Home Aircon

[Sdf4786k]

On 8/11/2021 at 7:47 PM, Ody_2004 said:

mmmm why 2 years later need change?

if trucking type of installation still not too headache.. concealed gypsum board super headache.. 

I read that it’s not copper but composite copper .. whatever that means .. I am guessing that it’s a mix of copper n other metal to increase the rigidity of the bends without have kinks but the material did not last.. but that’s just a guess n not validated

[Sdf4786k]

On a side note anyone had good experience with potable aircon ? What a minimum btu power rating to get .. 

[Victor68]

23 minutes ago, Sdf4786k said:

On a side note anyone had good experience with potable aircon ? What a minimum btu power rating to get .. 

Avoid unless you have no choice or for temp use. BTU is depending on the size of your room and the heat load you intend to cool. For such AC, efficiency is definitely lower than your standard AC lah

[Lala81]

59 minutes ago, Sdf4786k said:

On a side note anyone had good experience with potable aircon ? What a minimum btu power rating to get .. 

Portable AC just sucks BIG time. Never get it.

U need to be half deaf to sleep through it. Never believe what they say.
And I come from a background where i used a window casement AC for almost 15 years which is already about 500-600% noisier than a regular multi-split AC.

I sleep in AC >360 days a year. If u give me a choice of only portable AC vs just a normal fan, I'll take the fan  
I used to do calls 4-5 times a month for a year. And this call room had portable AC cos the AC there had spoilt. And i was still at my parents home then with my casement window AC.
It's just bad ...

Edited August 13, 2021 by Lala81

[Atrecord]

36 minutes ago, Sdf4786k said:

On a side note anyone had good experience with potable aircon ? What a minimum btu power rating to get .. 

I used to have one, or two, as we replaced the first one.

It was in my parents' old flat. In the early days (~40 yr ago), they moved in with minimal reno, and of course, no aircon. A couple decades later, after i got married and moved out, and when my mother was helping to look after my kids (in the day), we felt that it was good to install aircon. But my mother said only install in 1 bedroom and the living room (2-split) is good enough, as my father didn't fancy aircon, and another room was not occupied. <---- wrong decision on hindsight.

We went along with it cos the kid(s) was mostly gonna be in the living room, and the A/C would be switched on only if it's really hot.

The kids would go to childcare when they turned 2, so the time spent at my parents' place would be reduced when that happened.

Then when the elder kid started P1 (afternoon session), we ask her to sleep over at my parents' place from Sun-Thur, so that she doesn't have to wake up too early the next day for school, else we will wake her up when we go to work, and bring her to my parents' place.

By that time, we got her a bed in the spare room, and she was to sleep there. But that room got no A/C... So we went to buy a portable unit from Carrefour. 

Rooms in old flats are bigger size c.f. to new flats/condos. The unit we got was a 9000 Btu one, i remember. The split unit in the other room was only 6000 Btu, so we thought it was more than sufficient.

However, when we started using it, we had to turn it on at full blast to be cool (not cold) enough to feel comfortable. And it was very noisy. The hot exhaust was not an extremely big issue, because the installer had channelled it out of the windows using the flexible pipe, but the cooling efficiency is confirmed much poorer than the split unit.

In an enclosed room, the noise can be terrible, but the saving grace is that it's constantly loud (unlike renovation where the jackhammer will give rattling sound for maybe 10 sec, then silent for 4 sec, then repeat...). So once the brain got used to it, it's possible to just shut it off and ignore it - well least it's easier than those intermittent loudness, i feel. The noise is unavoidable, because the compressor is in the portable unit itself, which is inside the room.

The portable A/C would be used for maybe 30 min to an hour every night for the girl to sleep, after which my parents will open the door/windows, after she had slept.

After about 2 years, my parents moved out of the flat, and it was rented out. The first tenant used that as a spare room too, so didn't complain. Subsequently another tenant said it wasn't cold enough, although it was still working, and we got a replacement model, which I think was also 9000 (or 11000) Btu. They were all from Trends, one of the first few to have portable aircons at those times.

And after another few years, the split system was starting to give intermittent problem, so we replaced it with a system-3, and decommissioned the portable.

So that's my experience with an old portable. Not sure whether technology has changed, although I doubt. A mixture of good and bad, i'll say.

In summary, if you really need a/c in an area where you don't have or can't (or don't want to) install normal a/c, then this is an option. It's functional, but you must be prepared that it comes with noise that requires some level of tolerance. It is also not as cooling as the normal split unit, even when it's of higher Btu.

[Sdf4786k]

29 minutes ago, Lala81 said:

Portable AC just sucks BIG time. Never get it.

U need to be half deaf to sleep through it. Never believe what they say.
And I come from a background where i used a window casement AC for almost 15 years which is already about 500-600% noisier than a regular multi-split AC.

I sleep in AC >360 days a year. If u give me a choice of only portable AC vs just a normal fan, I'll take the fan  
I used to do calls 4-5 times a month for a year. And this call room had portable AC cos the AC there had spoilt. And i was still at my parents home then with my casement window AC.
It's just bad ...

Thanks for the heads up 

[Sdf4786k]

27 minutes ago, Atrecord said:

I used to have one, or two, as we replaced the first one.

It was in my parents' old flat. In the early days (~40 yr ago), they moved in with minimal reno, and of course, no aircon. A couple decades later, after i got married and moved out, and when my mother was helping to look after my kids (in the day), we felt that it was good to install aircon. But my mother said only install in 1 bedroom and the living room (2-split) is good enough, as my father didn't fancy aircon, and another room was not occupied. <---- wrong decision on hindsight.

We went along with it cos the kid(s) was mostly gonna be in the living room, and the A/C would be switched on only if it's really hot.

The kids would go to childcare when they turned 2, so the time spent at my parents' place would be reduced when that happened.

Then when the elder kid started P1 (afternoon session), we ask her to sleep over at my parents' place from Sun-Thur, so that she doesn't have to wake up too early the next day for school, else we will wake her up when we go to work, and bring her to my parents' place.

By that time, we got her a bed in the spare room, and she was to sleep there. But that room got no A/C... So we went to buy a portable unit from Carrefour. 

Rooms in old flats are bigger size c.f. to new flats/condos. The unit we got was a 9000 Btu one, i remember. The split unit in the other room was only 6000 Btu, so we thought it was more than sufficient.

However, when we started using it, we had to turn it on at full blast to be cool (not cold) enough to feel comfortable. And it was very noisy. The hot exhaust was not an extremely big issue, because the installer had channelled it out of the windows using the flexible pipe, but the cooling efficiency is confirmed much poorer than the split unit.

In an enclosed room, the noise can be terrible, but the saving grace is that it's constantly loud (unlike renovation where the jackhammer will give rattling sound for maybe 10 sec, then silent for 4 sec, then repeat...). So once the brain got used to it, it's possible to just shut it off and ignore it - well least it's easier than those intermittent loudness, i feel. The noise is unavoidable, because the compressor is in the portable unit itself, which is inside the room.

The portable A/C would be used for maybe 30 min to an hour every night for the girl to sleep, after which my parents will open the door/windows, after she had slept.

After about 2 years, my parents moved out of the flat, and it was rented out. The first tenant used that as a spare room too, so didn't complain. Subsequently another tenant said it wasn't cold enough, although it was still working, and we got a replacement model, which I think was also 9000 (or 11000) Btu. They were all from Trends, one of the first few to have portable aircons at those times.

And after another few years, the split system was starting to give intermittent problem, so we replaced it with a system-3, and decommissioned the portable.

So that's my experience with an old portable. Not sure whether technology has changed, although I doubt. A mixture of good and bad, i'll say.

In summary, if you really need a/c in an area where you don't have or can't (or don't want to) install normal a/c, then this is an option. It's functional, but you must be prepared that it comes with noise that requires some level of tolerance. It is also not as cooling as the normal split unit, even when it's of higher Btu.

Thanks .. will avoid .. else my zoom call going to be a shouting match between me n the aircon

[Atrecord]

49 minutes ago, Lala81 said:

Portable AC just sucks BIG time. Never get it.

U need to be half deaf to sleep through it. Never believe what they say.
And I come from a background where i used a window casement AC for almost 15 years which is already about 500-600% noisier than a regular multi-split AC.

I sleep in AC >360 days a year. If u give me a choice of only portable AC vs just a normal fan, I'll take the fan  
I used to do calls 4-5 times a month for a year. And this call room had portable AC cos the AC there had spoilt. And i was still at my parents home then with my casement window AC.
It's just bad ...

your ears must be very good and sensitive.

Mine aren't great, genetically i suspect (my mum too) and likely made worse dealing with demolition as combat engineer 😂

for my girl, we psycho'ed her into accepting it. Young kids maybe easier to convince 😆

[Atrecord]

10 minutes ago, Sdf4786k said:

Thanks .. will avoid .. else my zoom call going to be a shouting match between me n the aircon

Oh for zoom calls... no chance lah...  the earpiece/mics you use, will capture the noise and the other party/parties will not be able to hear you at all, regardless how loud you shout. For me, i cannot even sit directly under my ceiling fan when i have calls. The distortion is just too much, from the feedback i got.

[JanM]

2 hours ago, Sdf4786k said:

On a side note anyone had good experience with potable aircon ? What a minimum btu power rating to get .. 

many of the smaller portable aircon have poor energy efficiency.  Normal aircon have 2 air circulation flows which never mix with each other.  The first one is the cool air in the room which is blown over the cooling coils.  The aircon then transfers the heat absorbed at the coils and expels it at the external condenser by blowing outside air over the condenser coil, ie the 2nd air circulation flow.  The smaller portable aircons however will suck in 2 separate streams of cool air from inside the room.   the aircon then extracts the heat from one of the stream and return it at a cooler temperature back to the room.  The extracted heat is in turn transferred to the 2nd air stream which is then expelled directly to the outside via its single exhaust air hose.  If you were to stand outside facing the exhaust, you will actually feel quite cool since it was cool air from the room to begin with.  Also as air is being literally sucked out of the room, the room air pressure drops slightly which in turn sucks in warm air from outside the room through gaps in the door windows etc.  Not thermally ideal unless you want high fresh air circulation inside the room.  Or maybe to serve as a negative pressure covid 19 isolation room 😨

Those bigger units with two air hose should be better as they will draw in external air via one hose to shift the extracted heat out.

[Mkl22]

On 8/11/2021 at 2:28 PM, Kb27 said:

Yeap, Sanyo no longer around. It was one of the best brand yesteryears.

Before I had a Sys 3 Sharp in my old place. Keep having problem occasionally. Then the Sharp technician came and diagnose, it was copper piping kinked during installation. So have to look out for this when you're installing new aircon. Later I had a fujitsu Sys 1. It was working nicely until it starts to leak water and was no cold air. I replaced it with Mit Starmex, but on hindsight, the fujistu just needed a FCU cleaning. That's when I found out after learning to DIY clean the Starmex. And my old Sanyo is still working.

If I were to buy a new one tomorrow, I'll probably just consider Jap brands. It's a very stable technology, now with inverters. And remember, the fcu needs regular cleaning, the cooling coil especially, not just the filters and blowers.

There's no need to look at fancy "technology". There are all the same variations of a theme. The only important thing is the inverters.

just cleaned my starmex yesterday via pressure wash. after approx 5mths if usage.not that dirty as i use the daiso filter so that less dust is stuck on the cooling fins.

Won't need any aircon tech to come unless parts break. as long as aircons are not dismantled for cleaning. then will last a long time.

[Henryngseowkok]

23 minutes ago, Mkl22 said:

just cleaned my starmex yesterday via pressure wash. after approx 5mths if usage.not that dirty as i use the daiso filter so that less dust is stuck on the cooling fins.

Won't need any aircon tech to come unless parts break. as long as aircons are not dismantled for cleaning. then will last a long time.

Hi, may I know which type of air con filter you bought from Daiso? Mine is starmex system 3. Inside the filter it is a long small silver one and is very dirty n dunno where to buy. Thanks

[Stratovarius]

On 8/11/2021 at 7:42 PM, Sdf4786k said:

Oh .. only gain city provide free tubing upgrade.. but i read mix reaction on forum on having to change it 2 years later..

My take is dont go to these gain city or courts for AC. Consider looking for those independent AC installers. They are generally cheaper and more flexible in providing solutions esp you are changing out your existing system.

For existing piping, you can engage them to do a pressure test first. If okay, proceed with a flush. No need to change. Insulation i will say is okay even after 10 years since this is for cold fluid, not hot. If die die want to change, you need to see how to pipe runs and if you need to spend additional money to tear down other fixtures.

Just my 2c.

[Mkl22]

15 minutes ago, Henryngseowkok said:

Hi, may I know which type of air con filter you bought from Daiso? Mine is starmex system 3. Inside the filter it is a long small silver one and is very dirty n dunno where to buy. Thanks

[Mkl22]

2 minutes ago, Stratovarius said:

My take is dont go to these gain city or courts for AC. Consider looking for those independent AC installers. They are generally cheaper and more flexible in providing solutions esp you are changing out your existing system.

For existing piping, you can engage them to do a pressure test first. If okay, proceed with a flush. No need to change. Insulation i will say is okay even after 10 years since this is for cold fluid, not hot. If die die want to change, you need to see how to pipe runs and if you need to spend additional money to tear down other fixtures.

Just my 2c.

it depends.

i would say the insulation will crumble unless it is the good stuff. then you get excessive condensation.

[Henryngseowkok]

1 minute ago, Mkl22 said:

Thanks bro! Will go to Chinatown point Daiso to look for this filter.

43 minutes ago, Mkl22 said:

just cleaned my starmex yesterday via pressure wash. after approx 5mths if usage.not that dirty as i use the daiso filter so that less dust is stuck on the cooling fins.

Won't need any aircon tech to come unless parts break. as long as aircons are not dismantled for cleaning. then will last a long time.

Hi, may I know which type of air con filter you bought from Daiso? Mine is starmex system 3. Inside the filter it is a long small silver one and is very dirty n dunno where to buy. Thanks

[Stratovarius]

6 minutes ago, Mkl22 said:

it depends.

i would say the insulation will crumble unless it is the good stuff. then you get excessive condensation.

Yup. Im saying based on my work experience. If using Armaflex should be fine as i have seen cooling system that are more than 10 years old and those still looks fine. 

Those PVC drain pipes are more of a concern if not installed properly. 

[Mkl22]

1 minute ago, Stratovarius said:

 

Those PVC drain pipes are more of a concern if not installed properly. 

the idea is not too have the drains pipes run horizontal for too long after exiting the evaporator. best is have it descend immediately. then for sure no clogs.