[TriLUG] OT: thermodynamics of A/C question

Bill Farrow bill at arrowsreach.com
Wed Jul 4 10:55:24 EDT 2012


On Wed, Jul 4, 2012 at 10:03 AM, Matt Flyer <matt at noway2.thruhere.net> wrote:
> Last Friday when it was 100+ I noticed that my upstairs unit was having
> trouble keeping up with the load.  The thermostat was set at 77F and the
> temperature was 80F.  I went outside and used the hose to wash off the
> condenser.  Before doing so, you could feel hot air coming out of it.  I
> proceeded to hose down the coils for a while with a mist, keeping them
> wet as they would evaporate and dry quickly.  It didn't take long for
> the air coming out of the condenser to become cool.  I checked the
> upstairs temperature again about an hour or so later and it had managed
> to recover back to 77F.

Good work Matt, thanks for reporting back to us on your tests. You are
encouraging me to instrument my home so I can log temperature
measurements and electricity usage so I can conduct similar
experiments.  My electricity meter transmits a pulse of IR light for
every watt hour of energy used.

On a related note, Luke Fishback's company "Plot Watt" just raised
another $3 million in venture capital funding. I met Luke at a
Triangle startup gathering a couple of years ago, when he was just
getting started.  Plot Watt is located in Durham.
  http://t.co/Jz368rtd
  https://plotwatt.com/

Bill



More information about the TriLUG mailing list