We have moved to a NEW PLACE !!

Hi guys, I have moved this blog to another place AirConTalk . I will be updating more air-con information there. So see you guys there!

Air-conditioned Clothes Help Global Warming

Air-conditioned Clothes Help Global Warming

Kuchofuku air-conditioned bed and clothing

Air-Conditioned Clothing

Those who wants to feel cool even thought you are working outdoor. Now you has your "personal" air-conditioned fan located on your shirt or pants. Kuchofuku has a wide range of products including jackets, pants, white shirts (for both men and women).

Air-Conditioned Bed

A cool invent from Kuchofuku (Japan). This air-conditioned bed is using extremely quiet dual-fans at the foot of the bed, cool air is pulled in from behind your head and circulated through the soft membrane which also acts as an air-cushion to support you. Best of all, the bed uses extremely low power, costing only US$.24 per month if used eight hours a day! This product cost US$399.00.

Personally I free that the air-conditioned shirts looks silly but it may be very useful for some people who work under the hot sun for long hours.

IMPORTANT: Please do not wear that shirt during your dates, it will spoilt your whole social life. The Air-conditioned bed looks cool, you has your peaceful ZZzz, saves your electrical bill and saves the climates. I may be consider buying one for myself.

Feel free to comment =)

Tips on Saving of Air-Condition Electrical Bills

No matter what air-conditioning system you have in your house,you can save money and increase comfort with a few simple steps:

Tips #1: Contact a service contractor to check the refrigerant charge. If the system is overcharged or undercharged with refrigerant (PSI 60-70), it will not work properly; this will increase your energy consumption by as much 50%.

Tips #2: Clean or replace your AC filter every month. A dirty filter makes your AC work harder, which uses more electricity.

Tips #3: It is important to use the right size AC, and replacing your old AC with one of the same size is often a mistake. An AC that's too small OR too big will be inefficient and waste energy. You can check out my previous post on how to calculate the correct AC's BTU for the room.

Tips #4: For living room, always install 2 AC units than getting 1 high end AC unit. (For example, get 2 AC of 9,000BTU than 1 AC of 18,000BTU). During normal days, you just need to switch on 1 AC and switch on 2 AC if there are more people in the living room.

USB Air-Condition

Want to sit on your computer and enjoy cool air without switching on you air-condition?

I just surfing around and happen to found this DIY Usb Air-conditioning. Actually I have made one for myself, mine is a better version of his. Take it that his usb air-condition is 9,000Btu mine is 12,000Btu, haha...

I uses big milo tin and brough a much bigger fan. Usually I never switch on my air-condition during the day so now I can enjoy a little cool and saves energy ! =)

Here are the url to video on how to make Usb Air-condition. ENJOY! http://www.metacafe.com/watch/778215/usb_air_conditioning/

Direct Replacement of R22 Refrigerant

GOOD NEWS ! To people out there who had brought their new air-condition which are using R22 refrigerant.

From my last few post "R22 vs R410a" I mentions that,

"R22 going to phase out at 2020, so by that time there are no ways to pump up your aircon's "gas" which are still using R22. So what I recommend is when you want to install new aircon better be inverter using R410A."

Some of the bloggers read the post and sent me some sites saying that there is a direct replacement of R22 refrigerant. It is called 407C refrigerant.

407C is a non-ozone-depleting blend of three hydrofluorocarbon (HFC) refrigerants. It exhibits
performance characteristics similar to R-22. Read the full details of 407C, http://refrigerants.dupont.com/Suva/en_US/pdf/h65905.pdf

For me personally, I had never known of this refrigerant exist. I am really not sure whether this refrigerant will damage the air-condition unit in any ways but by refering to all the charts and diagrams proofing that 407c refrigerant is similiar to R22 in term of capacity, perform wise.. etc. It seem to be safe.

If we think Green, this refrigerant is Great! But if I wants to try which customers of mine will be the Guinea Pig? Haha..

Air-condition database

Found an interesting aircon database that apparantly most of the air-cons sold in singapore will be listed there. They got a calculator to tell you how much you spend if you were to leave it on for X number of hours a day for a year.

http://els.nea.gov.sg/mels/aircon.asp

Article on saving Electrical Bills

SINGAPORE: It pays to go green - that's the message the South West Community Development Council (CDC) wants to get across to residents, with it's Cool South West! programme.

With the help of the National Environment Agency, it wants to get residents to see that it makes perfect dollar sense to cut down on energy consumption.

Madam Asiah's family pays an average of $200 a month on electricity alone, but with the energy-saving lightbulbs, she can expect the bill to drop by 80 percent.

Organisers also want to encourage households to keep air-condition levels at 25 degrees celsius.

The NEA says that assuming an average household air-con unit is switched on 8 hours a day, simply raising the temperature from 24 degrees to 25 degrees celsius can save up to 470kg of carbon dioxide each year, and $170 on their annual utility bill.

"We are actually promoting awareness that by doing this really it's not just about climate change, just about mitigating climate change, but there are real practical benefits, that is saving electricity and therefore saving electricity bills," said Dr Amy Khor, MP, Hong Kah GRC.

To view the full article:
http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/255199/1/.html

Recommended to sets temperature at 25 degrees celsius to saves utility bill. As for personal habit, I always sets my room's temperature at 29 to 28 degree celsius. I will on the fan if the weather gets hotter. I am scared of cold! Aircon man scared of cold, what a joke =D

ICE-KACHANG MACHINE

Split unit air-con became Ice-Kachang machine!

This is a rare scence to see such a large ice form on the split unit aircon's coil fin. The ice formed and causes the filter to be stuck. So what should I do? I uses a screw driver and started breaking the ice just like an ice-kachang man crushing the ice cube.

My customers said,"Hey Vincent, bring down the ice and let me made you a nicecold drink!"

So what causes it?

This air-con basically lack of maintenance and heavily used. Refrigerant is also very very low, less than 30psi.


Ice formed on split unit's coil

BTU

Hey! Vincent why my air-conditioning still not cold after all the chemical cleaning and charging of refrigerant?

Kk.. don't be so worked out, please let me explain. Your air-condition is "undersize". Your air-condition's BTU is too low to cope with the size of your room. So how do i determine BTY? You need to figure out the size of your room, and then that will determine how much BTU you need, if you get too little BTU it may not get your room as cool as you like it, or it may take forever to cool your room.

SO LETS DO MATHS! Kk.. I know most people hate math, don't worry nothing very complicated. Please not that this formulae is just an estimation to determine the amount of BTU need to cool your room. Giving consideration of 2-3 people in the room.

Calculate your room volume - Length x Breadth x Height = Ans / 2 (answer divided by 2)

For example - 2.5m x 3m x 2.5m = 18.75 / 2 = 9.375
-> Therefore you should get 10,000BTU air-condition for that room

Simple enough?

I found a site that provides a BTU calculator: http://www.homedepot.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/THDCalcRoomAC

Enjoy =D

onlinesplits-how inverters work

I personally loves this video. This video was about differential between inverter aircon and non-inverter aircon. How they work differently and showing why inverter aircon was better in aspect of cost-saving, allowing the coolness to go to the "comfort zone" and maintaining. Just to add on, inverter aircon is running a referigerant called R410a which is 3-4times more expensive than the non-inverter aircon which is running at R22. Next post, i will explain further. AND PLS Enjoy the vid!

How Air Conditioning Work

Receive quite a number of complaint saying that my blog is too wordy. OK..Ok.. I found this video at youtube. This video give you an idea of how non-inverter air-condition work. Very clearly explained.

AIRCON NOT COLD

MY AIRCON IS NOT COLD! One of the reason why your aircon is not cold is your "gas" is low. The picture shown below shows a condensenser or some people called it outdoor unit. As you can see, one of the copper pipe became frozen. This indicated that your "gas" is very very low.

The picture below show how the aircon technician top up your "gas".

This is an enlarge view of the meter guage.

PSI 65-70 = Full...

PSI 40 - 50 = You will feel not cold

PSI 30 and below = Caution! Your gas pipe might be leaking!

Sorry that the picture is blur...

Hintech AirCon Comic

Very nicely draw by my army buddy, Derek Foo. (Click to enlarge)

R22 vs R410A

INTRODUCTION
Your aircon not cold? Most likely your "gas" are low. "TOP UP GAS, TOP UP GAS!" Most people called it as "gas" but actual way of saying is refriegerant. R410A is a type of refrigerant. A liquid coolant that makes air conditioning possible. R410A was developed as an alternative to R22 (Freon), which will be phased out over the coming years in response to international environmental concerns.

Why R410A is better?
- contains no chlorine, it’s ozone responsible
- better suited for use in higher-efficiency equipment
- energy cost savings
- cool your room faster

R410A Q & A

Will an R410A air conditioner cost more than one using R22?
Yes definintely! 2 - 3 times more expensive than R22!

Do I have to replace my current R22 air conditioner now?
The production of R22 is not scheduled to be phased out until 2020, so there will be R22 available for the servicing of units for some time to come.

Will there be another alternativerefrigerant for use in the future?
Currently all HVAC manufacturers have approved R410A as the only refrigerant acceptable for use in residential.

Can I use R410A in my existing R22 air conditioner?
No. The use of R410A in any unit not specifically designed for the refrigerant can damage the unit. Furthermore, the gas guage are not able to insert into R410a aircon.

Conclusion

R22 going to phase out at 2020, so by that time there are no ways to pump up your aircon's "gas" which are still using R22. So what I recommend is when you want to install new aircon better be inverter using R410A. So I forseed... by 2020 there will be alot of people installing new aircon using R410A, WAoh! $_$

Water Leaking

So one of the common problems that people face is WATER LEAKING ! =~( Omg! All my project materials are all wet! And tomorrow's the date line! I am going CRAZY! First thing, calm down, and take a deep breath. Ok, so why is your aircon leaking?

Air conditioners will have water condensing in the indoor blower and discharged through a draining pipe to the toliet. Water will start to leak when the drainage piping is choked. There are two reasons why your drainage piping could have choked:

1. Your drainage pipe does not have the gradient to allow the water to flow nicely from your air-conditioner to the toliet. Blame who? Blame your air-con man who previously installed for you.

2. Your air-con is being used HEAVILY! and did not has a regular cleaning.

So how to solve it?

Very simple call up your aircon man and book a aircon servicing with him. =) In the market there are 4 common type of aircon servicing. 1. General Servicing 2. Chemical Servicing 3. Chemical Flushing 4. Overhaul Servicing. *Some services may not be named as same as mine, so best ask your aircon man briefly how he going to do it*

1. General Servicing - What they usually do for this service is cleaning the cover, clean air filter, using the vaccum cleaner touch up abit and blower to blow off dust.
Cost range SGD$10 -SGD$15.
For me, this service are not useful in any ways. Think most of us can do it ourself.

2. Chemical Servicing - Spraying chemical on the aircon coil, brushing off the "jelly", blower off dust and clearing the drainage tray to prevent water leaking.
Cost range SGD$25-SGD$35
Best for maintaining your aircon cleaniness. Service it every 3-4month depend on your usage.


3. Flushing Servicing - http://www.hintechaircon.com/cf.htm Pictures on my company's site. Save my saliva pictures say a thousand word ya?
Cost range SGD$80-SGD$90
This service is best for aircon which got problem with water leaking. Service it every half a
year, your aircon will be running at tip top condition!


4. Overhaul Servicing - Taking off the whole aircon and bring it down to wash it with heavy chemical.
Cost range SGD$120+
Personally, I do not find this service neccessary, first it is too expensive and taking off your aircon down and up may spoil your piping. Strongly not recommended


If you want to know what aircon services we got, visit our website @ http://www.hintechaircon.com/


DIY !!!
After hearing this service that service, $$ is my concern! Alright I heard your prayer already. To solve this problem temporarily or can I say if you do it every now and then it may prevent it total! , you need a vaccum cleaner which is able to suck water. Go and find the drainage pipe, usually is in your toliet. Suck out all the "Jelly". As what I had said before, the jelly choke your drainage pipe and causes your aircon condensate water to over flow.

Drainage pipe very nicely concealed

Vaccum-ing the drainage pipe