RetroFedHouse was 83 degrees (28.3 C) this morning š„µ
Iced RaktajinoFor starters, yes, we have A/C and it works. I installed the first phase of my PV system last week and have been trying to go solar-only during this heat wave. Unfortunately, I only budgeted for 3 KW of solar in the first phase of this project, and the central A/C is about 3.5 KW. That means I can run the A/C fine during the day - drawing the difference from the batteries and charging them back up when the A/C cycles off - but at night, itās a straight 65 amp draw from the batteries. Due to the current heat wave, its also running more than it normally would, so the PV is struggling to keep the batteries up.
S.O. and I spent yesterday afternoon and evening downstairs in the basement where it was nice and cool and just turned off the A/C. It was about 11 PM when the movie we were watching finished so we decided to call it a night. Came upstairs, and it was 85 degrees. Yikes.
Rather than run the A/C to pump out almost 20 degrees of accumulated heat, we just opened all the windows hoping it would naturally cool down overnight and the A/C could cool it the rest of the way down in the morning.
Weāve also got a little 5,000 BTU (450 watt) window unit in the bedroom, so we brought the dogs in with us, closed the door, and turned that on. Itās pretty easy on the house battery, and we slept comfortably.
When we got up around 6:30 this morning and opened the bedroom door, it was like walking into an oven. Despite the outside temp dropping to 70 degrees overnight, the house only cooled 2 degrees from 85 to 83. S.O immediately caved and turned the A/C on (donāt blame him at all) and itās been been running constantly for about 2 hours now pumping out the accumulated heat. House battery is down to about 38% as of this writing, and the sun is just starting to hit the roof panels in useful amounts.
Todayās forecast is 99 degrees and afternoon thunderstorms, so I may have to cave and switch back to utility power for the rest of the heat wave (the rest of the weekend is supposed to be cloudy and hot).
Lessons learned:
- Add more PV to the roof ASAP
- Buy S.O. something nice for going along with my solar-only shenanigans this week
- It would have probably saved energy in the long run to have run the A/C the whole time at a higher temp than leaving it off and then pumping out about 14 hours of accumulated heat.
- Updating the houseās insulation is probably the next project I need to plan
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Consider a whole house fan if itās 85Ā° inside and 70Ā° outsideā¦
We can run the HVAC in fan only mode, and it doesnāt seem to help much for cooling with the windows open. Just moves the same air around unless thereās a breeze outside pushing outside air in/out.
We used to have a pair of window fans we put on opposite sides of the house, one pushing and one pulling, but those both failed in the last few years and we never replaced them (Why do window fans cost ~$60?! lol) Those worked great, so I guess Iām just gonna have to pay the ridiculous prices and replace them.
Air conditioners are designed to move the heat from inside to outside, not the air. So an HVAC fan doesnāt pull air in from the outside, it just recirculates the air in the house across the evaporator, which in āfan onlyā mode is turned off.
Window fans are an excellent idea, itās the only cooling method I need here in New Mexico. That, plus an insulated house. I run the fans for a couple of hours in the early morning when itās coolest, and then close up the house. It only gets up to 85F by the afternoon, and with <15% humidity, that is comfortable.
I think heās referring to whole house fan that pulls in air from outside and blows it into the house
I was picturing an attic fan that pushed the hot air up and out so fresh air is drawn in the windows.
Yup, thatās it.
They are amazing.
I have a whole house fan and I highly recommend it. Our AC use went down 80%. Gets us comfortable most nights. Theyāre not too bad to install, a few thousand.
We were using window fans before and itās just a pain in the ass to have to turn them on individually every night. Also they block quite a bit of your view/natural light. But, using them to see if it works to bring your house temp down is a good strategy to see if a house fan is worth the investment.
I just put a box fan in the window and secure it with a bungee cord, lol. Cheap af.
I pay close attention to the wind when Iām opening windows overnight. It works pretty well for most of the summer.
This may be too small for you, but itās way cheaper than $60
https://vip.sdichterlaw.com/products/7-in-3-speed-electric-twin-window-fan?currency=USD&variant_sku_code=29376892-0-0-0-0-0-0
I also found some $30 box fans that would be able to be modified with some cardboard to serve the same purpose, provided you have screens in the windows
Yeah ours has been like that for weeks.
We had a week of it being 32-37Ā°C upstairs last week.
We slept outside in a tent for the week with a fan blowing into the tent, every window and door open from 6 to 9 or so, depending on when everyone had to leave .
Our tiny upstairs attack bedroom only has one tiny roof window, so it doesnāt cool down even with the window open.
I know what you mean, but I like the idea that your house has some sort of defensive/battle room on top of it.
Weāre going through our PV system testing right now, so we feel your pain. All kind of sources of electric draw that you never think about until your batteries are running dry at midnight. Thankfully we did double down on more panels already, but thereās no question you have to be more disciplined to make this work.
On the other hand, looking at our power bill is very comforting. Iām really concerned about the rate increases power companies are going to push through whether or not all the AI data centers come up.
Yep!
Thatās how I found out our 18 cu-ft refrigerator is normally very efficient at around 100 watts for cooling, but it goes into a 400w ādefrostā cycle every 2 hours. Iāve found no way to turn that off and it doesnāt seem to be affected by the āenergy saverā mode. I get why it does that since I remember old freezers completely encrusted with ice, but I also remember only having to run a manual defrost of them like once a month or so.
Iāve wanted to have a PV system for a decade or more and finally decided to just do it. Battery prices and capacity were finally within reach, and I wanted to insulate myself from further electric rate increases. Rates have more than doubled in the last 5 years and thereās another rate increase working its way through the PSC (aka the ārubber stamp anything the utility companies want commission") right now.
Itās getting us all this global warming. We had it last week in the UK, hit almost 40Ā°C which is crazy for us! We donāt have any A/C anywhere! Our houses are very energy efficient as designed for cold wet weather, so retain heat extremely well.
Monitor indoor and outdoor temps.
Doors, windows, blinds and curtains all closed fully when inside is colder than outside. Fans blowing at us to cool down.
Doors, windows, blinds and curtains all open when inside is hotter than outside. Fans blowing out of the windows to get the heat out the house as fast as possible.
At least thatās what I find works best for us.
Howās the humidity in the UK? I can deal with the temps (to a degree, pun intended) but the 95% or higher humidity just makes it miserable here. A lot of times I can make do with just a dehumidifier, even if it slightly warms the room, just to make things less āstickyā.
Different construction, but our house is block and works similarly. Great in winter but just soaks up and holds heat in the summer.
Insulation seems incredibly important with those temps.
Just saw a video - not sure of origin so ymmv, about foam insulation blocks placed on the outside of walls, that are then missed to look like normal spackle. Seems great for anyone with a house with a shitty 50s attitude toward insulation and wall cavitys and needs some more space for that.
Thatās a project Iām gonna have to move up in priority. And yep, house is from the 50s and the thermal mass of the block itself is basically the extent of the insulation. Plan is to have those foam insulation blocks installed but put siding over them rather than spackle.
One side effect of my PV install is that I have a lot of large, thick foam inserts that I have to get rid of. Theyāre very similar in size and material to those foam insulation blocks, so I may hang onto them and ask the contractors if they can use them. Thatāll re-use something Iād otherwise be tossing out and also save some money on buying the foam panels, though Iām not sure how much those cost.
Donāt forget the roof. Even if old insulation up there should replace with new. And definitely make sure the installers leave air gaps up thereā¦ I know people that fucked that up and had mold problems afterwards
Our house is 100 years old, had multiple owners that fancied themselves as master renovators (they werenāt) so a majority of our HVAC system (among other things) is fucked.
The main upstairs room reaches 105Ā°F+ during the summer. For the bedroom upstairs, we had to shut off/stuff a few vents in key places so some cool air would reach. The door to that room is always closed and a box fan is running 24/7/365, otherwise the room would be uninhabitable in the warm months.
Last night we stuffed the bottom of the door with some blankets to keep more cool air in. Outside the room was 100F, inside was 75F, so we did pretty well.
Ugh. Years ago I rented a house like that. Landlordās fix was to permanently install a massive window A/C up there. It helped, true, but even running it full blast 24/7 the best it could keep the temp was low 80s. There wasnāt a door to close, unfortunately, so any cool air just sank down the stairwell to the 2nd floor.
We tried using that as the master bedroom for all of two weeks one year, and noped right out lol.
Thought about doing a mini split in the upstairs room? Our friend did that upstairs while the existing central handles the main floor and it works wonders.
One of my friends put up what we have been calling skeleton awnings last month and its insane how much of a difference it makes with no electrical cost, and maybe even savings.
Its just a frame but it casts a full shadow at the time of peak sun exposure
We keep ours at 79 with central heating. Works well. PGE is horrible in the summer.
Your right looking at insulation. Its going to help quite a bit with AC.
putting the temp up makes sense. 80 and dry is not really that bad. when the temp gets real high you only need the indoor thermostat a bit lower to keep it dry.
Iām not sure how much power a dehumidifier draws, but that goes a long way toward comfort, too.