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#1
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How to temporary chill a car with non-working AC.
The A/C system in an `89 old Honda is completely dead. They
quoted a price of about $1500 to fix but the car's worth as much as that. I like to put in a 700 watt 117V portable or standard home air conditioner in the trunk but worry it may drain the battery. Is it possible to make a difference by continuously pumping chilled waters (filled with icicles) into the entire liquid line (tube) that runs thru the evaporator? Thanks |
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#2
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Find and get an automotive swamp cooler. They were popular before car A/C
became common. On Wed, 22 Sep 2004, Burt Squareman wrote: > The A/C system in an `89 old Honda is completely dead. They > quoted a price of about $1500 to fix but the car's worth as much as > that. I like to put in a 700 watt 117V portable or standard home air > conditioner in the trunk but worry it may drain the battery. Is it > possible to make a difference by continuously pumping chilled > waters (filled with icicles) into the entire liquid line (tube) that runs > thru the evaporator? > > Thanks > > > > > |
#3
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Just carry a 450 oz. Slurpee!
____________________________________ Do not write below this line. Reserved for me. |
#4
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Burt Squareman wrote:
> The A/C system in an `89 old Honda is completely dead. They > quoted a price of about $1500 to fix but the car's worth as much as > that. I like to put in a 700 watt 117V portable or standard home air > conditioner in the trunk but worry it may drain the battery. Is it > possible to make a difference by continuously pumping chilled > waters (filled with icicles) into the entire liquid line (tube) that runs > thru the evaporator? > > Thanks > > > > Um. That would be so much trouble, so messy, and not very effective. When you say the system is "completely dead" - what is bad? if you can do the labor, the parts won't cost too much. Changing a compressor (if thats whats bad) is a matter of unbolting the a/c lines, taking the belt off, and unbolting the housing. |
#5
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I like to put in a 700 watt 117V portable or standard home air
> conditioner in the trunk but worry it may drain the battery. Is it > possible to make a difference by continuously pumping chilled > waters (filled with icicles) into the entire liquid line (tube) that runs > thru the evaporator? > > Thanks You've GOT to be trolling. How long an entension cord do you have? A car a/c unit is equivalent to cooling an entire house. A 700 watt window unit isn't up to the job anyway. JM |
#6
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Well, first, I'd suggest shopping around on the repair of your car's
a/c. Depending on exactly what is wrong, you may get some quotes below $1500. But on to the other ideas... > I'd like to put in a 700 watt 117V portable or standard home air > conditioner in the trunk but worry it may drain the battery. The kind of inverter you need to do justice to this application is pretty big: in ballpark figures, I'd go with a 1500 W continuous/3000 W peak inverter of at least "modified sine wave" output quality ("pure sine wave", i.e., what the power company gives you, would be even better, at higher cost). The ante is probably six or seven hundred dollars. The issues are that (a) motors draw more at startup than in continuous operation and (b) an inadequate inverter slowly murders them with undervoltage, like operating at home in a brownout. On the input side, we can do another finite-napkin model and figure that after accounting for inefficiencies, you're using 1400 W, at 14 V, which comes out to 100 A. That's a lot of current; you'd want to run a husky wire, fused at the battery end, like the kids with the enormous stereos have to do. It also represents a very large fraction of a typical car's alternator output. These arguments still apply even if you look at things more closely and decide that my safety margins are too large. Finally, you have to expose the home air conditioner's coils to the outside world or else you're defeating your own purpose by dumping that excess heat into the cabin. And don't forget to support it very solidly. > possible to make a difference by continuously pumping chilled > waters (filled with icicles) into the entire liquid line (tube) that runs > thru the evaporator? Without dragging out some rather dusty textbooks and a calculator, I think that as a working fluid, this would be far, far less effective than compressed freon. It would also eliminate any chance that any part of your a/c system is salvageable. And you'd have to arrange a pump. You might be better off getting an ice chest and some of those quilted blankets of "blue ice" and making cold packs for your body. This would at least be tidier than what I had to do on a trip across the Mojave when my air conditioner went on the blink -- an ice chest full of ice water, into which I could dip a towel for my head and neck and shoulders. It must have been a sight to behold, sort of Lawrence of Arabia meets the Beverly Hillbillies. You might be better off with a portable evaporative or "swamp" cooler meant for use in the car -- see for instance http://www.evaporative-cooling.com/e...ml#anchor93613 These only work well if you are in a dry climate. For high humidity environments, there are devices that blow air across an ice bed: http://www.evaporative-cooling.com/istr1.html Neither of these are anywhere near as effective as a compressor-type air conditioner in good working order, but they do take the edge off the heat, and their 12V power draw is reasonable. Best of luck, --Joe |
#7
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Burt Squareman wrote:
> The A/C system in an `89 old Honda is completely dead. They > quoted a price of about $1500 to fix but the car's worth as much as > that. I like to put in a 700 watt 117V portable or standard home air > conditioner in the trunk but worry it may drain the battery. Is it > possible to make a difference by continuously pumping chilled > waters (filled with icicles) into the entire liquid line (tube) that runs > thru the evaporator? > > Thanks ========================= I have a good air conditioner sitting in the middle of my garage . . . I sometimes us it to HEAT the room on a chilly morning. An air conditioner generates more HEAT than COLD, if the backside is not vented out a window. Are you planning to cut the hole thru the top of the trunk, or the side of the fender? catnip.... is that what you've been smoking? Buy a bag of party ice and sit it on the back seat, or your lap. :-) |
#8
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On Thu, 23 Sep 2004, motsco_ _ wrote:
> An air conditioner generates more HEAT than COLD An air conditioner generates neither heat nor cold. All it does is *move* heat. |
#9
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>An air conditioner generates neither heat nor cold. All it does is *move*
heat.> Partially true. It also converts a lot of electricity into heat in the process of "moving" the heat. Quent |
#10
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Daniel J. Stern wrote:
> On Thu, 23 Sep 2004, motsco_ _ wrote: > > >>An air conditioner generates more HEAT than COLD > > > An air conditioner generates neither heat nor cold. All it does is *move* > heat. > Actually, it doesn't move heat, either. It moves energy. Heat is just how energy is transfered between the condenser (or evaporator) and the rest of the world. |
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