Everyday Engineer #13 - Examining the Differences between central and mini-split air conditioners and heat pumps In this episode, I discuss the pros and cons of the two main types of HVAC systems.
I love your split but there is another option. Central mini split. I just installed a 5 ton central system. Yanked my old train dropped min the McCool Central System and it cost a fraction of the cost of hiring someone. You are correct, getting the air handler in the attic was hard but doable with $15 rope pulley from harbor freight. McCool has a 10 year parts and labor on the Central System. We are loving it.
We went with a central air system despite not having existing ducts, we had electric baseboard heat as our primary source of heat. We looked into mini splits and based on the way our house is designed, nearly every room would need one and the guy said it would have costed more than central air for multiple units. Our house is designed where if every room is heated or cooled at the same time it would feel less miserable overall. It was pretty pricey but it was worth the investment. Mini splits are ideal for milder climates or for those who need supplemental heating and cooling. But we live in the northwest where we have hot summers and cold winters. Both would be good for where we live but it’s out of our budget for now. Both systems have their pros and cons and the central air had more pros than cons for us.
I have the same situation/setup like yours lol, of course Ecobee as my thermostat as well! ,,,my office is the heat room to make my CA runs (I thought the same of adding Minisplit to my office as I found out the reason my CA runs quiet more often because of the office getting hot ...So did you take away Ecobee remote sensor of the office? How does minisplit cool your office? efficient? less $$ electric? Maybe mine is still in luck that the Day&Night Condenser still working (15 years old now) - and yes I am expecting it would fail anytime so my Sears Whole House Warranty would kick in LoL! I was baited to Solar panel but I think it might not help as well while handing down like $35K LoL!!
You got an upvote for that sponsorship joke. You do know they are guys with 2 likes that CLAIM to be sponsored by Samsung. "Samsung sent me this unit for free" LOL.
So its a worse scenario to run a duct and register to each room vs mounting a head unit, running copper lines through the wall and connecting each room to a condensor outside? And if its multi head, youre running two sets of copper lines and condensate drains to EACH room... What am I missing? Id rather run a duct to the room and be done. Not to mention you have so many more things to go wrong and maintain.
You need to have electrical (and all that entails) at all the points of use, as well as good places to put each unit (this will take a lot of real estate and could be an eyesore). Also, having 5 units is much less reliable than one. For an existing home where central air exists, you're almost always going to be better off keeping central air.
@@theeverydayengineer I don’t think 5 individual units are less reliable than a single central ac. Multi units that run independently will provide good redundancy. I.e if one dies, you have another 4 to supplement. One thing I am not sure is, if central air has been manufactured to a very high quality that it is multiple magnitude more reliable than cheap mini split. How do you think?
@@MrTimjin It doesn't work that way. Every unit needs periodic/preventative maintenance (PMs in the engineering world). Nobody is going to just say "oh one unit died, that's ok, there are 4 more." You'll always get that unit repaired. Instead of having 1 unit with a fail rate of X%, you have 5, which means you have a higher fail rate, plus more equipment to maintain. = more $
@@theeverydayengineer I agree with you on reliability. Single Zone Single Head/Outdoor unit will always be more reliable than a 5 zone, 1 outdoor unit system. You install more points of failure. This is why we like to pull continuous conductors in electrical with ZERO splices, each splice introduces a point of failure, no different than 4 extra flares for every other head added to a Mini split system.
Because it takes a lot of extra energy to drive larger physical devices such as larger compressor, larger fan. So it is wasteful to run all those, just to serve for a small area
With central air, there are a lot of inefficiencies associated with plumbing (ducting) the heat through the house -- typically uninsulated areas such as your attic. There are more reasons than this, but just to name one...
You put a new mini split in a afternoon??? I don't Think SO! Ya Right, if you deduct the time getting parts and ordering all the little details. Plus caulking, painting, sanding, finishing, and cleanup! Those things take time too. You had all the tools too? Dismissed!
