I have been using a portable ac unit for years. And have found that if you leave the unit outside. And only have the hose sticking in a port they work much better. The reason why . Ac remove heat they do not cool air. By Removing the heat from the air makes it cooler. If you keep the unit in the boat and vent out the hot air out a port what you are doing is making the boat have negative pressure. That forces all the hot air outside the boat inside the Through every vent and gap there is. By forcing cooled air into the boat you are forcing all the hot air out of the boat thew every vent and gap. The only down fall is that the never stops running because the thermostat is out side built into the unit .
For the doubters, we've run a minisplit ac in the Chihuahuan desert, offgrid for about three years straight, with three used 250w panels and a cheap home made lithium battery, and a dedicated 1000w inverter. It runs at 550w at most. Our ambient Temps get over 118°F in the summer and it never skips a beat.
Emily and Clarke's adventure Channel has a homemade ac unit that he built in place with off the shelf components that draws about 100 watts at 70% duty cycle to keep one cabin at 77 degrees and removes the humidity. It uses a tiny 12v variable speed pump meant to cool military electronics. Here is the original video. He has another one where he instructs a young couple of cruisers installing their own. He has a blended lead and lithium system, and can run this all night on battery power. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-xF113aUlZgo.html
Have you seen the new battery powered portable air conditioners? They are about the size of a duffle bag. One brand I saw is called Zero Breeze. There are others too but I can’t remember the name brands. You basically recharge the internal battery and it will run for 4-6 hours depending on how cool you want it. The reviews seem to indicate it will bring the temperature down 10-15 degrees.
AC yes ...before you look at jackery or bluettie, ecoflow ...build your own system, a rack battery and an EG4 controller, you need to litterly add a few cables and you will have twice rhe battery capacity for the same money and allow input of more solar panells than you can mount on your boat. This is a much better solution for much larger loads and about the same $$. Now u might be able to run the AC for 5-6 hrs vs 2 -3 hrs.
Chris have to agree I don't feel in those temps and climate you can be without AC. Thanks for the great other options you can do without the big expense at first 🤙🤙
yes AC is good to have but you should also strive to keep your deck cool - cover it with cloth, tarpaulin, etc, and you will make the life of the AC much easier too
@@USA4thewin Indeed.. The funny thing is, we are surrounded by water that is already cooler.. Besides, there is evaporation that cools things down too. That should be used to cool the boat down..
Just back from Aruba, 20mph breeze but my expedition hat gave no evaporative cooling. Sweated through light weight shirts. Could not sit in the sun, always sought shade. Once saw a ladies flip-flop melt to the street as she stood looking at a street performance. A/C is needed.
Its gets so hot in the south!! You should see the looks folks give me when I jokingly say "the south was won with air conditioning" lol The air gets so hot you can cut it with a knife.
Agree with you again. I have been sailing in the Caribbean on charter boat without AC and really miss it, mainly in marina where there is no wind. At anchor you won’t need it every day but when it rainy, you would. I will have AC in my cabin in my boat.
Guarantee that most of the people telling you that you don’t need AC on a boat are the ones that would never run their home units above 68 degrees F (20C)
It's a must have for me. I'm an old fat guy, so I don't want a boat without A/C. Not going to happen. If I was in my 20s, then maybe I could put up with the misery. But I'm not and an A/C is mandatory.
