With warmer weather, our thoughts often turn to creating a more comfortable environment in which to live, work and play. Maybe you just remember the hot, sticky and sleepless nights you endured last summer and said to yourself "that's it, no more living in an oven!". Whatever led you to this decision is not that important, but now you have some other decisions to make.
For example, will you go for a fully ducted system for you home or just a room air conditioner to make the hot nights more bearable? Or perhaps you might go for a split system, where you have an outdoor unit connected to an indoor unit by two refrigerant lines. These are all options if you own your own home, but what if you're renting? Many landlords would not be happy for you to make alterations to their building without agreeing to leave the entire installation for the next tenant. Conversely, you would understandably not be happy to pay for an installation that you may only use for a limited time.
The solution to this issue is the use of a portable air conditioner. This article will focus on this type of unit. So, what are your options in portable air conditioners? Well, basically there are two types of units; evaporative and refrigerated. Let's have a look at the differences.
Evaporative units use the principle of passing air over water. If you were to run a fan in a room, you would simply be blowing hot air around the room. This moving air would cool you down marginally due to it taking away the heat from your skin surface, but the effect is not significant in extreme conditions. You will still feel hot and very uncomfortable. If you were to blow the air through a wet cloth, the water would absorb some of the heat from the air and evaporate. Consequently, the air that comes out the other side would be cooler. This is essentially how an evaporative unit operates. A pump moves water from a reservoir tank over a pad (wet cloth) and a fan blows air through the pad.
It's a pretty simple concept. There are however, some drawbacks. The first one is performance. You will only drop the temperature by a few degrees at best. You can improve this a little by using ice with the water. The other negative is that the humidity will markedly increase, which will make the room feel 'sticky'. Also, you will need to top up the tank now and again. The advantages are the cost and portability. You can purchase one of these units for less than $100 and there are no special installation requirements. Just fill with water, plug the power in and go.
Refrigerated units look similar, but are quite different in their operation. They also rely on evaporation, but it's evaporation of a refrigerant contained within a high pressure closed system. The system comprises a compressor to pump the refrigerant around the system, an evaporator, which work similar to a car radiator and the interconnecting pipe work. The refrigerant leaves the compressor at high pressure and is transported to the evaporator, which faces the inside of your home. The refrigerant is allowed to expand in the evaporator, and in doing so, will drop it's temperature. This cooler refrigerant is allowed to pass through a coil. Air from the room is blown over the coil and the heat from the air is absorbed by the refrigerant to be taken back to the compressor, via a compressor coil. Another fan passes air over the compressor coil to cool down the heated refrigerant and expel it to the outside air. In a portable unit, this is ducted outside via a window kit.
So, in short, if you don't mind paying a little bit more, the refrigerated unit will provide much greater performance over the evaporative one. The only downside is that it is heavier and will use a bit more power. Whichever unit you choose, it will be make life in your home more enjoyable as you won't feel like you're slowly melting away into the summer months.
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