Posts Tagged central air conditioning
How Does Central Air Conditioning Work?
Posted by Tony in How Air Conditioner Units Work on July 30th, 2011
No doubt you are know that air conditioner units come in many forms, including portable air conditioners, dual hosed and single hosed units, heat and cool units, window and through the wall units, evaporative coolers and absorptive chillers. What we are looking at here is just another method, but how does central air conditioning work?
All primary home air conditioning systems tend to work on similar principals and central air conditioners are purpose built to cool the entire home. They use ducts to disperse and recycle cooled air throughout rooms on a continuous basis. Some models may also move chilled water via pipes and heat exchangers.
Frequently, you will find a split system where the condenser and compressor are located outdoors and connected by refrigerant lines to a coil (or evaporator) in the in the air handler unit. Such a unit basically resembles a metal box that may comprise of a blower, filters, heating/cooling elements, humidifier, mixing chamber, controls and vibration isolators. With a singular ‘packaged’ system, everything is normally located in a single outdoor unit.
In a split system, heat from the home is transferred to the outside using a compressor cycle that works similarly to a refrigerator. A refrigerant fluid is passed through an expansion device which changes from liquid to gas when it absorbs heat and is then released outdoors at high pressure as vapour before changing back from gas to liquid. The fluid will then return to the expansion device and the process repeated. The air in the home is cooled as it travels over the evaporator; the moisture removed from the air and disposed by the unit via the normal household drainage system.
Central air conditioning has a few benefits over other systems as the air is drawn through a filter. This filter extracts any dust and lint particles cleaning the air as well as cooling it. Additionally, specialist filters can also remove microscopic pollutants which can affect health. A further benefit is that noise is reduced as the unit is external to the building.
Central air conditioning is an efficient system but you do need to try and get the highest SEER rating you can afford (the range is 10 to 17). (SEER refers to the Seasonal Energy Efficiency Ratio.) If the unit carries the Energy Star label, it will have a SEER of at least 13 for a split system and 12 for a single unit.
Hope the above helps!
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How Does A Portable Air Conditioner Unit Work?
Posted by Tony in How Air Conditioner Units Work on August 1st, 2010
A portable air conditioner unit may come with or without a heater and in two types, either a hose or split system. Most air conditioners tend to work in a similar way by the use of a refrigerant system that passes refrigerant fluid through an expansion device and changes from liquid to gas when it absorbs heat and is then vented prior to changing back from gas to liquid. An exception to this are evaporative air coolers.
A split system would be connected to an external unit via tubing (similar to a central air conditioning unit) whereas a hose system is vented through air ducts. When looking at a hose system you also need to consider whether it collects the water in some form of receptacle and then stops when it is full (Monoblock version) or whether it discharges the water via the ducted hose (Air-to-Air version).
A single duct portable air conditioner unit is less efficient than a dual duct portable air conditioner unit as the latter draws air from the outside to cool instead of from the inside.
Similar to a portable air conditioner unit are evaporative air coolers or swamp air conditioners. These work differently in that they don’t use a condenser but evaporate water over cooling fins.
When buying you need to consider that with an evaporator, as the water evaporates it absorbs the heat but this can result in a ‘clammy’ atmosphere. However, without the need for external venting they can be more easily moved around the home, plus they tend to be lighter and smaller in size although not as effective in terms of cooling the home. A further consideration of any unit is of course noise, do check out the levels before you buy.
