Portable Air Conditioner Questions
I recently moved into a second floor apartment without a window air conditioner. The only suitable windows for air conditioner placement are over walkways which makes me very uneasy about putting an A/C in there. I think my best bet is putting in a portable A/C. I do have a few questions though. I've been looking at the Sunpentown 1010E units which are 10000 BTU units. ( http://www.sunpentown.com/ ) 1. All the info I see says that these have a LCDI plug. Does this require a special electrical socket? 2. One website says that the 14000 BTU version requires a 20 AMP socket. It specifically says (This unit is designed to operate on a 120-volt/20-amp circuit, using a specific electrical plug and outlet. If you do not have this type of outlet or if not enough amperage, contact an electrician who can install a proper outlet designed to carry the necessary amperage.) I can't find any info on what the 10000 BTU unit need. I checked my sockets and they say that they're 15 AMP. Is this enough? I'm a definite newb when it comes to this stuff. I didn't realize that there was so much to research. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Answer:
They are not the best air conditioners in my opinion. I had one in my old condo because there was no way to instal a window air conditioner. It could not keep the room cool when it was really hot.. and the water thing fills up very fast. I now use it in my bedroom to regulate the temp in it... however the house has cenral air. For this it works very well. You will note by looking at the picture that I keep the unit off the floor a bit and have a water bottle hooked up to it. The water only needs to be emptied about once a week. 1) they will be noisy and 2) there is a loss of efficiency, in that you are using the indoor air which you have cooled with the evaporator to cool the condenser then blowing it out the window, and replacing it with outdoor air. Both due to having the whole unit inside the room, instead of hanging the business end outside. In practice, of course, i may be totally wrong, as usual. Consumer Reports just had a mention of these kind of ACs in the new issue (not a full review). They looked at 3 10,000 btu models and found that they delivered less than half of that. They recommend that instead of a one hose model that sucks in room air to cool the condensor and blows it out the window, you look for a two hose model that sucks in outside air to cool the condensor and blows it back out. That makes great sense, I didn't know they made such things.