What Temperature Do you Keep Your Space?

[sourdough]

I realize that this is a wide open question. Not limited to garages, but to include homes, separate bedrooms, living areas, multi-story abodes, and anything else.

I have an LG 15K BTU unit cooling a 2100* ranch house with the addition of the forced-air furnace fan on manual setting. We are retired so I am able to monitor the OSA temps and go to cooling mode when the OSA is 2-3* above the interior temp. We can maintain 75-78* indoors when the OSA is 95-100*.

In the winter we rely solely on a forced-air propane fired furnace and keep the indoor temp at 67-69*.

Would appreciate any comments on your situation, even if you have backup/primary wood heat or other fuels, or heat pumps with electric/nat gas/lp backup.

I know it is cooling season in most places now, but heating season is a few short months away.

 

[The Cobbler]

house, if windows aren't open ( which have been l a lot this year) AC is set to 77 if I'm not home, 74 or 75 if I am

Winter, 68 to 70 if I'm home, 58 when I'm not, or at night while in bed

extended away stays, 80 on A/C, low 50's for heat

 

[pendragon1998]

We prefer the house to be between 68-70 year round. I prefer to drop it down to 66 at night, but we've kept it warmer for our baby this year. Lately, the AC isn't keeping up with the heat, and it's been 73 in here during the day.

Our house heat and cools very unevenly, with some rooms 7-8 degrees apart. It's very frustrating. We keep a small heater in the baby's room or it would go to 64 degrees in there very quickly, while the thermostat is set to 68 (right outside his room) and our bedroom could easily be above 70.

 

[skyking]

Summer. 70

Winter 76

 

[Notgrownup]

68 at night yo sleep, 70 during evening snow 72 during the day.

 

[Scott65]

Winter-Heat at 68 during the day, setback to 62 at night.
Summer-Air conditioning when necessary during the summer set to 75 degrees- more about removing humidity from the air than anything else. We have only used the AC for 3 days this summer.

 

[Premium08]

68 at night during summer to keep me from sweating. 70-72 during the day.

Sent from my SCH-I535 using Tapatalk

 

[Syberia]

So far this summer it's been whatever temperature our swamp cooler manages to attain, usually 78-80. Last winter we tried keeping the house at 70 all the time but we didn't like our gas bill when we did that. There's only about 2 months when we need heat, though, so we'll see.

 

[DCarr]

House stays at 70* during the summer and 65* during the winter months. During the Summer, Shop stays about 6-10* cooler than outside due to good insulation and fans blowing. I have an AC Unit in the 10'x5' bathrrom and will set it at 64* and sit in my recliner to cool off when I get miserable.

 

[Syberia]

64? What is wrong with you, I'd freeze.

 

[diggler306]

Summer
-------
Day: 72
Night: 70 (69 if the wife gets at it)

Winter
-------
Day: 71
Night: 67

 

[Falcon67]

Summer: 74 occupied, 78 unoccupied. Winter 68 occupied, 64 unoccupied and nights after 10 PM.

 

[over40pirate]

SW FL Hot and humid.
Summer 77 day 78 nite. 76 when doing physical work. 50 - 55% humidity
64 is insane in the summer.

Winter? What's that ! Just use a space heater when needed.

 

[KRB52]

Depends on who gets to the thermostat. I try to keep it somewhere around 68*F in the winter and 72-75*F in the summer. If my wife gets to it, the thermostat is at 75*F in the winter and 65*F in the summer ( or less. I've woken up in the morning freezing and found the damn thing at 60* or below in the summer, because "she was hot.")

 

[J.A.Varela]

God sets my stat at about 63 at night and 76 during the day. No silly AC or heat required. Once in a while it gets down to a testicle crushing 57 at night.Ceiling fans come in handy when Algore is floating by in his 4000 yard yatchet.

 

[sourdough]

SW FL Winter? What's that ! Just use a space heater when needed.

And do you all huddle in front of it when the orange growers are putting out smudge pots? J/K...

 

[351cmach]

Holly cow 68 - 72 during the winter? My wife and I would roasted out of the house. Winter 64 day 62 night summer constant 72. Garage is 57-58 in the winter if working

 

[FireTurtle]

68-69 at night & 70 during the day, although it get up to about 74 in the lat afternoon trying to keep up with the Texas sunshine.
Winter, we keep it at 67-70.

 

[PelicanPines]

Summer 77
Winter 67

 

[EarlyBroncoGuy]

I keep the house around 78 or so during the day, down to 72 or so at night. It's not the heat outside that bothers me so much, just the damn humidity. I can't sleep when I'm sweaty and sticky.

 

[Charles (in GA)]

House, Summer, about 78; Winter about 68-70. Thermostat gets moved twice a year, standard Honeywell mercury unit, no auto set up or down.

My mother spent most of her last 30 years jacking the thermostats on the furnace and window units up and down every hour or two for no real reason other than "I'm hot..." or "I'm cold" not understanding that it takes TIME for the temp of the house to adjust . I grew up vowing to never do this.......

Charles

 

[collision1]

I keep mine between 65 and 68.

 

[gipraw]

Summer: Upstairs @ 72, downstairs @ 68. The master BR is downstairs.

Winter: 62 on both levels.

Garage: AC is on when I am in it during the summer. Only a fan during the winter when needed, no heat.

 

[soapii]

Summer: 74 occupied, 78 unoccupied. Winter 68 occupied, 64 unoccupied and nights after 10 PM.

This is exactly the same for our house.

--Joe

 

[Zeke]

Having just installed central heat and A/C, I'm learning to live with 75 at night and 77 during the day when inside. The power bill doubled in the first month to almost 400 bucks for a 1300 sq ft single story home. We average 80º high days here for months. Then we average about 70 for the rest of the year with a couple months in the 60's for the highs. Nights are never higher than 70 and never lower than 45. So 400/month is gonna get expensive. When we get to Sept/Oct and it tops 100 many days I bet the thing won't even shut off.

 

[Paul1956]

68 - 69 at all times.

Old meat, like me, must be chilled to be well preserved.

 

[CWO4GUNNER]

With a ceiling fan in every room for the "wind chill effect" in summer if doing work in the house like vacuuming or cleaning bathrooms I set the thermostat to 77. But if just feeding my face and watching TV I have it set to 79.

 

[sourdough]

We, too, have ceiling fans in all bedrooms, TV room, and living room. The kitchen, dining, and living room are very "open concept" with 7' to 11'-6" ceilings. Lam beams support where there are no walls.

We have 2 ceiling fans and my wife's box fan running all night with 2 windows open in our bedroom. OSA temps have been in the high 40's the past few nights and so have the bedroom temps. The cat has even been snuggling against me by about 2 AM.

 

[over40pirate]

My question, is how do you cool the 2100sf house to 75 - 78 degrees, when it's 95 - 100 degrees outside, with a 15K A/C ! I thought a rule of thumb was 1 ton (12,000 BTU) per 500sf of area. A 2100sf place would require a 4 ton (48,000 BTU) unit.
What am I missing? I want the secret!

 

[Garagebound1]

House 68 day, 62 nights, garage 62-65 when I'm working, 42 rest of the time. Summer time we open the windows at night house cools nice, then we close up the house during the day and the 80 ft. Maple trees shade the house. Usually temps don't get above 75-80

 

[Boiler]

Winter 70, summer 72. We run heat or air always, furnace fan is always on. It may not heat or cool if not needed, but its on.

heat drops two degrees at night and air goes up two degrees during weekdays when I'm gone.

 

[blacknblue]

Jacksonville Florida

 

[sourdough]

My question, is how do you cool the 2100sf house to 75 - 78 degrees, when it's 95 - 100 degrees outside, with a 15K A/C ! I thought a rule of thumb was 1 ton (12,000 BTU) per 500sf of area. A 2100sf place would require a 4 ton (48,000 BTU) unit.
What am I missing? I want the secret!

Nighttime OSA temps are usually 46*-54* so we precool the house then and early morning [all 9 windows (vinyl sliders with stops) open 6"] to around 64*-66* using outside air (we get a lot of marine airflow being only 20 miles from the Pacific). When the daytime OSA temps reach 72*-73* we close everything up. When the indoor temp reaches 74* we turn on the window unit (setpoint at 69* so it never cycles), forced-air furnace fan, and the ceiling fans until the OSA drops a couple of degrees below the indoor temp in the evening. There is almost always a 7-10+ mph breeze here on the prairie. When we know that the weather will get hot, we try not to use the oven and rely on the microwave.

The single-level house has R-21 walls, R-30 floor, and R-38 ceiling with a light-colored roof. The attached 2-car garage is on the west end of the house which minimizes heat gain on that end. We are retired and someone is almost always here, so we can monitor the temps easily.

 

[driz]

64? What is wrong with you, I'd freeze.

65

In the Winter thats what we do. 64 to 66 is plenty and we let the unused rooms drop to pretty much whatever they settle to, probably 55 or so. It saves a ton of money and is plenty as long as you keep some clothes on. In the bedrooms we simply use an electric space heater at night and let the temp in the living room fall down to 57 until morning when the pellet stove kicks it up again.

 

[Peoria Man]

Depends on who gets to the thermostat. I try to keep it somewhere around 68*F in the winter and 72-75*F in the summer. If my wife gets to it, the thermostat is at 75*F in the winter and 65*F in the summer ...

Its the opposite here. The Mrs. is the one who writes the checks to pay the electric and gas bills, so she likes it set at about 78 in the summer and 64 in the winter. I don 't mind the coolness in the winter but setting the AC for 78 just doesn't cut it. It doesn't run often enough to make much difference! Especially overnight - imagine waking up in the morning and its 78 and sticky inside the house because the AC hasn't run since about 9PM the night before.

 

[jimp]

Shop 78 F summer, 60 F winter

House 70 F summer, 68 winter-60 night. (have a small window AC unit in bedroom and just turn it all the way down at night, don't know the temp.)

 

[ambenz]

Home
Summer: 74F occupied, 78F unoccupied and nights after 10 PM.
Winter 73F occupied, 68F unoccupied and nights after 10 PM.
I have a natural gas forced air furnace for 2200 squares of space including the basement. A generator insures I have power for the furnace during the winter in my Small Ranch Home.

Garage
Summer: As cold as I can get it with a window unit but only when I plan to be in there, all day and OAT is above 82F
Winter: 65 occupied, 45F to 50F unoccupied
I have a 30,000 BTU Vent-Free Dual Fuel Blue Flame Gas Garage Space Heater and use a box fan to circulate the heat. No other heating is required.

 

[walrus]

House, in summer, whatever, generally from 76 to 70. Its Maine not many days need AC but I do have a mini split so maybe 10 days a summer I cool it off or turn it on dry to dehumidify.
In Winter, 68 to 74 depends on whether woodstove is going or whether boiler or mini split is heating the house. I work outside most days so I want it warm

Shop varies greatly, summer its generally around 70, insulation works great, keep it closed up and it stays cool
In winter 45 to 65, solar panels keep floor around 50, woodstove to heat further if I'm going to be out awhile

 

[dlcwent]

Depends on who gets to the thermostat. I try to keep it somewhere around 68*F in the winter and 72-75*F in the summer. If my wife gets to it, the thermostat is at 75*F in the winter and 65*F in the summer ( or less. I've woken up in the morning freezing and found the damn thing at 60* or below in the summer, because "she was hot.")

Are you married to my wife's sister?

 

[jives]

Winter, mid 60s, but dependent on the amount of sun. Our house is "solar tempered" with a concrete slab and radiant floor heat. If the sun is out our house is in the 70s, no sun the heat comes on and set for 66. But, the system is zoned. The north side of the house is sleeping and much colder.

Summer? No A/C. Concrete slab moderates the temp, and along with cross breezes the house is rarely uncomfortable. Well-placed fans work wonders.

Jeff