Donate to Remove ads

Got a credit card? use our Credit Card & Finance Calculators

Thanks to johnstevens77,Bhoddhisatva,scotia,Anonymous,Cornytiv34, for Donating to support the site

Heat

A virtual pub for off topic, light hearted pub related banter and discussion. No trainers
UncleEbenezer
The full Lemon
Posts: 10690
Joined: November 4th, 2016, 8:17 pm
Has thanked: 1459 times
Been thanked: 2965 times

Heat

#428395

Postby UncleEbenezer » July 18th, 2021, 9:38 am

As we experience weather warmer than most of us find comfortable, does anyone here benefit from a two-way air-to-air heat pump that's keeping them cool right now? How good a job does it do?

(I have no such thing, but with thick stone walls, my north-facing downstairs living room remains pleasantly cool even as upstairs gets warm and the loft room positively hot).

dealtn
Lemon Half
Posts: 6072
Joined: November 21st, 2016, 4:26 pm
Has thanked: 441 times
Been thanked: 2324 times

Re: Heat

#428397

Postby dealtn » July 18th, 2021, 9:41 am

UncleEbenezer wrote:As we experience weather warmer than most of us find comfortable ...


Speak for yourself.

pje16
Lemon Half
Posts: 6050
Joined: May 30th, 2021, 6:01 pm
Has thanked: 1843 times
Been thanked: 2066 times

Re: Heat

#428400

Postby pje16 » July 18th, 2021, 10:11 am

That's part of being British
"Jeez i wish it would stop bl*ody raining, there can't be much more up there"
followed by 2 days of sun
"It's too hot now" :roll: :roll: :roll:

richlist
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 1589
Joined: November 4th, 2016, 3:54 pm
Has thanked: 33 times
Been thanked: 477 times

Re: Heat

#428405

Postby richlist » July 18th, 2021, 10:24 am

We have an air to air heat pump in Spain.....it's called an inverter air conditioning unit.
Work s great at keeping us warm in winter and cool in the summer heat.

One problem....and it's nothing to do with the air con unit.....is that property in Spain has little to no insulation. The fabric of the building heats up under the blazing sun during the day and then takes a long time to loose that heat during the evening/night. So we often need to run the air con even when the outside air temp is reasonably cool because of the warm building.

The same set up in the UK with insulation would operate much better.

UncleEbenezer
The full Lemon
Posts: 10690
Joined: November 4th, 2016, 8:17 pm
Has thanked: 1459 times
Been thanked: 2965 times

Re: Heat

#428424

Postby UncleEbenezer » July 18th, 2021, 11:13 am

richlist wrote:One problem....and it's nothing to do with the air con unit.....is that property in Spain has little to no insulation.

I've noticed such differences in the countries I've lived. Italy little insulation, Blighty sometimes more, Germany quite a bit more, Sweden more again. Seems to correlate more with winter than summer: more serious insulation for the colder continental climate than the mild atlantic or short mediterranean winters.

What Italy had was interiors to stay cooler, like the tiled floors. Oh, and shutters against the summer sun. Worked well for early summer dry heat, but not much defence against late summer heat+humidity.

monabri
Lemon Half
Posts: 8396
Joined: January 7th, 2017, 9:56 am
Has thanked: 1539 times
Been thanked: 3428 times

Re: Heat

#428443

Postby monabri » July 18th, 2021, 12:03 pm

We've got a portable air conditioning unit ( pipe goes out of the window) which we've had for at least 20 years...well, it's not used THAT much. It's maintaining a comfortable temperature in the lounge and the unit can readily be moved if required. In a few days time it will be unplugged and moved back into the corner of the room to await Summer '22.

AF62
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 3499
Joined: November 27th, 2016, 8:45 am
Has thanked: 131 times
Been thanked: 1277 times

Re: Heat

#428449

Postby AF62 » July 18th, 2021, 12:22 pm

UncleEbenezer wrote:As we experience weather warmer than most of us find comfortable, does anyone here benefit from a two-way air-to-air heat pump that's keeping them cool right now? How good a job does it do?


Yes, I had air conditioning installed last November so now is the first time I have had to put it to work for cooling, although I had it working in the spring to provide heating (they operate in both directions heat out or heat in).

How good a job does it do - a superb one.

I had two split units fitted (unit outside and the other part inside), a 5kW unit for the west facing living room with large windows and a 3.5kW unit for the east facing bedroom upstairs.

The bedroom unit I use the timer to come on at an automatic speed setting an hour before I intend to go to bed to get the room cool, and then to automatically change to the ultra low (and ultra quiet) setting until I turn it off in the morning. The room is cool when I go to bed and stays that way until morning, and the air con fan is almost inaudible, unlike the birds tweeting at 5am when the windows had to be open.

At the moment the living room unit is ticking over keeping the room at 21c whilst the temperature outside is at 26c and climbing. My smart meter display is showing that it is using about 350w, so around 5p an hour to keep the downstairs of the house cool (although it is in the living room I leave the doors open so the cold air spreads out).

Leothebear
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 1447
Joined: November 4th, 2016, 1:18 pm
Has thanked: 219 times
Been thanked: 825 times

Re: Heat

#428531

Postby Leothebear » July 18th, 2021, 4:37 pm

Pussycats.
Baghdad is expecting 50c in a day or two. What a joy it must be to live there.

richlist
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 1589
Joined: November 4th, 2016, 3:54 pm
Has thanked: 33 times
Been thanked: 477 times

Re: Heat

#428594

Postby richlist » July 18th, 2021, 7:58 pm

monabri wrote:We've got a portable air conditioning unit ( pipe goes out of the window) which we've had for at least 20 years...well, it's not used THAT much. It's maintaining a comfortable temperature in the lounge and the unit can readily be moved if required. In a few days time it will be unplugged and moved back into the corner of the room to await Summer '22.


I've had portable air conditioners in the past, even had vents cut into the walls to plug the exhaust pipe into instead of hanging it out of an open window. The two biggest problems with portable units are:
1. They are very heavy to move around. Requires considerable effort to push them across carpeted floors and don't even attempt to carry them up/down stairs.
2. They are noisy, even on their lowest setting.

ReformedCharacter
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 3120
Joined: November 4th, 2016, 11:12 am
Has thanked: 3591 times
Been thanked: 1509 times

Re: Heat

#428609

Postby ReformedCharacter » July 18th, 2021, 8:52 pm

I worked as an IT tech for a school once upon a time. My 'office' was about 5' x 8' and contained a server, another PC and various other heat-emitting devices. It got hot, especially in the summer and the server started suffering heat related problems. The headteacher's solution was to buy a portable air-conditioner. The window didn't open and the door was locked most of the time. I had to carefully explain to him why his solution wouldn't work. :roll:

RC

gryffron
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 3606
Joined: November 4th, 2016, 10:00 am
Has thanked: 550 times
Been thanked: 1586 times

Re: Heat

#428627

Postby gryffron » July 18th, 2021, 10:03 pm

richlist wrote:
monabri wrote:We've got a portable air conditioning unit ( pipe goes out of the window) which we've had for at least 20 years...well, it's not used THAT much. It's maintaining a comfortable temperature in the lounge and the unit can readily be moved if required. In a few days time it will be unplugged and moved back into the corner of the room to await Summer '22.

I've had portable air conditioners in the past, even had vents cut into the walls to plug the exhaust pipe into instead of hanging it out of an open window. The two biggest problems with portable units are:
1. They are very heavy to move around. Requires considerable effort to push them across carpeted floors and don't even attempt to carry them up/down stairs.
2. They are noisy, even on their lowest setting.

I agree with the flaws. AND they're horribly inefficient cos they don't seal properly at the windows.

And in spite of all those flaws, they're an absolutely marvellous piece of kit and I wouldn't be without mine. In fact, I'm on my second one after the first one died. You can't put a price on a decent night's sleep in a lovely cool bed.

I keep toying with the idea of "proper" aircon units for the house. But as monibri said, you only need it for a few weeks of the year in this country.

Gryff

AF62
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 3499
Joined: November 27th, 2016, 8:45 am
Has thanked: 131 times
Been thanked: 1277 times

Re: Heat

#428628

Postby AF62 » July 18th, 2021, 10:06 pm

richlist wrote:
monabri wrote:We've got a portable air conditioning unit ( pipe goes out of the window) which we've had for at least 20 years...well, it's not used THAT much. It's maintaining a comfortable temperature in the lounge and the unit can readily be moved if required. In a few days time it will be unplugged and moved back into the corner of the room to await Summer '22.


I've had portable air conditioners in the past, even had vents cut into the walls to plug the exhaust pipe into instead of hanging it out of an open window. The two biggest problems with portable units are:
1. They are very heavy to move around. Requires considerable effort to push them across carpeted floors and don't even attempt to carry them up/down stairs.
2. They are noisy, even on their lowest setting.


I would suggest the biggest problem with them is their method of operation.The unit sucks in warm air from the room and the heat is then blown out through the 'elephant trunk' hose with some of the air it took in pushed out as hot air through a window or hole in the wall and some as cold air blown back into the room.

However that hot air which has been blown out needs to be replaced in the room (otherwise you get a vacuum!) so air is naturally drawn in from other rooms or from outside. So whilst the machine is running it is constantly drawing warm air into the room it is trying to cool.

Whereas a proper split air-conditioning system transfers the heat from inside to outside through the aircon gas and the cooled air in the room stays in the room, and although there will be some interchange of air with other rooms it is nothing like the volume drawn in by the portable systems.

1nvest
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 4323
Joined: May 31st, 2019, 7:55 pm
Has thanked: 680 times
Been thanked: 1316 times

Re: Heat

#428636

Postby 1nvest » July 18th, 2021, 10:39 pm

We also have a portable, upright box around a metre tall, foot width/depth ( :) similar to the delight of filling up a car with litres of petrol to then drive miles).

A old fireplace has a chimney metal liner than protrudes down into the unused fireplace that is a perfect fit for the ac's elephant hose to fit within. Yes noisy, making watching/hearing TV difficult for my ageing ears, but headphones along with coolness comfort is fine/great. Think it cost less than £200 at the time, had ours for around 14 years IIRC, bought in Robert Dyas. Mostly stays under the stairs year around except for its July outings, been worth every penny.

Looks something like
Image
i.e. it has wheels, so easy to move it around, but heavy/dangerous to lift say upstairs for the more frail.

stevensfo
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 3436
Joined: November 5th, 2016, 8:43 am
Has thanked: 3806 times
Been thanked: 1398 times

Re: Heat

#428796

Postby stevensfo » July 19th, 2021, 2:21 pm

UncleEbenezer wrote:
richlist wrote:One problem....and it's nothing to do with the air con unit.....is that property in Spain has little to no insulation.

I've noticed such differences in the countries I've lived. Italy little insulation, Blighty sometimes more, Germany quite a bit more, Sweden more again. Seems to correlate more with winter than summer: more serious insulation for the colder continental climate than the mild atlantic or short mediterranean winters.

What Italy had was interiors to stay cooler, like the tiled floors. Oh, and shutters against the summer sun. Worked well for early summer dry heat, but not much defence against late summer heat+humidity.


Those shutters are not just for the sun, but also to protect the windows during strong wind and torrential rain. In fact I don't know anyone in Italy who uses them against the sun. That's because the houses have roofs that overlap the walls enough to provide shade.

The summer humidity is a pain but we use dehumidifiers - not for comfort - but to stop too much condensation and mould.

The insurance agencies also assume that you will use securely-locked shutters when you go on holiday. Absolute stupidity, since closed shutters tell every burglar that the house is empty. So lights on timers and alarms are much more effective.

Steve

PS Yes, the insulation is bloody awful!

DiamondEcho
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 3131
Joined: November 4th, 2016, 3:39 pm
Has thanked: 3060 times
Been thanked: 554 times

Re: Heat

#428906

Postby DiamondEcho » July 19th, 2021, 9:30 pm

I suggest not trying to cope with unusual heat by pressing everyday appliances beyond their capicity; you need to do something differently. I have one simple suggestion shower/bathe before going to bed, instead of when you get up. Or do both.
Better still, if you're coming in in the pm all-a-glow, run a cool bath, or cold if you can stand it, and lie in it for 20 minutes. It takes time to get the core vs surface heat out. It won't be uncomfortable beyond the first few seconds. Get as much of you under the water. If it no longer feels cool drain/refill some of the water. Once over the minor shock it should feel pretty glorious; that's the aim.
This will materially lower your core heat and later you should sleep comfortably.
[This is an approach in Asia for unusually hot weather, and I recommend it. The submerge in a super-toasty bath being the opposite and rather nice in the depths of winter x-ref Japanese hot springs].

didds
Lemon Half
Posts: 5244
Joined: November 4th, 2016, 12:04 pm
Has thanked: 3244 times
Been thanked: 1018 times

Re: Heat

#428971

Postby didds » July 20th, 2021, 8:34 am

ReformedCharacter wrote:I worked as an IT tech for a school once upon a time. My 'office' was about 5' x 8' and contained a server, another PC and various other heat-emitting devices. It got hot, especially in the summer and the server started suffering heat related problems. The headteacher's solution was to buy a portable air-conditioner. The window didn't open and the door was locked most of the time. I had to carefully explain to him why his solution wouldn't work. :roll:

RC


ah... memories.

One place it was so hot one summer we used tos cive off and go and sit in teh A/C server room.

Another place the server room was ion the roof space of a bildign -m no a/c but it had in effect huge vents beneat the eaves open to the outside. cool-ish in summer, freezing in winter! chicken wire over the gaps to keep the pigeons out!


Return to “Beerpig's Snug”

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 12 guests