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AC - Air Conditioning

anybody dyi their own insulation? i know it is not fun to be in the attic, especially during the summertime.....and i hate dealing with bugs and spiders.

probably will need a shop vac to suck up the old insulation and everything else up there. am i better renting or buying one for this job?

or should i wait until fall to do this when temps are more manageable?
 
ocnbrze said:
anybody dyi their own insulation? i know it is not fun to be in the attic, especially during the summertime.....and i hate dealing with bugs and spiders.

probably will need a shop vac to suck up the old insulation and everything else up there. am i better renting or buying one for this job?

or should i wait until fall to do this when temps are more manageable?
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It was 107° here today. There's no way I would enter my attic. I understand you can rent a machine to shred and blow in the insulation. It takes two people to do the job however. One feeding the hopper and another poor guy in the attic.
 
QQ: why are you removing the old insulation? Do you use your attic for storage or are you regularly in it?

If not, unless the old insulation is damaged (mildew, mold, the plague, etc.) then there’s no real reason to remove it, especially since you’d have to approach it as a hazardous waste (vermin feces/nests/carcasses, for example) and you’re just adding to landfills.

Instead, just get the rolls and roll it over the top of the old stuff. You’ll get a mild R-bump from the old as well.

You also won’t need to rent the equipment to install the blow-in stuff, and other than it being really bulky when it’s delivered (or you make several trips to the home center) the roll-in stuff is easy to work with.

Just my .02…either way, I’d also stay out of the attic until it’s cooler. ;)
 
rootabaga said:
QQ: why are you removing the old insulation? Do you use your attic for storage or are you regularly in it?

If not, unless the old insulation is damaged (mildew, mold, the plague, etc.) then there’s no real reason to remove it, especially since you’d have to approach it as a hazardous waste (vermin feces/nests/carcasses, for example) and you’re just adding to landfills.

Instead, just get the rolls and roll it over the top of the old stuff. You’ll get a mild R-bump from the old as well.

You also won’t need to rent the equipment to install the blow-in stuff, and other than it being really bulky when it’s delivered (or you make several trips to the home center) the roll-in stuff is easy to work with.

Just my .02…either way, I’d also stay out of the attic until it’s cooler. ;)
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well the pics that was shown to me was that the old stuffs was pretty much turning to dust....basically falling apart. he said it could just get vacuumed up....its that bad.

now granted i have not gone up there and see with my own eyes, but i saw pictures that he took and it looked pretty bad. plus there was hardly any insulation anyways.

i'll probably go up there this weekend and take some pics myself. and maybe wait til october to do it. it will be cooler and give me time to see what route i'll go with on insulation.
 
My home's A/C does this weird bug around this time of year anytime the outdoor humidity is above 75%. Doesn't matter the temp.

Woke up at 2AM last night sweating, with room temp at 75. Figured it was odd since I could hear the unit running outside my window, the Nest said 75 and cooling, 2+ hours to reach temp. It's odd since the outdoor temp was in the upper 60s. Thing shouldn't be running at all! Went to the vent and nothing was coming out. No air at all. Fan was making what sounded like subwoofer booms, and I had heard that around midnight but dismissed it as a neighbor playing their stereo to loudly or watching a good movie.

Turned the unit off, turned on a window unit in another room nearby and placed a box fan in front of that, and after temp dropped to 71, I went back to bed. Next morning I put the Nest into fan only mode and the airflow was back. The fan hadn't shot the bearings and was obviously working (no more booms). WtF happened? I'm leaving it off this weekend just in case. is the squirrel cage fan failing? Should I be concerned about using the furnace come winter? This is the second time it's done this since I moved in 2016.
 
Sounds like the evaporator coil had frozen up.

When this happens it blocks the air from being dispersed out of the vents, thus the no air flow and the booming sounds.

The main cause of a frozen coil is low refrigerant in system.

A very dirty coil with a very dirty return air filter will cause this.

The blower motor getting hot and shutting down will cause this.

A piece of insulation inside of the unit coming loose and getting into the blower wheel will cause this.

Furniture placed in front of the return air gill blocking air flow will cause this.

It is time to have it checked by a competent a/c mechanic, if the coil is freezing up this will cause damage to the compressor in the unit outside !

Let me know if you have any more questions.
 
It's not low in refrigerant since it gets ice cold during the day when it's 90+ out. It's just during the night if the humidity is high enough. I think it has a lot to do with my home's construction. The unit is in the garage, and the vents are in the ceiling and I can't find the condensate drain. I know how A/C works I grew up with my great grandfather and he taught me self sufficience. I was not sure if the fan had failed (It made a similar sound to when a squirrel cage fan bearing fails and it just bounces around the cage, but that problem doesn't solve itself) or it had frozen up. I've only seen old outdated office units mounted on a roof freeze like that. It's only done it twice, last time was this time last year. I'm leaving it off for now, since we're in a cool spell and the window A/C works fine. Like my great grandfather I'm a stickler for maintanence so I know there's no dirt or bad filter installed.

One place I worked at long ago had the tendency to freeze up if it was used in temps above 85, but that building was from the late 1960s and that unit was the original for the second floor. I don't think they even serviced that unit since 1978. Does RuuD even make A/C anymore? lol.
 
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An a/c unit is not supposed to get "ice cold", that is another sign of low refrigerant or issues !

It is a pressure/temperature thing.

Measure the air temp coming out of the nearest vent to the unit and measure the air temp going into the return.

The delta T (differential) should be 15 to 18 degrees, any less and it is low on charge, any more and it has issues that is making the air too cold.

Remember, an a/c does not make cold air, it removes the heat from the conditioned space.

We have a part of the season here where the ambient (outside) temperature is low and the humidity is high and one must set the tstat lower than normal usage to keep it comfortable. I have seen many instances were the coil froze up overnight due to this condition, it is usually due to the air being too cold.

Low air flow with a dirty coil and filter is a mix for freezing.

We want ideally a low pressure of 70 psig with a corresponding air temp of around 45 degrees. Expansion valves can run 50/60 psig with lower air temps, without freezing the coil. (I believe 50 psig is getting real close to 32 degrees coil surface for R22 refrigerant) 'Course these numbers all depend on the refrigerant being used, different values for different refrigerants.

Once the temp hits 32 degrees it is going to freeze no matter what the refrigerant.
 
Whenever a car I owned ran low on refrigerant it didn't blow cold much at all, and barely kept up with the heat. If there wasn't a leak in the system and everything was in order, you'd get frozen out of a car in a 95 degree summer day normally. Even more so given the benefits of R12 back in the 1970s. I miss ice cubes shooting out of the vents of a '78 Lincoln Contintental and I definitely miss the ride quality, but I digress.

I highly doubt it's normal for your home to be 85 indoors if the temp outdoors is 108 unless you're running low on refrigerant. If I can successfully keep it 70 indoors in the same hot day, I like to belive that means everything is working.
 
it is a breakpoint twixt low charge/too cold and to low of a charge and no cold.

Again it is a pressure/temperature relationship, as the pressure drop so does the coil surface temperature. When the charge passes the breakpoint, then it can no longer remove enough heat, to comfort the zone. And once the pressure drop/temperature goes 32 degrees and lower it starts to freeze.

I used to do lots of refrigeration work when R12 was still in use, as it got phased out, I needed some more and called the supply house and was told a 30 lb drum was $1000.00. That is when I quit working on R12 equipment.
 
alyciagordan said:
I know this response is a bit late, but I wanted to share some thoughts on your AC situation. Dealing with a hot bedroom can be a real challenge, especially with a big fish tank adding to the heat. Getting a professional AC guy to check out your setup sounds like a good idea.
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welcome to af!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

well if you would have read the entire thread, you would have seen this post:
ocnbrze said:
ok some updates. i just had an ac guy come out. i had no idea that there were filters that needed to be replaced on a monthly basis. so its probably been a few years up to 5 years since the filter was replaced. that helped with air flow.

i also had a new ceiling fan that was bigger and had more flow. so now i have a lot more flow into my room. it has been coming down in temp. but while installing the ceiling fan i found out that there is no insulation above my room.

could that be one of the causes for my room to get hot? should i call a roofer or whoever does insulation?
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so yes i had a professional ac guy come out. he fixed the air flow issue.....so yes i am now getting cold air into my room. the problem that still exists is the fact that the room gets hotter than the rest of the house. there several factors for this. my room faces the sun while the sun is setting.......so by 4pm the sun is shinning directly on my room. also i have no insulation to keep the cooler air in or the hotter air out. but with the better ceiling fan and getting the flow of air from the ac, my room is more tolerable now.
 
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My 'puter room is just like that, west side of the house, no insulation and windows !

By 3 pm I must draw the curtains to block the sun, I installed a ceiling fan awhile back and still the difference twixt the living room temp, (east side of house), and the 'puter room is very noticeable in the late afternoons !
 
so we here in LA from May to now are getting the June Gloom. it has been overcast with cooler temps. i'd say we have been averaging 70 degrees. so its been a nice start to summer......not looking forward to July & August.....so we shall see how tolerable the air flow and ceiling fan will be when it gets hotter.
 
We are in the low triple digits with a "feels like" of over 112 with humidity so thick you can barely breathe and sweat like a pig just standing still.

Gawd how I love living in Tropical Paradise !
 
Now that, was not a shameless plug, was it ?

sneer
 
I'm not uncomfortable in the heat. Mix heat with humidity and I struggle. I can handle it but don't like it. Sleeping is when I need the comfort of AC. Not only is the temperature lowered but so is the humidity. Without that comfort, I feel like I'm being steamed and struggle to sleep.
 
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