Air Conditioner Issues .. Again

Even though we had two air conditioner repairmen out within a few days, we have good news. The news is probably much better for me than for Vince . . therefore, you know it must involve spending money!  🙂

Ever since we got the mini split in the sewing room, and I learned how energy efficient they are, and how well they cool, I’ve wanted one for our bedroom. We like to sleep with the temperature quite cool.

Not everyone will agree with me, but I think central air conditioning is not what it’s cracked up to be . . at least for us. Here’s my thinking:

1. There are only two of us so all day, we’re cooling 3 bedrooms that no one ever goes into.
2. At night, we’re cooling two bedrooms, a family room, a kitchen and dining room that no one is going into.
3. We have almost no humidity so keeping the humidity isn’t an issue for us.
4. If the a/c is only on in the bedroom at night, we don’t need to turn the a/c on in the rest of the house til about 11:00 a.m.

During the day, it isn’t so bad because the solar power we produce is providing energy for the air conditioner. But at night, we’re paying for electricity and it’s almost 100% going to run the air conditioner.

Another issue is that our central unit – the outside unit makes a popping sound that’s loud enough to wake even the most sound sleeper (me) every single time it cycles off. We’ve had three repairmen out now and all three said . . that’s just the way it is. I’ve begged to get rid of the old a/c and get a new one but one a/c guy told us that in order to change out the inside unit (in the attic), he’d have to tear out the ceiling in the hallway. The second a/c guy told us that they would be able to get through the attic access hole but . . the third a/c guy told us that the inside part of the unit was fine and it isn’t old enough that it needs to be replaced but for about 1/3 of the cost we were expecting to pay, we can get a new more energy efficient, quieter outside unit. That’s good news!

But, the best news is this:  All the time I’ve wanted a mini split in the bedroom, Vince has said “NO” because: (1) we have no more room in our breaker box for adding a 220 plug and (2) the cost of the mini split was more than he felt the savings was worth.

The third a/c guy told us that we could get a mini split that’s plenty big enough to keep our bedroom cool and it will plug into an existing 110 plug, and, it will cost less than half of what we paid for the bigger unit in the sewing room.

I doubt we do any of it til next spring but with a mini split in the bedroom, we’ll be able to sleep as cool as we want without much energy cost; we’ll keep the central air off from about 9 p.m. til probably 11 a.m.

Eventually we’ll get everything the way we want it and then . . I’ll convince Vince that we need to move back to MO.  🙂