I have an AC question if someone would mind to take a stab at it.
I live in Brooklyn, NY. I¹ve lived in the current apartment for many years: the building is old, World War II era and is wired with solid copper wire insulated by a hard black insulator (looks like a totally oxidized black rubber) and the outside is enclosed by a cloth sheath. As you can imagine due to its age, much of the wiring¹s insulator is hard and when handled cracks and crumbles. The apartment (a VERY large place, 3 bathrooms) is wired for what I assume was a minimal electrical/appliance usage for the era and as such the rooms only have 2 electrical outlets each.
It¹s my apartment and four of us live here. I do not use an AC unit because of the amperage draw. One of my roommates got an AC unit last summer and did not heed my warning to research start/run amperage draw for various AC units. She just went to PC Richards and bought one, I assume on looks and price. Her room is connected to one of the kitchen circuits and other room circuits. When the AC runs and someone uses the kitchen toaster or coffee maker, the breaker (15amp) pops off.
An inconvenience, but if she can live with continual interrupted electricity (and if one other roommate can endure it as well as he shares a circuit with her) than so be it. If push comes to shove I¹ll demand she either get rid of the AC unit altogether or replace it with one that has a lower amperage draw. A big pain in the butt at best.
However, today I come home to a bombshell: another roommate informs me that she has ALSO bought an AC unit. I had casually mentioned to her in the past about amperage ratings etc., but she apparently chose to ignore or disregard the info. Her room looks also connected to this circuit and when I came home she informed me that the breaker with 2 AC units was popping off every ten minutes.
At this point I¹m going to tell her that she will have to return her unit and live with a fan like I do.
However, I was wondering if someone who knows the products currently manufactured can recommend an AC unit that has amongst the lowest start up/run amperage of the models available (what would be responsible for the circuit breaker going off, the run voltage??). The rooms are approximately
1400 cubic feet in size. I¹m looking for a unit that will modestly cool the rooms (it does NOT have to do an arctic freeze as my roommates will have to settle for what can function in the apartment). The apartment is wired for 110V. Price is not an object as I will not be dishing out the money (though lower prices units are more desirable).Any ideas?