Staying cool - AC, etc.

[Gardenarian]

Still loving our new home in Ashland, but temps are predicted to be over 100 for the next couple of weeks! I'm not used to that kind of heat - huge adjustment! - and this is the first time I've had an air conditioner as well.

It's been hitting 90 pretty regularly since June 1, and I haven't needed the AC - just open the windows at night and turn on a window fan, and shut everything up in the morning. When it got really hot, I turned on the whole house fan, which blows up the cool air from the basement and that brought the temperature down about 5 degrees. But last night, even at midnight, it was hotter outside than in, and it was 80 in the house - too hot for me to sleep comfortably. I set the AC at 75 and it worked well; I turned it up to 77 for the day time.

I don't want to become a weather wimp, always saying "It's too hot!" or "It's too cold!" but I do want to be reasonably comfortable. Maybe I can gradually increase the indoor temps.

Do you keep the fan running all the time, or set it to automatic? I read that the fan uses about 1/5 of the energy of AC (which could still be significant.) Of course if the basement heats up then I will not leave the fan running.

We're really lucky with our shade trees and the orientation of our house - many of our neighbors have been using AC since May.

The mornings are very pleasant, and we're really enjoying the warm evenings too (once the sun goes down.) It's not humid, so you don't get all lethargic, but the sun is searing. I've taken to carrying a parasol - works great. Maybe because of the geography of the Rogue Valley it gets hottest around 6:00pm, with the temperature just slowly increasing all day.

I'm trying to get up earlier to take advantage of the (relatively) cool mornings. I'm more of a night owl, but I rarely get anything constructive done in the evenings. On the other hand, it's summer! Do I really need to be constructive all the time? (The little voice in my head "Yes, Gardenarian, you must not waste a second.")

[ApatheticNoMore]

Oh I've given up and keep cool for the most part (which actually isn't chronically running A/C at least not yet ... but is running it some).

Since I actually have seen the difference between how cool a shaded well insulated house can be than my hot little apartment with a lot of pavement around it, anyone in a house who wants to lecture me about A/C is just asking for a fight at this point (of course some poorly constructed houses without shade trees are the same though you could at least INSTALL better insulation etc. in property you owned).

The apartment concentrates heat, it's often hotter inside than out. Of course lots of other features don't help, an inside water heater (ha something people who own houses have probably never had either - again the absurdity of them weighing in on apartment living), a stove with permanent pilot etc. (yes it's probably ages old, it came with the apartment). I do think of moving apartments, it is too hot, but until then window box A/C if I need it to get by (no I don't have any other A/C than a window box). There are ceiling fans, I use them too, and a stand up fan I own.

Oh and setting the A/C to a particular temp, that's also something I can't do, so any public service commercials telling me to do so uh whatever, the A/C has temps like cool, cooler, coolest etc. that ONLY determine how cold the air is coming out of them not when the A/C turns on - you can't set it to turn on at a certain temperature. The A/C may be ages old as well (though doesn't seem too bad in power use really, the costs aren't horrible).

By the by I do what else I can to keep the apartment cool. I use 40-60 watt equivalent LED lighting (not just LED lighting but dim LED lighting :)) for most of my lights in summer so lights generate little heat, I use the laptop rather than desktop as it generates less heat, turn down the water heater (but not so much I can't get hot water), have dark curtains. It just seems to be so little I CAN do to keep cool compared to the basic design of the building and stuff that I can't do anything about ... that and climate change :)

Oh I'd only run the A/C all night in the very hottest temps, otherwise run it an hour or so before bed and it's usually cool enough to sleep through the night.

[Teacher Terry]

We are 20 degrees above average right now so have been using the swamp cooler alot. They only work in dry climates with very little humidity. However, at night we cool down so turn it off before we go to bed & by about 10 am.

[Florence]

I live on the Texas Gulf Coast and consider air-conditioning a necessity. We run the a/c at night and turn it off during the day. Our house is well insulated and the windows are double-paned with solar screens on the outside.

[SteveinMN]

We've been using the A/C sparingly; sometimes just for a few hours at a time to cool things down. Most nights it's still in the upper 50s or low 60s, so opening doors and windows first thing in the morning helps to cool the house quickly. Trees and deep eaves and added insulation help a lot, too.

Gardenarian, if you don't already have one, you might consider getting a setback thermostat. Nowadays they're pretty inexpensive. But even when we bought them and they cost $100 or so, they paid for themselves in a year. Good ones let you set multiple temperatures a day, so you can have a certain temp when you wake up, let it rise while you're out of the house, and lower again when you're expected back. Different settings for weekends, too, when you're around most of the time.

As for the fan, it can be economic to run it all the time, especially if it can bring cool air into the rest of the house. More modern furnaces have a special lower-speed setting for the fan (and, in fact, some never shut off the fan; they're designed to work that way). I would say to try it for a month or two and see if the energy cost of running the fan all the time is made up for in comfort or allowing you to run the A/C less (though weather will be quite a variable in this; you may have to go just by the seat of your pants on this).

[kib]

Days - up to 110 here - I keep a small floor fan running almost constantly. If I'm sitting for any length of time I will keep a damp washcloth close by and wipe my legs or face with it occasionally, that plus the breeze feels wonderful. During the day with that going on I can set the AC or evaporative cooler (we have both) around 85. At night I do take my washcloth to bed with me but obviously I don't want to be waking up and wetting myself every fifteen minutes, so we set the AC at 79-80.

Unfortunately we have no basement and all of our cooling comes from the totally exposed roof down through the attic and then into the house, I'm convinced this set up costs us several hundred kilowatts a month, and makes the swamp cooler especially inefficient. No idea what they were thinking when they set it up that way, but it would cost five figures to replace and fix the issue, so ... maybe next year.

[ToomuchStuff]

I might be installing a/c soon after better then 20 years of no a/c. Wondering since a/c is also a dehumidifier, if you run one in the basement or home and if it makes a difference, prior to you turning on your a/c?

[Lainey]

I usually run my a/c at 78 degrees, so kib, it's funny to see your a/c set at around 85 because last week when I came home from work and found that it was 85 degrees I knew something was wrong! The next day when it hit 90 degrees inside the house I knew I could not delay and had to call the repair guy. Fortunately it was only a "burnt connector" and so one hour and $365 later I was back to getting my house cooled down.

It was a little surprising to see the difference between 78 and 88 in terms of livability, especially sleeping. I'm on the year-round budget plan and so pay about $100/month for my all-electric home. Could I save a few bucks by boosting the temp to 85? yes, but not worth it to me, so 78 it is.

[befree]

I live in Texas, too, and I rationalize the higher electric bills in the heat of summer knowing the heating bills in the winter will be much lower. Some of the things that are useful are: ceiling fans in each room, plus portable fans. Keeping the sun out of the rooms helps, and there are several ways to do this in addition to the ones already mentioned: if/when you replace old windows, the double or triple-paned are more insulating; hanging cheap mini-blinds or matchstick blinds on the OUTSIDE of the window will diffuse the sun (as will awnings and wide porches), and not only keeping the curtains drawn during the day, but make them drapes with thermal linings.

[ApatheticNoMore]

I experimented with curtains which ones are best keeping out the heat, dark or light colored curtains. The answer is definitely dark colored, and it's significant. I even tried thermal curtains and it was the most horrible off-gassing smell ever, so they went back to the store within about a week, never again, just plain cloth for me (these are probably polyester and 7 years old, so whatever, but no smell as not that weird thermal stuff at least - I learned to worry about things like off-gassing from those thermal curtains!).

[CathyA]

I have been so overly hot my whole life, and I just can't skimp on the A.C. Fortunately, we have closed loop geothermal and it doesn't cost much at all. I do worry, though, about how our bodies deal with such temperature swings (inside versus out).

ApatheticNoMore, that's strange that dark curtains keep out the heat the most. You'd think they'd absorb it and then make your room warmer. Interesting.
We didn't have any shade around the house, or any A.C. for several years when we moved here in l982, and it was awful. Then we had just 2 window A.C. for about 12 years, which worked pretty good unless you moved at all...haha Then I planted trees and they grew up and shade the house, and this geothermal A.C. is just fabulous......and quiet.....and inexpensive.
Oh, I forgot......when we only had that one A.C. unit, we also had a whole house fan put in, in the ceiling of our hallway. At night, we'd turn off the A.C. and turn that thing on and it would bring in cooler night air from the open windows. Unfortunately, it was loud, and it sucked in a lot of bugs through the screens.

[ApatheticNoMore]

ApatheticNoMore, that's strange that dark curtains keep out the heat the most. You'd think they'd absorb it and then make your room warmer. Interesting.

Yea I could think of good explanations either way 1) dark curtains attract heat to the window because they are dark so light colored would be better 2) dark curtains do block more light from outside so dark colored would be better (if not in all cases, generally when your just dealing with fabric). Silly, but not actually finding info on this, I ran the n1 experiment. Dark curtains do considerably reduce heat.

I also at one point cut a large piece of the cloth patio roofs are made of (that let in some light yea) and hung it outside a large window from the outside. But the apartment exterior was painted, it was taken down and it seems someone stole it. >:( I could cut more, still have material, but measuring and cutting it was work as was hanging it (my short self on tiptoes on a chair outside), but yea I've gone to lengths at times. I've installed some lightly tinted window film on some windows but not extensively (also work). Whether any of that work shrugs, I think the patio covering helped a bit, and the dark curtains do help.

[SteveinMN]

Wondering since a/c is also a dehumidifier, if you run one in the basement or home and if it makes a difference, prior to you turning on your a/c?
I think it depends on how well air circulates in your house. In my mom's place, we tend to keep the basement shut off from the rest of the house because it's used only for storage and laundry. We do run a dehumidifier down there because even when the A/C does not run (that does happen here :)), there's still moisture in the air downstairs.

If the A/C was running full-time and air circulated well throughout the house, I'd be tempted to shut down the dehumidifier and see if the A/C was enough.

[Gardenarian]

Thanks for all your replies!

I have stopped running the fan as it is just not cooling off at night (it's around 1am now and 82 outside.) It struck me that having the fan on is similar to running the AC in your car with the vents set to fresh air instead of recirculating.

I got food poisoning so was stuck indoors today and very grateful for AC. We have been trying some different ways to get out and stay cool- exploring the local creeks (and soaking in them too!)

There is also a natural mineral hot springs here. The swimming pool is around 80 degrees and you can just hang out in it all day. It feels very healing and at $7.50 per day (8am - 11pm) is priced well. It's great to be able to get some exercise despite the 106 temps!

I think we'll have to bring mist spray bottles along with parasols to the 4th of July parade.

Definitely a good learning experience. Also, I will not buy naturally fermented herbal drinks at the farmer's market again. Ohh, my stomach! Maybe it's supposed to have this "cleansing" effect- should come with a warning label!

[Gardenarian]

CathyA - is the geothermal loop the same thing as a heat pump?

[jp1]

Gardenian, a geothermal loop means that the a/c (which can also function as a heat pump) uses water that circulates underground to cool the outside cools in summer/heat them in winter. It's a significantly more efficient way to transfer the heat out of the a/c system than a fan blowing hot air across the coils for a couple of reasons. First, water is a much more efficient way of transfering heat than air is. Second, water coming from underground is significantly cooler than the outside air, so it provides a larger temperature difference. A side benefit is that the outside portion of the a/c system is also much quieter since you don't have a big fan blowing every time it cycles on.

[Gregg]

We've been spared the really high temps so far so haven't needed the AC for much beyond a little shot in the evenings to make it comfortable to relax then go to bed. Our attic fan does a good job of evacuating heat from the house during most of the day as long as its under 90* or so. OTOH, our dehumidifier has probably only been off for a matter of hours since sometime in late April.

[CathyA]

Thanks for explaining that jp1. The only thing I would add is that the fluid in the tubes is some sort of alcohol. If our pressures are down a little, then they'll just add water.
It's just fantastic! They put the tubing in about 10' down into the ground with a special piece of equipment that drills through the earth. We've had it for about 19 years now. Only a few minor problems.....but we have it serviced every 6 months.
Since there's no fresh air involved, we do occasionally leave a window or door open for awhile.

[Selah]

We are renting a house that we hope to buy. Once we do, the first major investment we're going to make in it is to get a heat pump so we can have some kind of cooling in this house! I shudder to think what life would be like if we were still in our apartment. It had no A/C either, but was also surrounded by other units top, bottom, and on either side. The units made our apartment so warm during the winter we only ran the heating twice for a couple of hours.

In the meantime, we are waiting for delivery of a futon which we will put in the basement and start sleeping on during these heat waves. Right now I'm spending most nights on the sofa in the living room, while DH seems to be able to handle sleeping in our much hotter bedroom upstairs. We're keeping the blinds and windows closed once the sun hits them, and then we open everything up once the sun goes down and things cool off a little.

Apparently, there's some kind of mysterious fan in this house that helps to cool the place down if you run it for an hour or so. However, the owner said "the switch doesn't work." My stepfather investigated the switch and the switch is fine, but what fan it's supposed to be connected to, no one has figured out yet.

[sweetana3]

Is there a "turbo" fan on the roof? It could have a switch which is sometimes an automatic one that turns on when it is hot or humid in the attic. This would be hidden except for the roof part.

Or is there a whole house fan in the ceiling of a hallway or room?

[Tammy]

Selah - I've found that living in the middle of several other apartments also keeps me cooler in summer. They run their AC and it insulates my apartment, keeping my cooling costs down.