I have not owned or worked on any Haier products before, so I did some quick research on them and found that they are an appliance manufacturer, not a manufacturer that specializes in air conditioning.  Needless to say, I don’t expect this thing to last for 20 years under heavy usage, but if I can get 10 years out of it and it works as it is supposed to, then I’ll consider it well worth the cost.

The reason that I even considered purchasing a portable air conditioner to begin with is the fact that we are empty nesters and there is just no reason to run the big central unit to cool off the entire house as much as we used to when the kids where here all of the time.  We still have it turned on so that the heat and humidity don’t ruin our stuff, be we can set it to something higher than a comfortable living temperature for the whole house, and now we can use the portable air conditioning for the bedroom so we can sleep comfortably.  If this works out, then we’ll be looking at a couple more units for the den and kitchen.

This particular model comes with separate air intake and air exhast duct ports, and a window adapter.  It can run in 3 modes: cooling, heating, and dehumidifying.  There is an LCD indicator that let you know when the condensation tank becomes full.  There are 3 an speed: low, medium and high.  There is a timer function that goes up to 24 hours that will turn the unit off automatically.  I’m not sure if and when I would ever use that, but it’s one of those “nice to know it’s there” features.  Heat pump included.  Temperature control.  Remote control included, for all of us lazy bastards that can’t get up out of the lazy boy unless it’s to get a frozen pizza or something like that.  It uses R-22 coolant which is not a good thing, but I haven’t seen an portable units that are cost effective that are using Puron yet.  The air filter easily snaps out from in front of the evaporator air intake in the rear.

That’s it.  As I get to know this guy a little better I’ll keep y’all posted.  Wish me luck!

Case in point.  I’m out working on the lawn yesterday and one of my neighbors was out and we started chatting.  Being the air conditioner guy for the neighborhood, the conversations always tend to turn in that direction, so we were discussing our electricity bills and his was more than DOUBLE what mine was for about the same square footage.  Now, you just can not attribute all of your energy consumption issues to air conditioning, but I was interested in learning why he was experiencing such a disparity with his bill and if this is something that occured year round.

We compared our elecricity bills and his only showed the spike that was causing concern in the summer months even though he was running higher that me for the rest of the year also.  We then looked around his place and there were some very obvious problems with very cheap fixes.

• Insulation around the doors and windows were worn out.  You could feel the cool air flowing freely from around the closed doors and windows from the outside.  This can be remedied for less than $5 per door and window.
• The AC filter in the return duct looked like a giant dust ball.  He claims that he replaces the filter quarterly, but I doubt it.  Even if he did, quarterly is not enough in my opinion.  I replace mine monthly to insure that the air is flowing freely.  As a matter of fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if he is experiencing some freezing in his line because the AC unit is having to work overtime to compensate for the lack of air flow.  A simple $2 per month will save on a costly air conditioner service call if the line freezes over.
• Looking at the compressor on the side of the house, I see grass growing up into the coils on the bottom, hedge limbs poking into the coils on the side, and pine needles covering the casing on top.  He (and apparently a lot of home owners) don’t understand that the function of these coils is to channel the heat out of the home.  The fan blow air over the coils to cool them down and dispurse the heat.  That’s why when the unit is running and you put you hand over the top you feel hot air.  When the coils are obstructed, the air can not pass over them to get cool which means you are not efficiently pumping the heat out of your home.  Keep the coils clear and unobstructed.  In addition when you air conditioner is NOT RUNNING, take your garden hose and with low water pressure rinse off the coils of accumulated dirts and debris.  This wont cost you anything and will make a world of difference with your electricty bill.

6am – The helper and I are unboxing the new equipment and stageing it in the appropriate areas while the installer turns off the power to the old units, drains the freon and reclaims it.  by 7am, the new outside equipment is hooked up and ready.  Now we need to tear out the old system from the attic.

7am – I have a power strip connecting every fan that I own blowing whats left of the cool air into the attic space where they are working.  The fans are strategically positioned so that sweat doesn’t fall on them causing a short circuit.  Sweat is already pouring steadily.  The space is too small for all three os us to fit in there, so I’m going to run out and get them some kolaches while they do their thing.

9am – The front lawn looks like a nightmare trailer park scene from a “B” movie with scrap metal, wires, duct work, and torn insulation strewn all over the place.  I’m sure that if the neighbors knew what we were planning they would have re-scheuled their garage sale for another day, because we probably scared away half of their business.  It’s time for a kolache break and much needed re-hydration.

9:30am – We’re back on the clock.  The one piece of equipment that I’ve decided to leave in place is the Honeywell air purifier, an electronic filter that removes particles from the air with an electronic zap.  It works fine and is easy to maintain.  I just put the filters in the dishwasher once a month then let them sun dry and we’re good to go.  So basically the way things are going to be configured is from the air intake first comes the zapper, then the heater, then the air conditioner.  The installer has sold me on the idea of installing each component butt-up against each other rather than using a transition piece of insulation between each component.  This will streamline the installation and cut down on potential energy loss.

Enough for now, I’m getting hungry talking about kolaches (-;  I will continue the saga on the post.

Next Page

About a month ago as the temperatures were sustaining in the 100+ range here in Texas, we noticed that our 20-year old Trane system was running for about 5 minutes, cutting off for about 2 minutes, thn kicking in again.  The temperature was getting down to the 81 degree setting on the thermostat (…you see Mr. Obama, not everyone sets their air conditioning to 78), but the humidity was never getting below 50% because the unit didn’t run long enough to effectively bring down the humidity.  Basically it was short-cycling.  Now, we’ve never had this problem in the past so we ran a full perventative maintenance on the system and found that the freon level was down about 20%, but mostly that the clutch on the blower motor was starting to fail.  It was drawing some serious amps in order to kick in.  I could only imagine what the electricty bill was going to look like for this month!

Even though the Trane unit was still working, we decided it was time to get serious about replacing this old unit before we experienced an outage and at the same time, reduce our electricty bill.  Another thing that factored into our decision was that the adjoining central heating system was one of the old pilot light jobs that have been phased out some years ago due to safety concerns.  We contacted a couple of home air conditioners installers who quoted us on a new central air conditioning and heating systems and we finally settle on a Carrier 24ABB4 (14 SEER Rating) split system with Puron refrigerant, and a Carrier 58STA/STX heater.  There were more energy efficient systems available with a better SEER rating that would quality for the new tax rebate, but we could not justify the increased cost vs savings.  The system we chose will give us the best bang for the buck.

Now that we’ve signed on the bottom line and scheduled the installation date, all that is left is the perparation.  In the next post, we’ll tell you all about the installation process and the decisions we needed to make along the way.

• The overall cooling capability of the unit
• How often the compressor will turn on & off.  “Short-Cycling” prevents dehumidifying
• Factors heavily into the energy efficiency & operating cost
• Maintenance costs over the life of the unit

Strangely enough, the most common problem encountered in existing construction is OVER-SIZED units.  In studies performed by utility companies on the west coast, one found that slightly over 1/2 of the home air conditioners checked were a ton (12,000 Btu/h) or more oversized and another company found the same in 1/3 of the home air conditioners they checked.

Why is this so?  Because the correct method of calculating the optimum size of the unit needed is rather complicated and most contractor use shortcuts to save time.  Either that, or they just don’t know how to do it properly.  MANUAL J is the universally accepted standard. It was jointly developed by the Air Conditioning Contractors of America (ACCA) and the Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration Institute (ARI).  It is a lengthy publication, and rightfully so since it factors in all of the variables that must be considered to properly size home air conditioners.

It doesn’t matter whether or not you are talking about:

• Central Home Air Conditioners
• Window Unit Home Air Conditioners
• Portable Home Air Conditioners

The requirements are the same in order to provide you with the comfort you need while minimizing the operating costs and total cost of ownership over the life of the unit.  Contrary to what your parents may have taught you, the longer that home air conditioners run, the more efficient they are.  Ones that cycle on and off constantly are no dehumidifying the air AND they are eating up your electrical bill.

Our recommendations are:

• Do not try this on your own unless you have an engineering degree, a lot of time to spare, and enjoy reading 200+ page technical manuals -or- can buy or borrow a copy of Home Air Conditioning Software based on the Manual J Standard;
• If you go with a contractor, select one that specializes in Home Air Conditioners;
• Insist on getting a printout from you contractor of the Manual J data they used to calculate the optimum unit size of the home air conditioners.