262 posts, read 495,655 times 18,512 posts, read 22,111,878 times Originally Posted by HtownLove I don't know about efficiency, but central A/C uses a lot more power overall. Saving on air conditioning & cooling - by Ask Mr. Electricity Originally Posted by AD1985 That's a BS article. IF you need 5 tons of cooling and only have 2.5 tons, then of course your bills will be higher because your unit will run constantly. secondly, central AC isn't designed to run constantly, it is designed to cycle, and like I said before if your tonnage is lower than needed you won't get a good cycling going on. thirdly, of course if you are running something that is 1440 watts constantly and running something that is 3000 watts constantly the one that is 1440 watts will obviously going to result in lower watts used. But the author neglects the fact that central AC is not supposed to run constantly. Central AC is supposed to be running less than 25% of the time, so you are supposed to divide the wattage of the central AC by at least 4.

Finally, the central Ac works more efficiently, and gives a more even cooling if it is done right. When I lived in San Antonio the house had window units in the bedroom and the living room. It had a closed layout (the kitchen opened out into the dining room through a door, which then opened up into the living room where the AC was. Every time we cooked we had to either open the kitchen door or die of heat stroke. If the house was cooled by central air, the unit would suck out the heat from the kitchen and replace that with cooled air. The window units didn't cool the kitchen one bit 5,286 posts, read 14,859,778 times I didn't realize that a house can be cooled in extreme heat without working continuously. I'm trying to read more about how central A/C cycles on/off, do you have any good sources? no, sorry I don't , but yes even in extreme heat an AC is designed to cycle. do you know whether you are moving to a studio or some place bigger? If you get just a studio then the window unit will pull the least electricity.

Central AC is expensive to install though. how to drain water from ac unitIt usually runs about $5000.air conditioner hvac systems if you are moving to a place that is humid that will be another factor as central units dehumidify the air a lot better.ac repair manual pdf The best I have ever seen are the chill water systems. My first apartment had one and we had to pay in to use it. The fee ranged from 8 dollars to 12 dollars, which was great because I didn't have to worry about AC on my electric bill and normally paid about 25 bucks for electricity. Having one big chiller instead of individual units cuts down the cost dramatically.This is an archived post. You won't be able to vote or comment. Frugal air conditioning in Florida....

Central versus window unit for night (self.Frugal)submitted by Hey guys! So I live in an apartment in Florida. It is hot almost all the time. During the day, we have no problem with the heat and keep the thermostat just low enough to not grow things on the walls, but we absolutely need the AC at night. There's just no arguing that. We have a box fan, ceiling fan, the works, but it needs to be cool for me to get quality sleep. I have no problem with it now since it's been cool during the days, so we really only use to AC at night, but during the summer months I know the AC will work a lot harder to cool the house, and my electricity bill will go up. My question is would a window unit be cheaper than using the central air at night? We don't need to air condition the entire house when we are just sleeping in the bedroom. If we always keep the AC at 78ish during the day and really only need the AC lowered for night, would my electricity bill be lower if we used a window unit to keep the bedroom cool during the night and could then keep the central AC unit for the whole house at 78-80 all summer long?

Edit: I should probably add that we have a one bedroom apartment around 900 square feet. We do have light blocking curtains in the bedroom, our apartment doesn't face the sun until the evening, and we keep our filters clean. π Rendered by PID 15734 on app-556 at 2016-09-30 16:49:08.207953+00:00 running 9b22fbe country code: US.This is a post by my husband Aaron who, thankfully, installed the window air-conditioner unit right next to the bed so it can blow on my pregnant self all night. That thing is such as life-saver this summer!- Anna As summer rages on and the heat increases we all look for ways to stay cool. Most people, in their time of thermal distress, turn to the air conditioner, one of the more costly, but effective ways to stay cool. Granted, it will always be costly if you chose to use an a/c, but there are ways to keep the cost down. We use pretty much all these tips and they work great. Lets quickly dispel the biggest myth first. Is it cheaper to run the air conditioner all day or turn in on just when you get home?

It works something like this. Heat likes to go where it’s not hot. When you hold your fridge door open too long, what happens? The motor kicks on to keep the fridge and everything inside of it cold. That’s because heat is rushing into the cold cavity of the fridge. Your house works the same way. If you are constantly cooling your house, heat is always looking to get in and the air conditioner has to constantly work to keep that heat out. If you leave the a/c off during the day, the house will heat up and then stop heating because the heat is already where it wants to be. When you get home and turn on your a/c, the air conditioner has less heat to remove, so it uses less energy and less money. Or look at it this way: you can leave the a/c on all day and constantly remove heat or turn it on when you get home and remove it all at once. The most cost-effective (and environmentally friendly) technique is to just turn it on when you’re actually home. Now that that big ol’ myth is cleared up, lets look at 10 more ways to save money while using a costly air conditioning unit…

1. Raise the temperature a few degrees Did you know, according to Mr. Electric that “each degree below 78 degrees farenheit will increase energy consumption by 3-4%”? So, set the air conditioner a few degrees warmer and pay less. 2. Use the air conditioner in conjunction with a ceiling fan This may sound counter-intuitive to run two appliances at once, but ceiling fans are inexpensive to operate, and can help cool your body letting you raise the a/c temperature a few degrees. A quick note on fans: ceiling fans (and fans in general) don’t actually make the air cooler. Fans work by blowing the hot air surrounding your body away from you. Its like when you blow on a hot spoonful of soup. You don’t have “arctic breath” you are simply blowing the heat off the food, so it gets cooler. That’s essentially what a fan does… it blows the heat your body is generating away from you. Plus, if you are sweating, the fan will cool you by evaporation. 3. Clean the air filter every week

When the filter is clogged, the air conditioner has to work harder. The harder it works, the more money it costs you. It takes me just a few minutes to pop out the filter and clean it. 4. Cool only the rooms you are in. Why cool the kitchen when you are in the office on the other side of the house? Quick note: obviously, this isn’t always possible with central air conditioning. Central a/c is expensive and uses a lot of energy mainly because it’s cooling the entire house. Window units, while still expensive are more economical. If you have central air in your house, try shutting the vents in the rooms you are not in so the cool air gets re-routed the rooms you are using. 5. Buy the right size air conditioner for the room Oversized a/c’s are inefficient and waste money. Sure, they might cool the room down a few minutes faster, but they use more energy. The converse is true too, a smaller air conditioner in a large room will have to constantly work to keep it cool.

The proper size one will cool the room down, then it will shut off (if you have that feature activated which we recommend doing). Here is a handy guide on how to select the correct size of air conditioner unit for a room. 6. Use window shades and blinds to block direct sunlight The cooler you can keep your house, the less heat there is that has to be removed. Our old apartment was west-facing and a corner unit so every afternoon our living room got blasted by the sun. We ended up purchasing these white paper accordion shades from the home supply store for just $6 and cut them with scissors to fit the windows (overlapping them in spots to get the right fit). We placed the paper shades behind the standard window blinds in the apartment and that really helped to keep the heat out. They were white, so not only did they help block the heat, they also helped to reflect the light away from our living room. 7. Seal the windows and doors Cold air that escapes is cold air that has to be replaced, and that means money is sliding on out of your place.

Properly sealed doors and windows will help keep the costly generated cold air in. It works just the same in winter time with the heat. Save some bucks by getting a few draft blockers for the bottom of your doors. 8. Keep the back of the air conditioner unit clear and free of debris In order to get cold air out, you first have to suck in air. If the airflow is restricted, then the unit will have to work hard and that means it will hurt your pocketbook (what is a pocketbook anyway?). 9. Keep the lights turned off This is a good energy-saving tip any time of the year, but especially in the summer. Touch a lightbulb that has been burning for a while and you’ll see what I mean. Adding extra heat into a room you are trying to cool won’t help you save money so keep the lights off. 10. Keep the oven off Along the lines of tip #9, reduce heat from cooking by forgoing the oven, and by using the microwave instead or try making meals that don’t require using the oven at all.