Central air
 

Some daft questions about central air con :-

1) Can you cool just certain rooms or is it all or nothing? I understand the air goes down ducts, but didn't know whether you could seal some off/shut the vent? I.e. what I'm thinking is, if I'm working in a room as a home office, could I cool just that room and not the rest of the house unnecessarily?

2) How much does it cost per day to run if you had it on for 24hrs? Guess this depends on the above...

Thanks.

Re: Central air
 

1) With enough money, anything is possible. The office could be configured as a separate zone, with its own supply, return, and thermostat. Whether it's worth doing this is another question. With a typical installation, however, single rooms can't be controlled. You would have a single thermostat in a central location, and the system would cycle based on the temperature there. An alternative to think about would be a window unit in the office.

2) Impossible to say, without knowing the size of the structure, temperature differential, amount of insulation, and a number of other factors.

Re: Central air
 

I thought that might be the case, but thought I'd ask. Would be rather wasteful to cool a whole house just for the sake of a room, so may have to look at an individual unit....

Re: Central air
 

Like your heating, it runs off the central thermostat, so while shutting all the registers save the one in the room you are cooling would cool that room faster, until where ever the thermostat is gets to the set point, it will continue to cool long after its "comfortable".

With our new 14.5 SEER high(er) efficiency central unit, it probable cost us about $50 a month for the two or three months it was on last cooling season, compared to maybe 80 or 90 in previous years with the old unit. YMMV of course. Worth every penny in the Ontario summer.

Not sure what it would cost you to cool one room with a (relatively inneficient) window unit, but it would certainly cost you less to buy in the first place!.

Re: Central air
 

Is that with it on pretty much all day, night too?

Re: Central air
 

Yes, but we cool to a conservative 23 ish in the summer...21 seems over kill, this way the humidity is much reduced, but the AC isnt cycling all the time.

Dont really want it coming in all the time overnight anyway as although the new units are much much quieter than the old ones, you still dont need it humming outside your window if you can avoid it.

And of course its cheaper that way too...

Re: Central air
 

It's the humidity that's the killer rather than the raw heat anyway, 23 degrees sounds sensible. $50 a month I could easily live with for not being sticky all day whilst working!

Re: Central air
 

Depends on your tollerence level...my wife doenst like to have it on all the time (she local, and also was used to japanese killer humidity levels), so maybe thats why we are averaging less that $50 during the summer?

I wonder what other people pay. I often find other people houses over cooled though. I dot mind a bit of heat, especially after a winter like this one.

Re: Central air
 

Apart from when my Dad visited, we only had the air on maybe 4 or 5 times during the whole summer. I found keeping blinds and shutters closed all day kept it bearable. At night we did run the ceiling fan in the bedroom though.

I've also visited ice box houses and wonder what on earth it costs them :unsure:

Re: Central air
 

I've a low tolerance to humidity.... heat I'm not too bad with, but humidity I don't like.... I've even air con here in the UK :eek:

Re: Central air
 

We have those rattan/ babboo blinds hanging on the outside of the large south facing windows for most of the summer to prevent the greenhouse effect. Even this weekend the outside thermometer was reading 30+C on our south facing deck!

Re: Central air
 

:ohmy: What does it read in the summer?

Re: Central air
 

Around the same, as we have the sense to put up those canopy things to keep it in the shade;)

Its in direct sunlight and the spring get heated up as a result...

Re: Central air
 

We have central air but this will be our first summer in the house. We will be suing electric fans generally and only use the central air when we HAVE to. Both cheaper and more environmentally friendly.

Re: Central air
 

For not working properly? ;)