Are there any dual hose portable air conditioners in the UK?
Posted by ProTechXS@reddit | AskUK | View on Reddit | 33 comments
I'm looking to purchase an air conditioner for the summer as my shed/cabin gets very hot then. I'm looking to save the hassle and avoid paying extortionate prices come summer. Everywhere I go, there's mixed reviews of air conditioners, and the majority of the times it's due to the fact that there aren't two hoses.
I'd preferably like to purchase one with dual hose configuration to avoid any attempt in hacking my portable ac, but I can't seem to find any in the UK. I understand that wall units are becoming extremely affordable, but the issue is, my cabin doesn't support fixing a unit on the wall outside as there are panels.
Can anyone help me find one?
Martipar@reddit
You need to subscribe to Technology Connections for all the information you'll ever need on air-con, heat pumps and more. He's also acutely aware the US kind of sucks when it comes to electricity and safety in general (his video on indicators on US cars is fab). Anyway here's his video on portable air-conditioners Portable Air Conditioners - Why you shouldn't like them.
EmperorPedro2@reddit
It's a great video, but as he says, but doesn't cover extensively, the dual hose ones are more thermodynamically efficient and they are also usually equipped with variable speed inverters, that help with the noise change and also efficiency to smaller extent.
And as the comments below that video says: it's all great if you own and are permitted to install a conventional or split AC, but if you're renting and have vulnerable people, portable ac becomes a bit essential.
Faded_Fraggerr@reddit
i cant find any dual hose portable ac available in europe tho, which is crazy
AirconGuyUK@reddit
Did you ever find one?
wundaii@reddit
Checking in for this year’s heatwave - did you manage to find one?
AirconGuyUK@reddit
I bought one and modified it by 3d printing an adapter.
IntroductionLive4027@reddit
Which one did you buy? Was it easy to mod?
AirconGuyUK@reddit
Homcom. The cheapest, and rebadged as loads of different brands.
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005011938631807.html
It's loud. But I can share the 3d printing file with you if you like
D2WilliamU@reddit
Hi could i get a copy of the 3D files, want to see if i can do this as well.
Cheers!
BillV3@reddit
Any chance of grabbing that 3D Print File at all? I own that same model and would be very interested in giving this a whirl
wundaii@reddit
I’d like the 3D print file too, please! :)
NumerousApostle@reddit
This is a great tip, thank you! I’d love the 3D file if possible :)
LeftWingScot@reddit
not who you asked, but a few months ago i looked around for ages and eventually found a video on youtuber from the uk recording his own struggle in finding a dual hose AC.
eventually he bites the bullet and phones uk distributors, with a few of them telling him they purchase dual hose variants in the single digits.
depach@reddit
Resurrecting this thread, not sure if it will come up again but I got here from google so worth the post
I decided to try out the Ecoflow Wave 3
It's designed as a camping / van air conditioner , but given our limited choice for dual hose systems, I thought I would give it a try
It's not cheap at £699 but if you have extra use for it while not home, it could make sense. You can add a battery and solar charging options.
Its quite easy to find with a google so I wont link anything here, not s sure what the rules are , I grabbed mine off Amazon
So far its performing better than my old argos cheapo single hose , but murpheys law the heat wave ended the day after it arrived :P
The only issue is the availability of window kits for dual hoses, and being on the 16th floor I am paranoid about something dropping out of the window
Plastic-Dependent@reddit
I was gonna look it up until I saw £699 😂
DecentRaspberry75@reddit
Ive also got the wave 3, and am after a dual hose window kit! If you find one please post back on here! I’ve looked around and while DIY is a solution - not for me! 😅
depach@reddit
I have been mainly using it during the day so it’s not bad , the one evening I tried it with the unit outside my room in the lounge (windows open) with hoses going into the room and it did a decent job
much quieter than having my bedroom windows open as I am above a major intersection
a bonus extra use I have found , when there is no wind , having one hose out the window on fan mode to get the air circulating
could do with some extra hoses as changing the attachment the whole time to switch to the above setup is a pain 🤣
CouldBeARussianBot@reddit
Yep, they exist but they aren't cheap - I have a Fral SC14 but I had to buy the second hose separately. The other thing is that there are drawbacks - the cold-air house causes a HUGE amount of condensation, is big, and very very bulky. It's very rare I bother with it.
That said, the aircon unit as a whole is probably the best thing I've ever purchased. I don't think I'd be able to do any useful work without it
NegotiationRegular61@reddit
It has intake vents on the side. How is that supposed to work without a mechanism for closing them?
I think dual hose AC are banned, probably in some obscure hard to find regulations somewhere because they're more likely to overheat and cause a fire than the retardedly inefficient single hose ones.
CouldBeARussianBot@reddit
What? The thing has two hoses - one which spits out cold air, one which spits out hot air. You run the cold air one to wherever you want, and the hot air one outside
BlackenedGem@reddit
That's not what dual hose is though. With dual hose one hose draws in air from outside and heats it up, making the air inside the room colder. Then the second hose takes the heated up air back outside. What you have is a 1 hose machine that happens to let you replace the cold air grill with an extension.
With that design (and all other 1 hoses) you have to use the air already inside to provide the cooling. You heat up the air inside and chuck it outside through one hose, and then blow cold air out through the front. This is inefficient because you're using already cooled air to perform the cooling, and then sending it back outside. What's even worse is that it creates a low pressure zone inside the room, drawing in warmer air and particulates in from outside.
doktormane@reddit
That's not quite the right explanation for a two hose AC Think of an AC as a two part system, one has a coil called a condenser that gets COLD and the other has a coil called the evaporator that gets WARM. In a traditional mini-split system, the coil that gets warm is outside while the one that gets cold is inside. In a portable AC, both of these are inside the same unit but because the whole point of air conditioning is to take the heat OUT of the house, in a two hose unit one hose takes air from inside, passes it over the WARM evaporator then another hose takes the heat and dumps it outside. However, the majority of portable AC units in the UK are one hose models, so you only have a hose dumping the warm evaporator coil air out and this causes negative pressure in the room so the room is "forced" to suck in warm air from outside through any opening it can, like the cracked window you have open for your hose.
EmperorPedro2@reddit
That's not a dual hose system, is it?
speculatrix@reddit
After reading many reviews, I too bought an AGE Chillflex Pro, back in April to avoid the rush, because the noise it makes is fairly steady and you can sleep through it. I would have bought a twin hose system but of course they're impossible to get hold of.
Once the boiling hot weather is behind us, and I am confident I won't need to be claiming on the waranty, I will be taking the back off it to see if a twin hose conversion is possible. We use it in a small room and I can hear and feel the air being sucked in round the doorway in order to replace the hot air vented outside!
It was searching for dual hose modification which led me to this reddit posting.
speculatrix@reddit
found this:
https://imgur.com/gallery/kA4Z0uV
via reddit
https://www.reddit.com/r/AirConditioners/comments/v2qp2j/dualhose_conversion_for_electrolux_chillflex_pro/
4z4roth@reddit
mm this looks good, I'll give it a try, thank you for sharing the find!
this-is-garbage-2022@reddit
What did you buy? :/
MeasurementDue3069@reddit
I picked up a dual hose 2 summers ago, in Homebase the model is Amcor PLMV16000E. I think it’s got a super high BTU, but I did check the refrigerant gas given the climate summit and it seemed quite bad for the environment. I also got another one in Homebase, probably 6 + years ago, it is Homebase branded, model 275937 although the sticker on the front has an energy rating of a C. I’ve not had any other air conditioners, and maybe I’ve been lucky, but both times I just drove down to Homebase and picked one up for a reasonable price (around £400 I think both times). When I got my first one I remember it’s all they had in the store, and they had about 30 lined up down the entranceway all the way to the back where the garden centre is. I remember there was a unit which was more money, also Amcor, but I think it was 18000 or 20,000 BTU and it has a special inverter motor which my washing machine says it has, I don’t know exactly what that does, but there’s definitely more than one model by Amcor that has two hoses. I didn’t opt for it as 1, there was no stock and 2 I think it cost a fortune. Oddly, running the Amcor has been costing me a lot less than running a small unit that I got gifted which was 7000 BTU single hose.
ProTechXS@reddit (OP)
I ended up going with the AEG ChillFlex Pro (AXP26U338CW). Apart from the noise, it's a really good kit for my room, which is pretty small. But as with most portable AC's, the noise will hardly ever be low. It's efficiency rate isn't that great, but I only use it for couple hours max. Gets the room temperature down in around 10-15 minutes.
noooods@reddit
Does the ChillFlex have a dual hose?
ProTechXS@reddit (OP)
I don't think so unfortunately. I was quite sad with that, but it's very rare to find a dual hose in the UK. The one's that do are all out of stock.
MeasurementDue3069@reddit
The UK does definitely sell dual hose. However, there is very little stock imported and the portable units are procured in large batches. Eg stock sold now is what is left from the summer periods at outlets such as appliances direct, air con direct etc. I found this out as I wanted a specific model and messaged them when it sold out in June, they said they get stock around Easter so there would be none in stock till the following year. My mum wanted a unit and I saw a dual hose in The Range early this year, we went down a few weeks later and it was gone. The staff said “we don’t sell dual hose.” When I flagged the model we had seen they said “we had about 3 of them.” So, it made me think, the stocks supplied to the UK are very limited.
We later saw a dual hose in Homebase in Luton, by chance, as they didn’t have any on their website… it was display model, and they had none left in stock otherwise.
The manager said his son was in commercial air systems, and that the general climate in the UK isn’t consistently hot enough that people in the UK understand how AC / HVAC systems work. This means they won’t pay the premium for a dual hose and see it at face value, that is “why do I want two giant hoses when I can have one!?” & “whys it more expensive and has two giant ugly hoses when this one’s got it all in one?” Of course, there’s no such thing as all in one. Consumers lack interest in AC, as it’s often only used for the month or two where it gets hot, eg this year we had 40 Celsius (105 Fahrenheit) predictions for around 1 or 2 weeks. The traditional radiator systems, stemming from coal fire / gas fire days, with back boilers, mean a gas combi boiler is commonplace in the UK, and it is rare to see a ducted heating / cooling system in homes in the UK. If more people had ducting and HVAC there would be a greater interest, which would be beneficial given the ventilation problems we see in many UK homes which are insulated to death, with radiant heat, and limited mechanical ventilation which limits air flow / indoor air quality.
So I think he’s totally right…
Another thing that stems to mind:
Most people that buy a unit in the UK are unaware that it even contains refrigerant. People in general in the UK they don’t seem to know what a refrigerant is, and don’t understand the different types of refrigerant.
There’s a misconception that air conditioning is terrible for the environment, because it “uses so much electricity.” Although, that’s not really the reason for its environmental impact, especially given electricity is increasingly from renewable sources. Rather, some refrigerants, have very high global warming potential (GWP), which is a measure of how much the refrigerant will warm the planet, compared with the equivalent amount of carbon dioxide gas emitted into the atmosphere. IE a refrigerant with a GWP of 2000, such as some of the most common refrigerants used in commercial buildings in the UK, means the refrigerant gas is 2000x more warming, compared with the same amount of carbon dioxide emitted.
There are plenty of low GWP options, however there is a trade off, in that lower GWP options have traditionally been more flammable, although advancements are changing this.
There’s even older types of refrigerant eg freon R-22 which was one of the most widely used refrigerants ever, and despite being phased out / banned, is still widely used in commercial settings in particular. The problem with this refrigerant is it damaged the ozone layer due to it being a HCFC, as well as warming the planet. Unfortunately, alternatives designed to fix this, such as freon R-410A, solve the issue of ozone layer depletion, but still have a Global Warming Potential of approx 2000. IE it has quite a high potential to heat the planet if the gas is lost (eg appliance leaks the gas).
One of the things that genuinely hurts my heart is I find even people who drive cars in this country don’t understand the concept of refrigerant gas in their vehicles. It’s common that I see people turning on their vehicles AC only when it’s “hot.” They’re unaware that the system needs to be utilised, even during winter, to ensure the rubber seals and ducting joints, remain lubricated, to prevent cracks appearing. Refrigerant gas will escape very quickly if a crack forms.
They turn the vehicles AC off as there’s this belief that running it is “bad for the planet.” So they feel bad running the AC switch, when it’s cool. Whilst this is good intended, the net result is that the system isn’t lubricated during the colder times. Then all of the refrigerant leaks via a crack that forms. This is refrigerant that’s many thousand times more warming to the planet than carbon dioxide (CO2).
When the summer comes along, they find their AC doesn’t work. So they generally put up with no cool air, or pay to have it regassed. The service technicians performing the regas don’t inform them of why it happened, as they want to make a quick buck, doing the same job next year, and the next… All of this time, it’s a total train wreck on the planet.
Refrigerant should be stored adequately, and if a systems used correctly, there’s no reason for the gas to leak out for decades. If people understood this better, they’d run their AC more frequently to keep the gas contained.
There does need to be some education that goes alongside AC systems in the UK. Even a quick poster alongside the portable AC unit that explains the benefit of dual hose. Once a consumer gets it, they don’t want a single hose. Manufacturers need to do better at explaining dual hose, even just saying “Balances the amount of air in a room. Single hose, extracts air but doesn’t replace it. This worsens efficiency, reduces air quality and costs more to run.”
EmperorPedro2@reddit
What a rare gem of a comment. Thank you, anonymous human.