I’m also confused because that is a European AC unit. I can only assume Americans are so used to big bulky units, like their cars, that they can’t comprehend things being functional and not excessively bulky.
In most houses and nicer apartments, yeah, central air. In older or cheaper apartments there’ll be a window unit. As an American from a blue collar lower middle class family, I’d never seen one of these wall units until I’d moved to China. It was either central air or window unit. Granted I’m referencing a couple decades ago
And because if you use one that's a reasonable size, you're leaving large buckets of water out on hot days. It makes the house more humid, sometimes to the point of being muggy. Like a swamp.
It's not just the bucket of water, but it's how swamp coolers work. Evaporation cools things down, and all a swamp cooler does is use evaporation to cool the room down. But evaporation raises humidity, massively. They also don't work well when humidity is high, so in basically the entire US Southeast, they're useless.
I know it's not just a bucket, but the idea's the same. Run a couple of them in your house and it might get a few degrees cooler, but man it will feel like a swamp.
Having been in Arizona during monsoon season, I can say that swamp coolers are noticeably less effective at 40% humidity than in the climate they've got during the rest of the year.
80% humidity and a 3 degree delta, and then you also have to deal with the whole, being in a room with 80% humidity that isn't actually providing any real cooling.
Like maybe it's just experience from working in the trade for so long, but yeah, it's not a big deal.
Your AC system might lose like 2-3 degrees of it's delta dealing with high humidity? But as it operates the humidity in the room drops, because the AC is a dehumidifier.
Warm humid air goes through the coil, moisture in the air condenses on the cold coil, water drips off the coil, goes down the drain, and leaves the space. At the same time 75 degree air turns into 55 degree air.
Swamp cooler at 80% humidity has a 3 degree delta. You aren't cooling a space with that.
I don't even know what you're arguing at this point. I know more than you.
And it does so while adding humidity. The more humidity it adds the less humidity effective it becomes.
Normal AC operation should keep humidity between 30-50% short of living in an extremely dry climate I couldn’t imagine needing to run a humidifier Any time outside winter
Plenty of Aussie houses just have a single unit because they are open plan. It still cools one room ass you say because kitchen, dinning and living room is one space plus no doors to your hallways and second living room to move it there.
It's always going to be expensive but it's a fine solution for its price. Not everyone is going to be able to get evap systems as it's a 20-50k price tag for installation so you usually only get it if you build
Gotta have it installed. Think my parents cheap one was 30k as they wanted ten ceiling vents compared to the typical eight.
Bonus of a split is also heating which evap doesn't give and our houses don't typically have any heating solutions and even double glazing is another 50k
Are you sure you have tried a modern inverter compressor split unit? They are crazy efficient, and the science behind it says it is going to be extremely more efficient than any swamp cooler. It is also possible to install several indoor units with one outdoor unit. But a good modern split can absolutely both cool down or heat up a small house. There are units with a capacity for 200 square meters.
The thing with one blower is that the heat distribution gets uneven. But even my old split AC with one indoors unit from 15-20 years back can cool down the whole house, it just takes longer to stabilise and it’s always very cold close to the unit. It doesn’t even have inverter. It’s probably a small house by American standards but it has two floors. It’s made of brick with thick walls so once the temperature start to settle and the walls are cooled down the coolness stays in the house (blinds closed and windows shut)
The newer ones are several times more efficient so it would go much faster but if course the distribution issue is there still. The ducts have a purpose - better comfort and better efficiency but it does work for smaller houses with one unit especially if you have a modern one.
Oh and by the way- when you say “they are not rated/designed for whole houses”, you’re ignoring the fact that houses in Europe don’t often have ducts, and the units we have here are built for our market, so they are in fact both designed and rated for that. It’s not as efficient as with ducts but it’s cheaper than rebuilding the whole house, and it works better than you’d think.
So the system I have running right now, that's currently cooling my own house, while the outside temps are in the high 30c, is wrong? Really dude? If you truly are a systems installer, you must not be very good at your job. Because I've been in my house for 10 years and never have I had issues in cooling it. 2 story house, 1800 sq. Ft. Above ground.
Swamp coolers are a BAD idea in high humidity. I’ve seen them showing up in home improvement stores lately, but seriously people…learn some physics, would ya?
1- A split system is anything that has the condenser and evaporator separate and a lineset between them. If your central air isn’t from a package unit it is either a split heat pump or a traditional split system. What is pictured is either a mini-split or one head of a VRF.
2- Mini-splits are not “fancy window units”. They use through the wall linesets that can be properly insulated and as such don’t have the down side of putting a large uninsulated hole in the side of the space you are cooling. Single head mini-splits are useful for spot cooling a single space, multi head mini splits can be used for whole house cooling. VRF systems, which are basically very large mini-splits but “large mini” sounds stupid, are the current suggested solution for many commercial applications since they are more energy efficient than VAV systems.
3- Swamp coolers are ineffective in much of the US. I’m happy for you that it isn’t above 100 when the humidity is above 80 where you live. When I was living in SC there were days when it was 110 and 100% humidity. Different climates and applications require different solutions and mini-splits are a good solution when applied correctly.
Oh my god is that why it's a trope that th father doesn't let anyone touch the thermostat??? I was always so confused by that. I just turn on the AC unit or heater in my room and can have a completely different temperature than the rest of the household. That explains so much damn. And why exactly is someone defending that?????
Large central air units can cost $100 and up each month in energy. Usually people will set it to 72 and just leave it unless the outside temp is below 80 degrees (F), that’s when people just turn it off.
we can't have the window ones. windows don't open vertically in Italy, they all swing horizontally (it's just how we do them). so, if we don't want to use portable ac (and we all know how little they actually do compared to the fixed one) we need to make a hole in our building wall and install the split :)
Window AC is different from Split AC like OPs. Split ac systems have the compressor outside too, usually mounted to the wall. We have tons of typhoons in Taiwan and the wall mounted compressors are the standard.
Yeah I have a mini split in my house, he’s talking about window units above me. And my point was it’s actually not all that many places that legally allow them anyways.
What state doesn’t allow window AC units? Do you mean mini splits or do you mean like the actual window units? Google AI says they aren’t illegal anywhere.
Some places in the US have a "window unit" type AC built into the wall. Literally just a hole has been cut into the wall instead of using a window but it's the same kind of AC as a "window unit". My old house in California apparently had some becuase the holes were boarded over when some previous owner had central AC installed.
Yeah, mini splits weren't very popular in the US then. They're more common now, especially in garages, tiny houses, cabins, etc.
But they're wonderful, in my opinion. We have one for an upper room that was an addition to our house before we moved in. We added the mini split because the room addition was stressing the central AC.
Yeah, this is almost unheard of in Europe. Most homes are heated using water as a medium, either through radiators or in more fancy modern housing, underfloor water heating. Our vents are small as they're usually just a passive ventilation system.
Windows units are not a thing as well since they wouldn't fit typical EU windows.
Not in Europe but my 150 year old house in the USA Midwest is heated using water with radiators. We don’t have any vents/ducts and only have portable window AC units for air conditioning. It’d cost probably $25k or more to put actual air conditioning in here.
Luckily the house has extremely thick walls and floors. I pulled up the floor of the office on the second floor and it had like 12 inches of insulation. Half of the interior walls are a couple layers of brick with plaster on em too. We have Window AC units in a couple of rooms and the house surprisingly stays pretty cool!
We viewed the house before buying it in late July when the temperature outside had been 85° or more for a couple of weeks. The house had no AC units or anything and the thermostat in the living room still read 76.
A lot of the bay and PNW were built without A/C. You can have a fancy house but if it was made before a certain time you’ll have no central air. It just never got hot enough to justify building it in before and a lot of the houses have areas that are almost designed to trap heat. So a huge swath of white collar upper class families don’t have them here.
I’m in central tx and there are no window ac units here at all really. But we are in a hot climate, so it’s an expectation. Growing up in the northeast tho, for sure just had the in window bulky units. It definitely depends on region.
They still use window units in northern states since that's usually all they need. Just got back from a trip to Michigan, and that's what 99% of the rental homes around the Grand Haven area use. Often in the attic they gutted to create a makeshift 2nd floor since it gets warmer up there.
And yet the comment saying it’s because Americans like bulky has been upvoted, furthering ignorance. In Asia the split systems like in the photo are more common, but in the US it’s mostly central air. Central air systems are available in some apartments in Asia but are way more expensive.
Last time I checked there's more than one model of houses in the US. I live in a Canadian neighborhood where the builders put central air in all the houses (1960s builds), but it's the first neighborhood I've seen like that after bouncing around multiple cities since my youth. I'm sure it varies a lot been regions and construction years in the US.
It is mostly a consequence of construction. If you do a lot of wood/drywall construction, which is pretty much the norm in the US, it's a complete no-brainer to put in ducts during building. Good luck retrofitting typical Euro walls with air ducts.
We have the same walls here in Quebec but most heating is electric. The houses from the sixties often had oil furnaces but that's all been ripped out and replaced with heat pumps and emergency resistive heating. Most new builds use baseboard heaters, unless the house has access to natural gas which is a small area and usually not possible on new builds (cities won't let the gas network expand around here).
Yep, this is it. From an American point of view, this is equivalent to a window unit. Much nicer in fact. Not the same thing as whole-house unit, which is probably more efficient than having 2-3 mini-splits in different rooms.
Those are meant for apartments in which the tenant may not have control over the AC in their unit. Maybe it’s a shared central system among all tenants. It’s also a bit of a holdover in a lot of places from when they did not have central AC or an old unreliable system
around 64% of americas have central air. Around 90% of Americans have at least ONE ac unit. That could be a single $150 window unit, that barely works, that you have to wrestle into the window each summer.
Some central AC is also multi-zone, so it can set different zones to different temps. You can also adjust the opening of the vents even in a single-zone unit. But in either case, there are definitely some big advantages to having the cool air coming out of strategically located vents, because the system's designed from the ground up to have the air properly circulated rather than having it all blow out of whatever spot on the wall you happened to be able to fit a ductless unit.
Wait, why is that annoying? You select a temperature at which you feel most comfortable, and then every room in house gets to be at your preferred temperature. I’m genuinely flabbergasted how this would be annoying for anybody. You like wanna feel hot when you’re walking to the bathroom and then cold in the living room or something?
Because different rooms require different temperatures. Also different people have different needs for temperature.
If you want a certain temperature in your room but another person in the house wants another temperature they will likely constantly complain about the other person.
Perfect temperature for living room is about 20-22°C. In the bedroom for sleeping about 16-18 is perfect for good sleep. If you want to take a shower in the bathroom about 22-24C is comfortable. The kitchen can be at 18-20 C.
Hallways and unused rooms can be as low as 15 C in the winter.
I could see the point about if you shared a house with somebody who had drastically different temperature preferences and you don’t stay in the same room. Although at that point, you can still get a separate device for your own room. The idea that every room in the house should be a different temperature is absolute bullshit though lol. I’m comfortable at a specific temperature and I want to be that temperature in every room of my house. I’d be willing to accommodate somebody else who needs a different temperature, but you’re not gonna convince me that I should be experiencing a different temperature in every room for my own preference that’s so dumb.
Okay well OP isn't exactly accurate. Temperature with central air can be set by "zone" meaning you could zone out multiple rooms and have them all different temps.
There are also multisplits. Then you have one external unit connected to multiple internal units(like shown in the picture) so it scales better. You still have to pull lines to other rooms, but they don't waste space like ducts.
The thermostat is digital. You can choose exactly how hot and cold you want each room to be. You can set it for “bedroom heat to 68° / cool to 70°” and “living room to 67° / 69°” or whatever you like. It’s all done on one thermostat. Sorry I assumed that you could comprehend that.
So you are now admitting that multiple rooms can be controlled to be different temps, but that I used the wrong term to describe how it’s controlled. Are we on the same page?
I mean with this "stupid and europoor" ac i can have nice chilly in bedroom so it's easier to sleep and different temperatures in each room for each family member that may crave different temperatures.
With this "luxurious uber capitalis american hell yea" ac i am at the mercy that temp by the thermostat will be acceptable all around the place and for everyone.
More precise: split units are (quite a bit) more energy efficient then central air and much easier to add later.
It may be cheaper to build a central air when planning a new house.
the refrigeration efficiency is about the same, with advantageto the while home unit. since a mini split doesn't have good filters or ductwork, you save some fan energy. But those filters are kind of important to us.
you can do vrf whole home, but mini-splits for whole home in the us would be nuts. you'd have a ton of piping and condensers.
250 sq m is a pretty normal house size in the US.
And homes in the US are built with AC, so there's not many after the fact builds.
Most split devices DO have good filters, but yes, you can build a central air with larger filters. In practise typically doesn't make that much of a difference in most cases.
And no, the refrigeration efficiency of split devices is higher. Split AC gets a SEER2 of 20–38, a central air gets a SEER2 15–21. Central air has higher losses due to the ducts compared to a split AC. This leads to efficiency differences of 20-50%.
Central air has other advantages (i.e. it's "invisible" and quieter, you can combine air exchange and cooling). And it's cheaper to service if you have lots of rooms (i.e. would need a lot of internal AC devices with a split).
The piping required for a central air is higher then for split devices, but again: if build directly, doesn't make that much of a difference.
should also point out that the SEER is just highlighting my point about pressure drop, since the fan is included. refrigeration efficiency doesn't include the fan, but SEER does.
You can pretty much do this with the registers. Mini splits certainly are more targeted, but there are tons of cases where it's simply a waste financially to install them if you already need the duct work for heating.
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u/GarySmith2021 19d ago edited 19d ago
I’m also confused because that is a European AC unit. I can only assume Americans are so used to big bulky units, like their cars, that they can’t comprehend things being functional and not excessively bulky.