Cooling upstairs of a house

[Rick Hughes]

It's an option but a lot of noise (I assume in one room)

The original plan was the 'central unit' so no fan noise in rooms.

[Rick Hughes]

Bo***cks to that ... ruins brickwork & pointing

[Huge]

I've stayed in a hotel in Arizona with swamp "cooling".

It didn't noticeably do anything.

[Rick Hughes]

That is a fair bit of mass ... I had 18" stone walls in previous place never overheated

[Tim Watts]

+1

I love my concrete kitchen and hall floor and brick inner skin cavity wall - helps keep things cooler in summer.

If I built a house from scratch and had unlimited money - I would have

9" brick inner leaf, 4" celotex filled cavity and a single brick outer skin.

My floors would be concrete/screed on top of celotex.

[Martin Brown]

Only if it is rubbish grade pointing and modern useless bricks.

The point is that plants can keep their own temperature under control in the sunshine and stop the outer walls becoming storage heaters.

[Capitol]

Only run in daytime. Never noticed much noise in a double glazed house, quieter than the average ceiling fan.

[Tim Watts]

I have had ivy up one corner of my house on bare London Brick Rustics (herring bone pattern). Bricks are 1950s.

I chop the ivy off and it grows back. Repeat ad infinitum.

The only damage it's done to the bricks it leave its "roots" stuck all over them.

The main reason I chop it off is I cannot see out one window and it tries climbing into the soffits.

OTOH the last house I rented, built in the 90's, when I drilled to put up some hooks in the garage, lumps if the brick face were coming off and the brick core was made of cheese.

[ARW]

Trade name c*ck up:-)? ie Xpelair

I watched the wholesaler google for it today when I needed a DX400 and two CF40's.

[Rick Hughes]

That is the issue it is 'at night' we need cooling

[Rick Hughes]

Maybe ... but I don't like it ... I think it looks awful on a modern design house .. realise its a personal thing.

[Andrew Gabriel]

And I even glanced at it to get the spelling right, *FAIL*

BTW, thanks for the extension lead response - I need to be more awake than I'm likely to be with this week's workload to digest it.

[Andrew Gabriel]

A split one isn't much noise - the compressor is outside.

They're more noise than that. You can usually adjust the fan speed.

[David]

Fit one or two Velux windows in the loft, and in summer open them to vent the hot air in the evening. You can get electrical kits to open and close them.

Then all you need is a big central loft hatch to allow the hot air to rise from the upstairs into the loft.

Bug screens on the downstairs windows so cool air can flow in.

[The Other Mike]

K glass helps reduce heating requirements but makes the situation of unwanted solar gain far worse than plain glass. Too late now but you might have been better off with Pilkington Suncool rather than K for large or south facing windows .

Be interesting to see what happens to the temperatures around the house and in the loft space with zero contribution from occupancy. Then with the outside temperature profile and sunshine figure you'll have a better idea of how much you need to reduce the heat gain and from where.

[Davey]

I'm not surprised, it's a bad concept anywhere. Ford Motor Company used it a lot for the air supply to its US paint shops, it was terrible. It was a great humidifier, a bad cooler.

I've seen some places with water piped to spread over the roof to cool that down by evaporation.

[harryagain]

I have a highly insulated house. I just open some windows. The reason it remains hot is likely to be stored heat in the house structure. (Thermal mass)

Whole house ventilation is a waste of space. A stupid fad that came and went about ten years ago. I know several people that have it and have shut it down. As you have now realised, it doesn't work in domestic houses. Fine in intensively occupied commercial spaces.

The attic will likely be even warmer than anywhere in the house in Summer.

[F Murtz]

Works well in Australia, better in dry areas, almost all McDonalds have evaporative cooling here.

[harryagain]

It only works when relative humidity is low. Even in Arizona, relative humidity is not always low.

[Davey]

Better conditions, then, can make it viable. Good to know, thanks.