sitting in my room is crazy hot.

Is 2am now and still too hot to sleep >< I thinK I SHOULD get another fan. lol

I just use natural AC.. shade LOL. The front and top level of my house is baking but I stay at the ground level at the back under the sun-deck and its relatively cool. :D Best of all its free and no emissions! :D

I want to line the whole backyard with trees to keep even cooler but the garden is in the way :mad:

Yeah...it's hot and I can hardly sleep!

consumer reports just did a test on the portables and none of them did the job...

i had no idea some of the larger ones are almost 80lbs+!

Glad I live in a basement suite :) when I used to live upstairs my room was facing the front, in the afternoons it was scorching. I bought an AC machine and had to have it on all afternoon for my room to be cool :(

Just soak up a wet cold towel and wrap it around your neck or something.

You're losing bowel movement control in bed? Wow, that is hot.

I lol'ed

I have a quick Q regarding portable ACs,

Some of the newer models now have bucketless systems and use exhaust pipes to drain the water out, how do you guys deal with pipes, or is it even necessary to worry about that?

Most people need to understand the concept of air flow.

Like what was said above, if you place fans in some sort of a wind tunnel setup, and block off any major leaks of air, you can get a pretty decent breeze on hot days, and on hotter days, you just have to minimize the amount of sun coming into your place as well.

Following this method, i've been able to keep my place cool, without a/c for a while. I do have central at one house, but it racks up the bills >_<

For my condo, i've got a portable A/C unit in the master for when it's too hot, and otherwise, all the doors open to the patio during the day

I'm only on the 4th floor apartment and my temp read 32 degrees. It's brutal, I have two fans blowing and my patio/window doors are open. Any suggestions on maximizing air flow?

~650sq/ft, should I get a portable A/C??

I ended up putting a bag of ice on my head last night =(

i just got the fan to max in my room.. and its doing the trick so far...

^ Go for a swim :)

someone suggested to put a bowl of ice in front of the fan... not sure if that is effective.

Yeah and they cost $500

why don't u go for the cheaper more enviro friendly option like i did (um...or so i think...):

buy one of those ceiling fans which also have lightbulbs and screw it in place of your lightbulb in your room. You get light+3 settings of cooling, without damaging the environment or spending big bucks

I live on the 4th floor, as well. My place is definitely cooler than outside. I don't have thermometer, so I don't have any metrics for you. Like Jun says, it's all about air flow. Close the patio door. Install window fans in every room. Depending on the time of day, you'll set your fans to intake or exhaust. What you want to do is have flow. Don't have all the fans doing the same thing.

I currently have 2 fans setup. One in the kitchen, and one in my room. It's usually cooler in my room, so that fan is set to intake, and the kitchen window fan is set to exhaust. This allows the cooler air to flow through my apartment, and the air won't get stale and hot.

I also make sure I close the blinds before I sleep, so the morning sun doesn't heat up my east facing living room. My neighbor would have sweat pouring from his forehead in the morning, when I see him in the elevator. He keeps forgetting to close his blinds.

My parents have one of those A/C units that sits outside the house, but they never use it. They don't have to. They just open up the vents in the basement, and have window fans in all the rooms upstairs, which are all set to exhaust. It pulls all the cold air from basement. Their place is always cool.

how much does centralized A/C usually cost for a 4000sqft house