Room air conditioners (not roof top) - quality, soft start?

[FlyFishn]

Do any of you have experience with any in-room air conditioners that are worthy of looking in to?

What I am curious about are units that are already set up with soft start for running on generator power and that are good quality - IE actually cool, dont trip "breakers" or "resets", and will last.

I have a Honeywell 9k BTU unit that has served well at home but taking along camping it doesn't do well. It is bigger and heavier than I want to tote along also, so something smaller and more convenient is desired. Although, I want to watch the BTU's - I don't want to skimp on the cooling capacity so if I need to size up for that reason I probably would.

[Kirk W]

Are you thinking of adding it through one of the windows of your fifth wheel? We did have friends who installed a window a/c unit through a window of their travel trailer that had no a/c when the trailer was more than 10 years old and it was quite a long time ago. 

The 7 Best Lightweight Window Air Conditioners

[GlennWest]

I understand some are being built on inverter tech like the mini splits. They would be super efficient and very soft start.

[FlyFishn]

The stand-alone room form factor is the most versatile. I can use it anywhere I can route a vent hose - cabins and tents too. A window-mount unit is hard-mounted and not versatile, same for roof top.

[oldjohnt]

I don't know what more residential style units are factory equipped with soft start technology, but suspect its not real common. I follow several RV publications and mini splits seem to be gaining in popularity for RV use.  Many RV rooftop AC's are around 13,500 to 15,000 BTU which perform okay (on shore power at least, maybe marginal on a genset subject to its size and any soft start) so maybe your 9000 could work even without soft start, but like you say too heavy...Room AC's are getting to be lighter and more efficient but the smaller units may only be 6000/7000 BTU. The heat load sitting there in the sun makes it hard for an even 13,500 to do the job. My advice if you're going to buy a Genset would be get one that's big enough, an Inverter type, and still have a soft start on the AC .

John T 

[vermilye]

I have an 8000 BTU Midea window AC in my bedroom.  Probably would not work well for an RV since it is sorta a mini split and would be difficult to install in a typical RV window. The window closes through the middle of it, leaving the compressor outside.  Very quiet, inverter technology, and cools the bedroom fine.  

[FlyFishn]

4 hours ago, oldjohnt said:

My advice if you're going to buy a Genset would be get one that's big enough, an Inverter type, and still have a soft start on the AC .

Have generators. The AC unit I have will run on the EU2200i with eco mode off. It starts hard, yes, but will and will run (kinda one of those if it starts it will run deals - running load is significantly less than starting). The operational issue with it is a pressure switch keeps tripping - I've bee trying to troubleshoot that, and am thinking about bypassing the pressure switch, but if I have to go that far with it and risk blowing up the compressor then what else is on the market that might better suit the environment than what I am trying to "make work"? As far as troubleshooting - the unit runs daily in a house with no issues (its running as I type this - been reliable for years). Just something about the unit out of the house changes and it doesn't run well.

[oldjohnt]

 

59 minutes ago, FlyFishn said:

Have generators. The AC unit I have will run on the EU2200i with eco mode off. It starts hard, yes, but will and will run (kinda one of those if it starts it will run deals - running load is significantly less than starting). The operational issue with it is a pressure switch keeps tripping - I've bee trying to troubleshoot that, and am thinking about bypassing the pressure switch,

 Hey there Fly, FWIW Im not into by passing any pressure switch either..

  That genset 'supposedly' produces a clean sine wave so as long as it maintains adequate voltage under load (ever monitor that?? low voltage under a load could cause problems) I cant say why your unit behaves different at home versus connected to it, but I'm NOT any HVAC person. I do know if a load has a lousy power factor (like a motor can have) if the energy source (like say a marginal sized genset) cant supply the VARs (Volt Amps Reactive) there can be problems. I don't know if your AC compressor motor is capacitor start AND RUN ?? but where I was an engineer we added capacitors in motor feeder circuits which improved the power factor and performance. While Ive seen a 2200I run an AC and that may not be an issue, there can be problems if a genset is only marginal and barely hanging on when used to power highly inductive loads, yet if the load were resistive it may do just fine.  

 Don't take a lot of faith in what I said, I don't know about your AC plus I'm too long retired n rusty, just thinking out loud, maybe an HVAC tech has ideas. If it has a run capacitor ?? it may have a problem. 

 John T  Too longggggggg retired. There are some other fine engineers and techs on here maybe they can help       

Edited July 1, 2021 by oldjohnt

[FlyFishn]

15 minutes ago, oldjohnt said:

That genset 'supposedly' produces a clean sine wave so as long as it maintains adequate voltage under load (ever monitor that?? low voltage under a load could cause problems)

Thanks for the reply.

Voltage under load with the AC running was 123 volts. The kicker to that measurement - the voltage was measured AT the air conditioner (meter was between the power cord on the AC and the power distribution box) and the main cable run from the generators was around 140 feet (the large gray cable in the picture is all 6 gauge SER). We had generators set well out of camp deeper in the woods to keep the noise down. In other words, the voltage was fine - regardless of the length we didn't have significant voltage drop. The other unit is a 15kw rotary with a GX690 engine. Interesting to note - with the AC running the line voltage was the same 123v on the big kahuna also.

 

 

The pressure switch is associated with the compressor, it doesn't have anything to do with electrical current draw or temperature - there is a small copper feeder tube that connects to the compressor circuit somehow and that pressure sense line is what the switch functions/trips off of.

 

One of the theories I have is the vent hose perhaps causing too much back-pressure. However, that back-pressure would affect the fan that is blowing out/venting the hot air. If the pressure in the vent hose goes up then the load on the blower fan goes up = it draws more current. That current is NOT what is tripping the "pressure switch" - it can't. Electrical amperage and pressure are apples and oranges. So where is the connection between the air pressure in the vent hose causing the load on the fan motor to go up and the "pressure" that the AC compressor sees going up? Is there a temperature component to this - in that the ambient temperature being above a certain number causing the "pressure" that the pressure switch sees to be above it's trigger point? Or is the higher pressure in the vent hose causing inadequate cooling (from the venting of the hot air being lower) which is raising the temperature of something that is raising the pressure above the trigger point of the pressure switch? And if so - the purpose of the AC, from the get-go, is to drop the ambient temperature. So that temperature theory seems like an oxymoron - it makes the AC akin to a giant paperweight.