Portable air conditioners are a relatively new addition to the market. Instead of a window mount, they have a free-standing design that resembles a huge dehumidifier. The devices have a single or dual hose exhaust vented through a flexible duct to a neighboring window.
To get the best results from your air conditioner, there are a number of things you need to do. Here are some of these things as given by air conditioner repair services.
Buy a dual-hose AC
These systems feature two “loops,” for the two different functions required to cool and remove heat from your room. The first loop sends air from your house through cooling coils and back into your house.
The heat is released outside your home via the second loop, which is located on the other side of the system.
The air in your home is not used to blow hot air outside; the two loops remain fully independent: the AC cools the interior air in a loop, and the AC unit outside your home releases heat in a separate loop.
Dual-hose devices mimic the ancient way by drawing air from outside your home, blowing it over condenser coils, and directing heat from the AC unit through the other hose.
It’s not perfect because some heat will radiate back into your room via the flexible intake and exhaust hoses, but it’s far superior to the single-hose design.
What’s the problem with the single-hose design? The heat is ejected through a single exhaust hose. This creates negative pressure in the same way as putting a fan in your window would.
What happens when you place a window fan in it? It generates a draft from other parts of your house. You can send air out a window without replacing it with air from somewhere else.
Whereas a standard air conditioner or even a dual-hose portable unit is constantly pulling in air from the room, cooling it, and returning it while maintaining balanced air pressure in the room, a single-hose system is constantly lowering the pressure in the room and drawing unconditioned air from outside the room through any ingress points—under the door, unsealed outlets or window frames, and so on.
As a result, while a single-hose AC unit may make you feel cool if you stand directly in front of it, and the room may be slightly cooler overall, it will never feel as cool and dry as a dual-hose AC unit or window unit—because it is constantly drawing hot air from outside the room. It’s similar to operating your air conditioner with a window open.
Use the correct window adapter.
If you have a normal single or double-hung window, chances are the window adapter that came with your portable AC unit will fit well in it. The only thing to remember is to use weather stripping or tape to fill any gaps around the edges.
However, you’ll need a different adapter if your window isn’t a conventional hanging. In a pinch, you can make your own out of whatever materials you have around the house, but you might want something aesthetically pleasing and custom-made.
A tall vertical adapter is required to vent out of a sliding glass door. If your window is a casement, you’ll need a flexible cloth adaptor to drape over it.
When obtaining an adapter, keep the following factors in mind to avoid being stuck with an adapter that does not fit your AC unit or window:
Adjust the adapter diameter to fit your unit. Hoses are commonly available in 5.1′′ or 5.9′′ diameters. The actual window kit may include a round or oval hole (if it does, it should consist of a little adapter for your round hose).
Take meticulous measurements of the window. If your sliding glass door opening is 87 inches tall and the adaptor can only be extended to 70 inches, you will be more than a foot short.
Leave the unit running.
When you’re at work or otherwise away from home, it may be tempting to switch off the unit. While this is an energy-efficient (and cost-effective) option, the portable AC unit will perform even worse while you’re at home and wanting to stay cool.
When you chill your home, you are not only cooling the air. You’re also cooling the house’s contents. This includes your furniture, books on your bookshelf, clothes in your closet, and the entire structure surrounding you.
If you arrive home from work and your house has been scorching in the sun all day, your little portable AC unit will struggle to extract heat and effectively cool the property for the remainder of the evening and into the night.
Removing heat at night and running the system all day to regulate heat is far more efficient than waiting until every square inch of the room is heated.
Watch for water buildup.
Your portable air conditioning unit contains an air filter that keeps large dust particles, pet fur, and other debris from going directly to the coils. You should check this filter regularly (or directly inspect the coils if your machine lacks a filter) for the best operation.
A dirty filter can not only reduce the efficiency of your unit, but if you leave it too long, you may have more serious issues, such as your coils icing over or the unit burning out.
Furthermore, be careful of the type of portable AC unit you have and how it handles moisture. Many types are “fully evaporative,” which means that the moisture pulled from the air by the unit is ejected from your home together with the warm air through the exhaust line.
Some units are only partially evaporative, so you’ll need to empty it like a dehumidifier (by pulling out the bucket and dropping it down the drain). On the other hand, others have a drain line with a pump that you can run out the same window as the exhaust vent.
Even if you have a completely evaporative unit, extremely humid weather may need you to manually drain the unit via a little drain plug at the model’s base.
You can do the draining yourself or hire AC repair services Smithtown.