Kinja reply list

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Done With This SiteAlan Henry
6/25/16 2:08pm
I like the idea of cooling your cats and using them as pillows. Best thing Lifehacker has ever come up with!
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  Alan HenryDone With This Site
  6/25/16 4:30pm
  stay cool :D
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logruszedAlan Henry
6/25/16 4:06pm
Blocking light has absolutely been the biggest help for keeping my apartments cool over the years. I had a 22nd floor corner apartment with a S/E exposure that got insanely hot until I put foil on the windows and the temp literally dropped 15 degrees in an hour and never got crazy hot like that again.
Some landlords are really not cool with foil on the windows, however, but if it’s an option for you then it really works. If you’re a light sleeper the added benefit is your home becomes a pitch black cave.
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  veracommentlogruszed
  6/25/16 7:30pm
  foil is so ghetto.. i use space blankets. LOL.
  basically the same thing (but not blackout). the ones I have are 7 feet by 5.. mylar is easier to “pack up” and reuse vs. foil.
  you can even take one and roll it up in a cheap matchstick blind then stick it in a closet for the winter or once the sun passes - i assume you have a view.
  they’re cheap too - 10 pack for 15 bucks or so.
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  logruszedveracomment
  6/25/16 9:31pm
  I like to have zero natural light in my home if I can avoid it. I also tend to replace all my bulbs with the lowest possible wattage. 90% of the time the only light in my home other than that coming from the TV is a 12watt bulb hanging from the ceiling and that’s actually in a red silk hanging lantern.
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SnowmanPantsAlan Henry
6/25/16 12:46pm
So I don’t think thermodynamics works in my apartment. I’m on the top floor of a 3-floor building. It’s been hot here in Chicago during the days, but cools off into the 60s overnight. After the sun goes down, I’ll open all of my windows, turn on all the fans, and even open the transom on our back door that goes to a brick stairwell. There’s a 10-12 degree difference between the temperature inside (~83) and outside, but the thermostat says 81 when I wake up. What the hell?
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  kittiesruleSnowmanPants
  6/25/16 3:58pm
  Your walls, floor, ceiling, etc. are also 83 degrees, and take a while to cool. I think this is why it’s more efficient to keep a house cool with AC all the time versus repeatedly letting it get warm and then cooling it off.
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  MyTVNeverLiesSnowmanPants
  6/26/16 6:37am
  Same here. It’s the damndest thing. When it’s noticeably cooler outside, and you open a window, entropy alone should be trying to even things out, but a 20 inch box fan can’t seem to bring things into equilibrium.
  What the hell?
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hobbes9Alan Henry
6/25/16 12:56pm
This is what I learned as a kid and I’m sticking to it!
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  umataro42hobbes9
  6/26/16 3:15pm
  When I was a kid, I learned not to use up your own refrigerator.
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kis_evAlan Henry
6/25/16 12:39pm
My 1950s house has been remodeled many times through the decades, but man does it get hot in during the summer. I added a couple of rolls of R30 insulation in the attic, redistributed the old blown cellulose, weatherstripped some doors, and added window curtains/shades, but that still wasn’t enough.
Before investing in a whole-house fan, I used two high velocity box fans and place one facing inward and the other outward at opened doors on opposite sides of the house to create wind flow. This worked nicely, but was pretty loud and inconvenient to do each evening. I bought a Quietcool WHF, installed it with a Belkin WEMO smart plug that allows rules and remote operations, and I’ve been really happy with it. The key is using it with an indoor/outdoor weather station that lets you know when the outside temperature is cooler than the inside temperature.
I also added some drop shades to the exterior of the south of my house (it gets about 6 hours of direct solar gain during the summer days) and reduced the surface temperature of the exterior stucco by 40 degrees! I bought 4 sets of Coolaroo shades off Craigslist for $100, enough to cover 30 linear ft of wall, window, and doors. I installed them on the inside of the roof eaves.
Finally, I bought a used evaporative cooler off Craigslist to use on the hot and dry days. It’s effective for our sunroom/home office which is about 300 sq ft. We bought our house with central AC, but the unit is over 20 years old and draws about 5.5kWhr…the WHF uses .1kWhr. I would be more inclined to use our AC if I had roof-top solar panels or if my state wasn’t constantly in an energy crisis.
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  logruszedkis_ev
  6/25/16 4:02pm
  Yeah, if you’re a homeowner in a dry climate a swamp cooler is absolutely the way to go.
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  kis_evlogruszed
  6/26/16 12:31pm
  Agreed! On a dry day, say 20% RH and 90 degrees F, you can get 70 degree air with some water and about .5kWh to spin a high speed fan. It also works extremely well as an air cleaner, but you have to maintain and change the water every 4 days to prevent algae growth.
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Urambo TauroAlan Henry
6/25/16 12:45pm
I’m a big ~~fan~~ er, proponent, of the “fan fortress” method, but I’d like to add that it’s even more effective if you use it to expel hot air outside at night, and close the windows in the morning to trap that cool air inside. (It’s actually quite similar to the “whole house fan” method.)
I don’t have any air conditioners at home, but after experimenting with this method, I found that if you do this to just one room in the house, it will keep that room up to ten degrees cooler than the rest of the house throughout the day (if you keep the door to that room closed). The results might be even more impressive if you have better insulation than my old farmhouse does.
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1wheeldriftAlan Henry
6/28/16 3:10pm
Here’s a cooling breathing technique that a yoga teacher taught me that *really* works:
- Open your mouth and curl your tongue so it makes a tube or channel in the middle.
- Breathe in slowly through your mouth, through the tube you made with your tongue.
- Close your mouth and breath out slowly through your nose.
If you do this for a minute or so (or longer), you’ll feel noticeably cooler. Repeat as often as you want. I assume this work by drawing the in breath over the moisture on your tongue. However it works, it’s genuinely effective, doesn’t cost a cent and you can do it anywhere/anytime.
Credit and thanks to Michael Brod.
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brodiemacAlan Henry
6/28/16 10:39am
Something that always surprises me when people are building houses is they clear the lot of ALL trees. My parents have a 150 year old maple that shades their house and they have never needed an air conditioner. If you are building a house, pay the extra excavation cost to leave as many trees as close to your house as possible, especially on the south and west sides of the house. The cost saving over time far outweigh the additional excavation costs.
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someonesomewhereinspaceAlan Henry
6/25/16 2:55pm
these are pretty good suggestions but i already knew all of them. my home was built in 99 and its the most inefficient thing. its made of wooden boards and the roof will heat up considerably which heats the house quickly. same with windows, they get quite hot. the electric bill is actually around $230 in the summer. theres nothing that can be done, the A/C itself is old and inefficient. but its the only thing that works. the humidity here is unbearably and cant be controlled without the A/C right now its 94 degrees with 47% relative humidity so you have a heat index at 101. its been like this and worse the past month. turning off the A/C just turns the house into a humid oven.
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l3luel300lvlAlan Henry
6/25/16 4:17pm
Big fan of the wet and naked suggestion! That’s how they did it since the olden days! :] combo of brillant ideas to make you look like an AC genius!
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