Life before air conditioning

[Desert Engineer]

A subtopic of this would be: what temperature do you keep the AC at?

I keep mine at 76-78 with the ceiling fans on. If I go any lower, my bill goes through the roof (2 degrees lower adds $300 to the bill). 76 feels good when your coming in from 105.

 

[Capt Worley PE]

I keep mine at 73. it is an old house wihtout much insulation, so the ac is gonna pretty much hold the temp and that's it. I'd rather it hold 73 than 78 and it only runs maybe an extra half hour a day.

 

[EM_PS]

ok, northerner skew here - I shoot for 72, 71 at lowest. Wife seeks 70 tops (skandinavian blood of hers). we compromise, 71 during day, 70 at night. Its been a comfortable summer anyways, so the air hasn't really run that much thankfully.

 

[Katiebug]

Mr. Bug and I finally caved on Sunday and installed one of the window A/C units in our bedroom. As usual, we wondered why the hell we waited so long and also why the hell we didn't install the units in the downstairs (one in dining room, one in kitchen). But in another 2-3 weeks the heat will be over and it's such a pain to install the things that I just don't want to bother this year.

We have an attic fan that cools the house nicely if the temps are in the low 80s or below. That gets us through June most years before installing the A/C units in early July. This summer was a bit odd because it was relatively cool and extremely rainy, so we didn't need A/C as early as we usually do.

The one in our room is kept with the thermostat at 74-75 degrees.

 

[Chucktown PE]

Mr. Bug and I finally caved on Sunday and installed one of the window A/C units in our bedroom. As usual, we wondered why the hell we waited so long and also why the hell we didn't install the units in the downstairs (one in dining room, one in kitchen). But in another 2-3 weeks the heat will be over and it's such a pain to install the things that I just don't want to bother this year.
We have an attic fan that cools the house nicely if the temps are in the low 80s or below. That gets us through June most years before installing the A/C units in early July. This summer was a bit odd because it was relatively cool and extremely rainy, so we didn't need A/C as early as we usually do.

The one in our room is kept with the thermostat at 74-75 degrees.

Where do you live?

We're in a town house right now and we shoot for 75 during the day and 73 at night.

 

[Melanie11]

I'm in Florida and it's unheard of here for any house not to have Central AC

Mine just quit working last night so we are waiting for a repair guy. Since it is the hottest part of the summer I have a feeling this is going to be a rough weekend! :shakehead:

 

[TouchDown]

I remember as a kid getting to come down from the upstairs and sleep on the floor in my parent's bedroom (they had a window unit) so I wouldn't like die of heat exhaustion. Old farmhouse. In the winter, you'd wake up and be able to see your breath. GOOD sleeping bags were a must during winter.

My kids are unbelievably spoiled when it comes to AC. My middle one will throw a complete drama fit ("Ohhh I'm DYING!!") if I don't turn the AC on in the car and use windows.

My wife stays home with the kids, and she's pretty cool natured, so she likes the thermostat in the house to be around 78. When I come home, I have to have it set on 76 to be "moderately" comfortable. I HAVE to turn it down to 74 at night to not wake up in a pool of sweat at 3AM.

The older I get, the more I find myself able to stand heat. Cold though... ugg, I am dreading winter, again.

 

[csb]

It was 100 here on Saturday, but it was a dry heat. We just kept the house closed up and it stayed about 70 or so. We're lucky to live about 6000 feet as well...with 100 days being few and far between. God bless our basement and second story, combined with ceiling fans.

 

[Capt Worley PE]

We have a full basement and it is always nice in there (partly due to the ducts being uninsulated). I've always wondered about circulating cool air from the basement into the house.

 

[Chucktown PE]

Samp cooler?
My parents put in a swamp cooler, and yes, it works quite nicely.

A swamp cooler is an evaporative cooling system correct? They just drip water across a porous media and a fan blows air across it. I'm no mechanical engineer but I don't think those would work in the high humidity down here.

 

[Capt Worley PE]

I'm no mechanical engineer but I don't think those would work in the high humidity down here.

They don't. As a matter of fact, I had a Thermo profesor at USC that said if any of his ex students ever deigned a swamp cooler for use outside AZ, NV, UT, or NM, he track them down and kill them.

 

[Guest]

The older I get, the more I find myself able to stand heat. Cold though... ugg, I am dreading winter, again.

I am pretty temperature tolerant either hot or cold. I have been laughing at the group I have been with here in MI - it gets up to 80F and they are practically 'dying' from the heat!

I am actually looking forward to the winter - it has been a LONG time since I have seen cold, snow, and ice. Even though, the story the drillers had about working a job last January when the highest 'high' temp was -18F not including wind chill did send a little fear into me!

JR

 

[csb]

We had a swamp cooler in college. It was heaven.

 

[Capt Worley PE]

My Dad once told me that when they got a attic fan in the mid fifties, it was more of an improvement than AC was over the attic fan.

 

[Dleg]

A swamp cooler is an evaporative cooling system correct? They just drip water across a porous media and a fan blows air across it. I'm no mechanical engineer but I don't think those would work in the high humidity down here.

My parents live on CO.... Works just fine there - very low humidity.

But, I will say this: the largest and last garment factory that was built here on island (I think they were making clothes for Abercrombie & Fitch) put in these massive swamp coolers in the side walls of their two factory buildings, and they sort-of worked. I was surprised. They pulled in massive amounts of air. I think they were 8 ft diameter fans, spaced maybe 30 ft. o.c. for the length of the buildings, with big swamp coolers in front of them. While it was not as cold inside the factory as an airconditioned building, it was cooler than outside, and it was very comfortable, probably just because of the huge quantity of fresh air moving through the place. A little damp, yes, but I spoke to a few workers (the few who spoke English) and they said they were comfortable and did not sweat. Bottom line, I guess, is that they were still getting some evaporation, so there was some cooling.

 

[Fluvial]

The first time we lived in an air-conditoned place was the summer of '66, I think. Daddy was working at NASA for the summer and we stayed in an apartment.

I don't really remember when we finally lived in a house with central air, but it was probably 1970 or so.

Here the stores and movie theaters were the first places to get a/c; I remember the ads on the windows: "Come on in, it's KOOL inside".

None of our schools were air conditioned, all the way up through high school. Those late summer days were the worst, with a big fan in the back of the classroom pushing the hot air around and making a soothing humming sound - we were all half asleep most of those days.

Everybody was used to it back then - we were all sweaty and sticky. Didn't stop us from playing, or working.

I wonder if Mississippi's obesity problem isn't related to air conditioning; nowadays it's hard to imagine going outside in the brutal weather to play.