Fitted Air conditioning
Discussion
Back on the smack chic said:
Are you living in the same UK as I am? 
I have had Ac in bedrooms for four years now. I’m the only person I know with AC, except for a few people with portable AC units. I think it’s still very rare. People are surprised we have it - although this is north west. Agreed it’s definitely it as out there as I would expect. I’m the only person I know with AC and get ripped for being ‘Posh’ because I have it despite it costing under £2.5k all in too cool a 4 bed house !
Tell you what though… I will never ever be without it again. If we sell and move, next house will have AC fitted on day 1 .
Tell you what though… I will never ever be without it again. If we sell and move, next house will have AC fitted on day 1 .
Back on the smack chic said:
Are you living in the same UK as I am?
Why the rolling of eyes 😂😂What is there? Almost 30 million homes in the UK, how many have fitted AC ? A minuscule amount compared to some Countries. Where as everything is refrigerated 😂
Your food, beer and medicines…..
Like I’ve said home ac is a growing market in the UK, but it is also a race to the bottom. People have started DIYing the stuff now it’s that easy.
Ask yourself if you would let Joe blogs loose on a process plant with a few £mil of beef getting warm…..
You stick with AC and leave the big stuff to the fridge men 👍👍
k99 said:
We pay about £120 every year for one split unit.
If the unit is operating in heating and cooling ok. Simply take the filters out of the indoor unit every couple of months, give them a wash through. Put a small jug of warm water through the drain pan whilst the filters are drying and make sure the water comes out the other end of the drain hose.
Give the outside unit a quick wash through with the garden hose.
All with the power off to the unit !
Save yourself the cash for when/if it breaks down.
Home/office ac is not like car ac. They are a sealed system, if installed correctly. The outdoor unit will usually rot away before it needs a “service”
Cleverley said:
If the unit is operating in heating and cooling ok.
Simply take the filters out of the indoor unit every couple of months, give them a wash through. Put a small jug of warm water through the drain pan whilst the filters are drying and make sure the water comes out the other end of the drain hose.
Give the outside unit a quick wash through with the garden hose.
All with the power off to the unit !
Save yourself the cash for when/if it breaks down.
Home/office ac is not like car ac. They are a sealed system, if installed correctly. The outdoor unit will usually rot away before it needs a “service”
Simply take the filters out of the indoor unit every couple of months, give them a wash through. Put a small jug of warm water through the drain pan whilst the filters are drying and make sure the water comes out the other end of the drain hose.
Give the outside unit a quick wash through with the garden hose.
All with the power off to the unit !
Save yourself the cash for when/if it breaks down.
Home/office ac is not like car ac. They are a sealed system, if installed correctly. The outdoor unit will usually rot away before it needs a “service”
thanksfastbikes76 said:
Agreed it’s definitely it as out there as I would expect. I’m the only person I know with AC and get ripped for being ‘Posh’ because I have it despite it costing under £2.5k all in too cool a 4 bed house !
Tell you what though… I will never ever be without it again. If we sell and move, next house will have AC fitted on day 1 .
There are two types of people, I find - those who denounce AC as being posh and a waste of money, and those who have lived with a system fitted. Once you’ve lived with it, you never want to go back.Tell you what though… I will never ever be without it again. If we sell and move, next house will have AC fitted on day 1 .
Countdown said:
Apologies if Ive asked this before - for those who have it fitted
1. How often do you have it serviced
2. How much does it cost (per Unit)
Thanks
1. Never. I just pull the filter out the indoor unit and gently vacuum it. Fitter said it was a waste of time if it was working ok. 5 years later it still works perfectly, so it seems he was right.1. How often do you have it serviced
2. How much does it cost (per Unit)
Thanks
2. Nothing.
steveo3002 said:
id have it in every room but the elec bill would kill me , hate being too hot
I checked my meter today which is fitted to the AC only, over the last 5 days my 3 units have used a total of £5.20 leccy, that’s with them being run flat out all day as I leave all the doors open so they cool the whole house. My 27kw multi split pulls just under 1kw leccy flat out so around 15p per hour , with just one unit running it’s 500w so 7p roughly per hour of peaceful sleep…. Bargain
Harry Flashman said:
Okay chaps, did the core drilling for the one box units today. These, in fact.
https://www.appliancesdirect.co.uk/p/iqool-smart12...
I wanted them floor mounted as they are heavy buggers and I don't trust my old walls. This involved chopping out skirting. Drilling the 182mm holes was done from outside, and frankly if you want to save dust, make sure that there are two of you, and one is inside with a shop vac when the core is coming through. Also, buy a decent core drill. I spent £100 on a decent Spectrum one, and it makes a big difference. My friend Chris, who was helping me, is a builder, and he said that he had never used a bit that was this easy to use. Actually drilling each hole only took about 20 minutes of drill time, but the marking up, prep etc takes far longer, as you can imagine.
IMG_20200826_153030 by baconrashers, on Flickr
Fitting the vents is meant to be a one person job. It is not as it is far, far easier if you have one person on the outside and one person on the inside. When Chris left we had only fitted up the vents to one air conditioner ((two holes). Doing the remaining four on my own was a pig and took hours. Complicated by the fact that the internal wall was half brick, and half plaster so at different depths. There is a supplied plastic sleeve sheet that you are meant to cut that forms a liner for the hole. Getting it exact is harder than one would think, but critical for getting the external vents and internal vents to sit tight. Needless to say, I messed this up on one of the holes and shimming etc was a real pain in the backside.
The templates provided for the units are OK but not perfect, but as long as the holes aren't wildly out, it seems to work. Biggest issue was thet despite measuring it to sit on the floor, the units are about 10mm off the ground if you use the template. As I had already drilled all the holes, I have to fabricate some feet to sit between the floor and unit's rubber feet in order to take the load off the wall. Not hard, but irritating.
IMG_20200826_170132 by baconrashers, on Flickr
As you can see, they are pretty bulky units. Fired up, it cools rapidly at 10,000 BTU capacity. The noise is far louder than a split unit, but quieter than most floor fans (except Dysons etc.). The swing is vertical only. You cannot switch off the display, which will be annoying at night. I have not yet connected them to the WiFi, but they use a different app to the TCL units I have elsewhere - but I think I can get around this by tying them into Alexa.
One worry is those big vent holes. You cannot really put much of a fall on them, and I am worried than angle rain will bring water into the house, or the unit. I have bought some 9" x 6" air brick cowls from ebay to shelter the external vents to mitigate the problem. Time will tell if this is a problem.
Wiring is dead easy - just put it near a plug.
This is more of a pain to install than a split, as you have to drill three holes per unit (condensate pipe takes another 20mm hole), instead of one. We were able to drill from outside due to scaffolding being up, but if you did this job from inside the dust and mess would be unbelievable. In terms of electrics, frankly you can wire a split unit's inside component to a plug from inside if you have to, and if you can do the gassing yourself and have a place for the outdoor unit to go and power there, it is easy to do.
The one advantage with these really is neatness on the front of a house. Two big vents at the front, and no pipework running everywhere.
In future I would use proper splits (the reason I installed these was that they are in front rooms and I did not want pipework ruining the front of the house. But they are noisier, much bigger inside units, the large core drilling job is a pig, functionality of the units seems more limited, and installing the vents made me want to throw the whole lot in a skip.
Harry - How are you getting on with this unit? Do you still rate it? https://www.appliancesdirect.co.uk/p/iqool-smart12...
I wanted them floor mounted as they are heavy buggers and I don't trust my old walls. This involved chopping out skirting. Drilling the 182mm holes was done from outside, and frankly if you want to save dust, make sure that there are two of you, and one is inside with a shop vac when the core is coming through. Also, buy a decent core drill. I spent £100 on a decent Spectrum one, and it makes a big difference. My friend Chris, who was helping me, is a builder, and he said that he had never used a bit that was this easy to use. Actually drilling each hole only took about 20 minutes of drill time, but the marking up, prep etc takes far longer, as you can imagine.
IMG_20200826_153030 by baconrashers, on FlickrFitting the vents is meant to be a one person job. It is not as it is far, far easier if you have one person on the outside and one person on the inside. When Chris left we had only fitted up the vents to one air conditioner ((two holes). Doing the remaining four on my own was a pig and took hours. Complicated by the fact that the internal wall was half brick, and half plaster so at different depths. There is a supplied plastic sleeve sheet that you are meant to cut that forms a liner for the hole. Getting it exact is harder than one would think, but critical for getting the external vents and internal vents to sit tight. Needless to say, I messed this up on one of the holes and shimming etc was a real pain in the backside.
The templates provided for the units are OK but not perfect, but as long as the holes aren't wildly out, it seems to work. Biggest issue was thet despite measuring it to sit on the floor, the units are about 10mm off the ground if you use the template. As I had already drilled all the holes, I have to fabricate some feet to sit between the floor and unit's rubber feet in order to take the load off the wall. Not hard, but irritating.
IMG_20200826_170132 by baconrashers, on FlickrAs you can see, they are pretty bulky units. Fired up, it cools rapidly at 10,000 BTU capacity. The noise is far louder than a split unit, but quieter than most floor fans (except Dysons etc.). The swing is vertical only. You cannot switch off the display, which will be annoying at night. I have not yet connected them to the WiFi, but they use a different app to the TCL units I have elsewhere - but I think I can get around this by tying them into Alexa.
One worry is those big vent holes. You cannot really put much of a fall on them, and I am worried than angle rain will bring water into the house, or the unit. I have bought some 9" x 6" air brick cowls from ebay to shelter the external vents to mitigate the problem. Time will tell if this is a problem.
Wiring is dead easy - just put it near a plug.
This is more of a pain to install than a split, as you have to drill three holes per unit (condensate pipe takes another 20mm hole), instead of one. We were able to drill from outside due to scaffolding being up, but if you did this job from inside the dust and mess would be unbelievable. In terms of electrics, frankly you can wire a split unit's inside component to a plug from inside if you have to, and if you can do the gassing yourself and have a place for the outdoor unit to go and power there, it is easy to do.
The one advantage with these really is neatness on the front of a house. Two big vents at the front, and no pipework running everywhere.
In future I would use proper splits (the reason I installed these was that they are in front rooms and I did not want pipework ruining the front of the house. But they are noisier, much bigger inside units, the large core drilling job is a pig, functionality of the units seems more limited, and installing the vents made me want to throw the whole lot in a skip.
Edited by Harry Flashman on Wednesday 26th August 21:27
Been using them constantly. Excellent. Whilst louder than a split, less noisy than a fan and very powerful.
Baby's room is 24m2 with 3m high ceilings One of these has been effortlessly keeping it to 20C. Wifi control is excellent.
Have had no rain ingress issues over last wet winter.
Given you don't need to pay someone hundreds of pounds to gas it, if you can bear drilling the big holes and those bloody vent covers (just glue them on from outside) a good option. Would be very easy for a garden room, for example.
All that said, long term, if it breaks, the unique hole configuration means that replacing it could be a pig. I'd still go with a split for future proofing, if you can. If a split unit breaks, any brand can replace it. Not so with these due to a non standardised vent configuration.
In terms of actual performance though, can't fault these single box units so far. Big, a bit noisier than a split, but undeniably effective.
Baby's room is 24m2 with 3m high ceilings One of these has been effortlessly keeping it to 20C. Wifi control is excellent.
Have had no rain ingress issues over last wet winter.
Given you don't need to pay someone hundreds of pounds to gas it, if you can bear drilling the big holes and those bloody vent covers (just glue them on from outside) a good option. Would be very easy for a garden room, for example.
All that said, long term, if it breaks, the unique hole configuration means that replacing it could be a pig. I'd still go with a split for future proofing, if you can. If a split unit breaks, any brand can replace it. Not so with these due to a non standardised vent configuration.
In terms of actual performance though, can't fault these single box units so far. Big, a bit noisier than a split, but undeniably effective.
Edited by Harry Flashman on Wednesday 16th June 22:52
Anyone here done a split system on a Victorian terrace?
Obviously I don't have a side alleyway option, there's not really anything on the roof as its all sloped/converted loft with windows, so only option would be on the side of the house but would be quite visible, or the back, again, mostly window, with the exception of down near ground level in corner of garden then I guess could try and disguise it with something?
Obviously I don't have a side alleyway option, there's not really anything on the roof as its all sloped/converted loft with windows, so only option would be on the side of the house but would be quite visible, or the back, again, mostly window, with the exception of down near ground level in corner of garden then I guess could try and disguise it with something?
Gassing Station | Homes, Gardens and DIY | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff