Using Window Air Conditioners Effectively

When I was a child my father bought one air conditioner for the living room and put up heavy curtains in the doorway to keep from "wasting" the air conditioning by letting it escape into the rest of the house. In summer, he sat in front of the television and the AC in comfort while everyone in any other part of the house sweltered. He believed that the AC could not keep the whole house cool, and he was probably right; however, it probably could have kept at least one more room cool.

As an adult, I live in a house that is quite similar to the house I grew up in. It is a small, old wood frame house in Texas. I have three window AC's, and I have to say, I have learned a bit about how they work and how to get the most out of using them. For one thing, I have found that even the most inexpensive window unit you can buy today is stronger and more efficient than the window unit we had when I was a child. As a child, I never got cold in our one cooled room. As an adult, I find that my window units can easily freeze me out of a room.

Nonetheless, many people still think the way my father thought. They believe that a window AC is not strong enough to cool much space. Well, of course, you can find out how much space a window AC is intended to cool by reading the side of the box it came in. But even that is not entirely accurate, because you can greatly enhance the effectiveness of your window AC by using fans. Using fans to boost the range of your AC, rather than keeping all your AC's going all the time will help keep your utility bills down.

I usually have only one or two of my window AC's running at a time, yet my house is always comfortable. I make sure to give each one a rest every 24 hours because this helps increase the life of the AC. If you run your AC full blast all summer, it is highly likely to freeze up and die before the summer is over. If you give it a break for at least an hour or two every day, it will give you good service for years. It is also important to run your AC's for a few minutes, at least once a month during the cool months. This keeps the Freon from pooling up and becoming nonfunctional. This is a non-technical explanation, but it is essentially accurate.

To get the most efficiency out of my AC's, here is what I do. At night, I keep the AC in my bedroom on, and I keep a fan on myself. I also set a fan in the door of my bedroom to blow the cool air into the rest of the house so that it won't get too terribly hot. This does not keep the rest of the house cool enough to be up and actively working in it, but it keeps it from being oppressively hot when I get up in the morning.

Once I get up, I turn off the AC in my bedroom and turn on the one in my living room/work room. If it is already very hot, I turn on the one that I use to keep my kitchen area cool as well, but usually I don't do this until later when I am working in the kitchen. I reset my fans so that I have one fan blowing on me while I work and one bringing cool air to the rest of the house.

When I work in the kitchen, I turn on the kitchen AC and usually leave the AC on in the other part of the house. I set up a fan to bring the cool air in from the other part of the house while I am cooking. I also have a kitchen fan that blows right on the work area to keep things cool.

It is important to understand that using window AC's this way is not "wasting" the cool air. Window units don't work on a thermostat like a central air conditioning system. They will work just as hard whether you close yourself up in one room and let the rest of the house swelter or not. Usually, if you close off the room where you are, you will end up being too cold! By using a system of fans, and rotating your use of AC, you can keep your work/living area very comfortable and the rest of your house tolerably comfortable. Rotating the use of your AC's will help keep them running well for many years.

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