Portable air conditioner in shop (garage)

[Bruce Cohen]

After this past summer, and its still hanging around, I did very little work because of the heat and humidity.
I can more or less tolerate the heat, but the humidity warps the heck out of what I'm working with, makes glue-ups a "sort-of" thing and plays the devil out of final finishing.
Nothing drys, including me. Though its a good way to lose (sweat off) some weight.
I've been thinking of buying one of those portable air conditioners where I can vent the exhaust out of the side door.
As the garage is only 200 sq. ft., most of the one's I've seen will do the job.
Anyone out there tried this, as I expect next summer to be even worse.

Bruce

[capncarl]

A friend of mine bought one for his 2 car garage shop and hosed the discharge air out the window. It cools kinda ok, but it seems to put a lot of heat back into the room due to the compressor and fan motor being in the room instead of outside. My guess is it is about 60-75% as efficent as a window unit the same btu. His also cost more than a window shaker.
capncarl

[JimD]

I've seen a window unit installed in a hole in the wall. Doesn't look great but seems like it would be functional. I haven't checked price yet but I like the idea of a split system. Small air handler in the room and compressor outside on a slab.

[dbhost]

I have a 13.5 K BTU unit that is vented between the doors. My garage / shop is at present only 1/2 insulated. If I recall correctly total space is 380 sq/ft x sloping floor making the ceiling between 8.5 and 9 ft high. Assuming the 9ft I have a grand total of 3420 cu/ft of area to cool off.

The ceiling is insulated with R30, the powered walls, which are the common wall with the house, and the west wall are insulated with R19. The west wall still lacks sheetrock on about half of it (working on it, but still more or less on the mend and not getting any help...). Doors are insulated with ridgid foam board to a total of R10 plus radiant barrier. The segment between doors is too thin for fiberglass batts, I am about to lay in spray foam before I rock it back up. I have enough foam to get 3" thick which should get that segment if I recall the specs on the foam, to R27 (R9 per inch if I recall correctly).

The remaining wall will stay un insulated until I get the west wall finished, the tool cabinets, tool stacker, and dust collection ducting reinstalled. The lawn and garden stuff is fixing to get into a cheap plastic below the fence line shed I picked up off of Craigslist for next to nothing...

Our temps here have hovered a little bit under 100 with 90% RH all summer. With the AC on, the shop starts at about 98 deg and cools off to under 80 with a RH of around 50% in less than an hour. I can live with that pretty well.

The biggest problem I have is that the little fan in the AC unit is hardly enough to mix the air in the room up to push the hot air back toward the AC, thankfully it is within the "airflow circle" created by my overhead air cleaner, which allows the AC to piggy back on that, with both the AC running, and the ambient air cleaner, the shop can and does quickly become a very comfortable space to work in, except when it is junked up and all cluttered beyond belief like it is presently... (Mad at myself for not being done with this yet...)

The big thing I have found with mine anyway is that I have a twin hose unit, and I have insulated the hot air hose with insulated flex ducting so I don't get the heat dump back into the space that others experience.

For what it's worth, I wouldn't even consider a single hose unit. Too inefficient.

If you have an HOA, this may be your only real option, Perhaps a mini split system if you can hide the outside pieces behind a bush. Mine just looks like 2 big dryer flap vents that are painted to match the house... The HOA simply can't tell from the street.

[capncarl]

Lazydays houseboat co. use to install window ac units completely inside the living quarters of their boats mounted in a box. All that was visible on the outside was a louver or shutter surface. These were high end boats for their time so it wasn't just a cheap rig. This mounting technique would be un-noticable by any HOA. The box could be mounted under ceiling heigth in the garage and would take up little valuable space.
Another option would be Packaged Terminal Air Conditioners. These are the units that were and still are popular in motel rooms, usually mounted through the wall below a large window. They have a wall sleeve that functions like the houseboat ac box described above. Unlike a regular window ac they are not vented on the side or bottom of the box, and can be installed completely in the building with only the outdoor louver exposed. They are more expensive than window units but are more ac for your money, still cheaper than the mini-splits.
I cool my 800 sf, very well insulated workshop with 1 1400 btu window heat pump unit. It is turned on in April and off in November and idles most of the time. Thermostat is set around 80 and nudged to 72 when I am in the shop as the temps in S Ga. seem to like the high 90s to 100. The power bill increases about $25 during these months to run this ac, less than $1 per day to be able to use my shop, cheap.
capncarl