You can run your window air conditioner from an inverter. The most common way to use an inverter is when changing from alternating current, or AC, when going off the grid. By going off the grid, you will be using direct current, or DC electricity, from a sustainable energy source like solar, windmills or water. The inverter converts the DC current into AC current so that regular household appliances can be run from typical household sockets. The Electrical Basics An inverter is part of a 12-volt DC system. For practical purposes, it takes 11 amps of DC power to successfully run a 1-amp AC powered device. If you have a 5-amp window air conditioner, you will need 55 amps of DC power to run the unit continuously. However, all electrical appliances have a starting surge that gets the motor running. This is generally five times the continuous electrical load, which means that, in this instance, you will need 275 amps of DC power to start the 5-amp air conditioning unit and then a continuous 55 amps to keep it running.

The Air-Conditioning Unit The smallest window air conditioners that are designed for a single room, usually in the 5,000 BTU range, use about 4 to 5 amps of power when running. A larger whole house unit that puts out 12,000 BTU will use about 11 amps of power when running. The surge on an 11-amp unit will be about 360 DC amps while the surge on a 4-amp unit will be about 130 amps. In this case, using the smallest air conditioning unit possible will enable you to use a smaller and less expensive inverter. The Power Source In real terms, all the inverter does is to transfer a specified amount of power to operate any given AC electrical unit, including air conditioners. Although the inverter must be rated to accept the high amperage rating that an air conditioner will pull through it, all inverters get their power from a power source like storage batteries or direct hook-ups to solar panels, windmills or hydropower. These power sources must be capable of providing the needed surge power as well as the continuous energy needed to keep the air conditioner running.

Charging In most cases, storage batteries will be used as the power source to run the air conditioner. These batteries will need to be charged on a regular basis. Alternate forms of sustainable power are almost always used to charge the batteries, including solar panels and windmills, among others. how to change air filter on ac unitHowever, unless you are using hydropower, which guarantees a continuous source of sustainable power day or night, wind or no wind, a back-up AC grid hook-up can be used to charge the batteries on days when there is no sun or wind. hvac heat pump thermostat wiringI have an old Hussmann refrigerator with two sliding glass doors, that was originally usedair conditioner outside unit hot as a refrigerated produce case in a grocery store (I use it to

store eggs from my free-range egg farm). This was a nice unit in its day -- it's built like a battleship -- but its refrigeration unit is shot, and was an inefficient dinosaur even when it ran properly. These old refrigerators are good news/bad news. The good news is that their crummy refrigeration units mean that they cost almost nothing. The bad news is that hteir crummy refrigeration units mean that they're worth almost nothing. After having mine repaired twice at about $350 each time, I took the advice of the HVAC "Get a window air conditioner, replace the thermostat so you can turn it down to 40 F, and stick it in the side of the refrigerator." So I did just that. For $179, I got a new 7,500 BTU air conditioner. I cut a rectangular hole in the side of the refrigerator with a saber saw and installed it, sealing the edges with aluminum Window air conditioners are cheap, efficient, quiet, and lightweight. You can install them yourself

if you know how to saw a rectangular hole in the side of a big metal box and how to do simple wiring. For my purposes, the smallest unit I could find was actually too big, and I ran it on "low" most of theI would have been better off with a little 5,000 BTU unit for my 50 cubic-foot refrigerator. You could probably run a small walk-in cooler on a larger window air conditioner! The only thing you have to modify is the thermostat. Simply replace the original one with one that will go down to refrigerator temperatures. Consumer air conditioners are very flimsy inside. The unit I bought had ducting made out of paper-thin styrofoam. What you'll want is a line-voltage thermostat with a remote probe, that goes down to 40 F or so, such as the #CR2147 from Put the remote probe right against the cooling fins, which is where the original thermostat is. This is the best method, since if the unit ices up, so will the thermostat probe, and 32 F is cold

enough to turn the unit off until it defrosts. On my installation, I used a thermostat without a remote probe, and sometimes it would ice upIt did this less if I hung it so that some cold air blew over the probe. Depending on the unit, the thermostat may be on push-on connectors, or you may have to cut the wires and use wire nuts. The thermostat should be set up so the contacts are closed when the temperature is high, and open when it's cold enough. In general, a refrigerator is just a big insulated box, so you can saw holes in it wherever you want. However, there might be heater cable here and there to prevent the unit from freezing up, and wires to run fluorescent lights and such. These are usually in obvious places, but unplug the unit before using theIf you find any severed wires, you have the choice of not using the fancy-pants features like lights and defrosters, or opening up the junction box and disconnecting anything you broke. have to do this anyway if you want to keep the lights and stuff, since you'll have to disconnect