OzarkMan
Well-known member
Haven't posted in a while. Hope all you guys and gals are doing well!
I bought a KwiKool KB1811 portable ac unit to cool an outdoor 285sq ft block storage building. The unit is 17,700 BTU's running R410a on 120v. It is rated to cool up to 600 sq ft spaces. Unfortunately it didn't work as well as i thought and during the heat of the Arizona day, the temp creeped up to 88 in the space and cooled down to 78 at night. The ceiling is 8' and insulated but the walls are typical hollow 6x18 block. I realize there is heat gain. The building is surrounded by another block wall on two sides, a garage on the other and a full porch in front. So I called the company and they agreed to exchange it for a larger unit. I bought their largest 120v unit called the KIB2411 which is supposedly a 2 ton 23,500 BTU unit. I received it the other day and put it in service in the same space. This one does a worse job despite being a larger unit with the temps creeping up to 94 during the day and taking even slower to reach 78 by early morning. They claim this is the largest 2ton 120v unit on the market. I was really excited to get it knowing its claimed to cool up to 800sq ft of space. Of course the first thing I did when I got it was to check out the insides via the access door. I noticed it has a LG 208-230v compressor. I don't know how it is wired to run on 120v but it does. I googled the compressor and LG's website says its an 18,200 BTU output. The Kwikool advertisement showed it to be a reciprocating compressor running on R407c. I was hopeful with it coming with the 407 and recip compressor being that our temperatures are high ambient and of course being a true 2 ton unit. This thing cost me 4k.
Sooooo.... To you HVAC gurus, why's this thing not keeping up let alone being a bigger unit working less efficient than the smaller unit I sent back? How can they run a 230v compressor on 120v? Is my theory of R407 being a better refrigerant for high temp environments? They have another model called the KIB2421 which is the same exact thing except it runs on 220v.
I did so much research online but came up empty. I guess I need info from you guys who are in this business. Incidentally both the KIB1811 and 2411 both use rotary compressors.
Much appreciated!
I bought a KwiKool KB1811 portable ac unit to cool an outdoor 285sq ft block storage building. The unit is 17,700 BTU's running R410a on 120v. It is rated to cool up to 600 sq ft spaces. Unfortunately it didn't work as well as i thought and during the heat of the Arizona day, the temp creeped up to 88 in the space and cooled down to 78 at night. The ceiling is 8' and insulated but the walls are typical hollow 6x18 block. I realize there is heat gain. The building is surrounded by another block wall on two sides, a garage on the other and a full porch in front. So I called the company and they agreed to exchange it for a larger unit. I bought their largest 120v unit called the KIB2411 which is supposedly a 2 ton 23,500 BTU unit. I received it the other day and put it in service in the same space. This one does a worse job despite being a larger unit with the temps creeping up to 94 during the day and taking even slower to reach 78 by early morning. They claim this is the largest 2ton 120v unit on the market. I was really excited to get it knowing its claimed to cool up to 800sq ft of space. Of course the first thing I did when I got it was to check out the insides via the access door. I noticed it has a LG 208-230v compressor. I don't know how it is wired to run on 120v but it does. I googled the compressor and LG's website says its an 18,200 BTU output. The Kwikool advertisement showed it to be a reciprocating compressor running on R407c. I was hopeful with it coming with the 407 and recip compressor being that our temperatures are high ambient and of course being a true 2 ton unit. This thing cost me 4k.
Sooooo.... To you HVAC gurus, why's this thing not keeping up let alone being a bigger unit working less efficient than the smaller unit I sent back? How can they run a 230v compressor on 120v? Is my theory of R407 being a better refrigerant for high temp environments? They have another model called the KIB2421 which is the same exact thing except it runs on 220v.
I did so much research online but came up empty. I guess I need info from you guys who are in this business. Incidentally both the KIB1811 and 2411 both use rotary compressors.
Much appreciated!
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