1 minute ago, Don said:

That is a good price @Chris-R. Conventional or diverter type?

The cow or the aircon?

 

No inverters at the moment, should be in within the next week or so. We expect very good pricing and could be near the conventional pricing. That is if mr Z does't .....fix it up for us all!

@Chris Hobson, I see you now get AC/DC Hybrid Air Conditioners. You probably first need to build on another room at your house to get roof space to fit the panels for the aircon. 

8 hours ago, Don said:

Damn @Chris Hobson, I thought we could get away with 1 and a half cows. Seems it is still 2 cows.  I really hope you get enough rain the rest of the year.

Thanks Don. We have been forecast a wet late summer. So far it has not materialised.

7 hours ago, Don said:

That is a good price @Chris-R. Conventional or inverter type?

 

7 hours ago, Chris-R said:

The cow or the aircon?

Probably what I love most about this forum is the irreverent humour.

Guys, I received the spec sheet of the solar aircons. ( Attached hereto )

The units is readily available and the cost of a unit compared to a LG 12BTU Inverter model, will be approximately R4000.00 more than the LG.

This does not include the solar panels, which is connected directly to the aircon. Quite impressive.

Their is also another range available which has buildt-in batteries and can be operated with no grid-power available! Little more expensive!

Any feedback and opinions on this? I have not seen any of this in RSA yet, what about you?

TTT can do a cost analysis, but if I am not mistaken the unit will pay itself within 3 years ( Difference to normal aircon) The units carry a 7 year warranty though!

Thanks

 

AC-DC Aircon - 12000btu.PDF

Thought I'd necro an old thread:

 

Looks like they are now available locally

https://www.acsuperstore.co.za/solar-air-conditioning

 

I'm very tempted to try one :-P

 

-G-

PLease report back.

 

On 2016/06/27 at 9:47 AM, superdiy said:

The compressor motor of an inverter aircon runs on DC and the speed it runs at is adjusted according to the difference in temperature between what it is set at and what it currently is at.  I'll try and explain it by means of an example.  If the aircon is running in cooling mode and the temperature is set to 22°C and currently the room temperature is at 24°C the compressor motor will not run at full speed but say at 25% because the delta T is not much and if the aircon was specced correctly and no other unforeseen external factors are present (e.g. a fireplace heating up the room at that moment) the aircon should be able to reach the set temperature quite soon. If however the aircon is set to 22°C, but currently the room temperature is at 30°C, the compressor motor will probably run at full speed or close to that since the delta T is quite big. Obviously the faster the compressor motor runs, the more power is used. Therefor the aircon might use as little as 300 to 400W if the room has almost reached temperature and just have to maintain that temperature, but on the other hand it will use a lot of power (run at max) if you've set the temperature to 16°C and it is 40°C outside and all the doors and windows are open. 

Conventional aircons work like typical refrigerators where the compressor always runs at maximum speed until the set temperature is reached and then it switches off completely until the temperature has changed by a degree or two and then the compressor is turned on fully again until the set temperature is reached again - this is called cycling. Obviously if you've set the temperature to 16°C and it is 40°C outside and all the doors and windows are open the compressor will also run continuously and theoretically draw the same amount of power as an inverter aircon under the same circumstances.

Where an inverter aircon also use less power is where an aircon is specced incorrectly or used incorrectly. Unfortunately aircons are frequently underspecced, because things like insulation on the ceiling, sun shining directly onto a window, large windows, a room on the second story / highest part of the house to name a few all influences the size of the aircon required and in most instances only room size is used to determine the size of the required aircon. The the biggest problem is user training - a comfortable temperature to set the aircon at is between 22 and 26°C for cooling and around 18 - 20°C for heating and most people does not know that and often sets aircons at 16 or 18°C (lowest possible setting) for cooling and 30°C for heating and most of the time the aircon will never be able to reach those extreme temperatures unless they were initially overspecced for the specific room / area. In such an instance a non-inverter aircon's compressor will constantly run and never reach the set temperature and obviously constantly use maximum power, but under the same circumstances an inverter aircon's compressor motor might initially run at full power but will gradually start to run slower and use less power as the delta T becomes smaller and therefor an inverter aircon might use less power than a non-inverter aircon.

 

A/C's are also great for heating - a good 18,000BTU inverter unit uses around 1.6kWh and if powered with solar PV it's cheaper than lighting a fire.....

 

Fires cost money?

3 hours ago, DeepBass9 said:

Fires cost money?

For city folks yes. In bulk you end up paying around 70 cents for a piece of wood about the size of a brick. After that comes a heap of science, eg closed combustion stoves make more heat with the same amount of wood.

Even on the farm, I'd think that guy you have to send out to chop the wood... that guy is paid a salary 🙂

6 hours ago, plonkster said:

 

Even on the farm, I'd think that guy you have to send out to chop the wood... that guy is paid a salary 🙂

Cutting a tree , then breaking it up is a lot of labour and then it must be transported .

3 hours ago, Chris Louw said:

Cutting a tree , then breaking it up is a lot of labour and then it must be transported .

Granted, today this is mechanised a lot. Even back in the 80s my dad had a rotary saw driven by a diesel engine on a trailer... make wood chop-chop 🙂

18 hours ago, plonkster said:

For city folks yes. In bulk you end up paying around 70 cents for a piece of wood about the size of a brick. After that comes a heap of science, eg closed combustion stoves make more heat with the same amount of wood.

Even on the farm, I'd think that guy you have to send out to chop the wood... that guy is paid a salary 🙂

Unless you are that guy. Spoilt I guess. I can cut and load a ton of wood in about 2 hours. I cut about 10 loads around this time of the year so it is dry for winter, and have a fire every night. It helps if your neighbours have thickets of blue gum and black wattle. I cleared my place of aliens a few years ago already.

So that is one litre of petrol to cut, one litre of diesel to haul, so R30 per ton! Cheap.

Edited April 14, 20197 yr by DeepBass9

42 minutes ago, DeepBass9 said:

Unless you are that guy.

Aaaah, heat yourself twice 🙂

15 hours ago, DeepBass9 said:

Unless you are that guy. Spoilt I guess. I can cut and load a ton of wood in about 2 hours. I cut about 10 loads around this time of the year so it is dry for winter, and have a fire every night. It helps if your neighbours have thickets of blue gum and black wattle. I cleared my place of aliens a few years ago already.

So that is one litre of petrol to cut, one litre of diesel to haul, so R30 per ton! Cheap.

mmm, perhaps I should come pickup some wood Pity we don't have a fireplace.

You can pick it up, I'll show where I want it put down!

If you are using wood it is cheap if you buy a lot, people sell it here for R8 or R9 a bag or R500 a bakkie load of loose wood.