If you are buying an air conditioner for the first time you must be asking, can an air conditioner be too big? Yes, the air conditioner can be too big for the house you are looking to cool.
When you aren’t experienced with the air conditioners, you must be thinking it’s safer to have a lot of house cooling than too little, right? Unfortunately, air conditioning repair professionals advise against this.
Why a big air conditioner is a bad idea
There are plenty of reasons you should avoid a large air conditioner. Some of these reasons include:
Discomfort
When the air conditioner runs, it has two jobs: it lowers the temperature in the air and also removes moisture from the air. To do the second function, it has to run for a while. For the appliance to remove the moisture, it has to pass over the evaporator coil that cools the air.
When air passes over the coil, the temperature can drop by as much as 20°F. When the temperature of the coil is below the air’s dewpoint, water vapor condenses on the coil surface.
When you have an oversized air conditioner, the unit makes the house cool faster. As a result, it runs for shorter periods. As a consequence, the water doesn’t condense on the coil, and it’s carried back into the room.
So, while your room might be cooler, the large air conditioner results in a “sticky feeling” that you sometimes get when you step in air-conditioned houses.
Wear and tear
In addition to a large unit making your house uncomfortable to live in, it tends to wear out fast; hence you have to replace it after a short while. The wearing out is due to the appliance having plenty of start-ups and shut-downs.
Increased noise
Have you visited a home, and the air conditioner sounds like a freight train when it turns on? This is a big sign the air conditioner is too big for space. Sometimes the noise is too much that you can’t communicate properly in the house, especially if you have to place the appliance close to the sitting area.
House damage
If you live in areas where the air conditioner plays a significant role in getting rid of moisture in the air, you can easily damage your house due to high moisture levels that the appliance fails to remove. Excessive moisture in the house damages the paint, drywall, and wood products.
How do you tell you have installed an oversized air conditioner?
If you aren’t sure whether you have installed an air conditioning system that is too big for your home, there are plenty of signs you can look out for. Some of these signs include:
Short cycling
To tell whether your appliance is short cycling, you need to time a cycle on a hot day. If the system operates on a consistent cycle, you have nothing to worry about but if the system short cycles or only runs for a few minutes, then shuts off, the unit might be too big.
Your house is uncomfortable.
As mentioned above, one of the reasons a large air conditioner is a bad idea is if it makes a house uncomfortable to live in. So if your house is uncomfortable and yet the air conditioner is on, you most likely have a large air conditioner.
High electricity bills
Due to short cycling, the air conditioner has to constantly power up and down, which tends to require a lot of electricity. If you have noticed your electricity costs rising than they are supposed to, your air conditioner might be too big.
The house is too humid.
As mentioned above, one of the problems of a large appliance is that it doesn’t remove all the moisture, which makes the house too humid. So if you have noticed your house having high moisture levels, the appliance is most likely too big.
What should you do about an oversized air conditioner?
The most ideal solution is to replace the appliance with a smaller one, but if you don’t have money to do it, HVAC companies McLean observe that there are plenty of other things you can do. Some of these things include:
Invest in a stand-alone dehumidifier: When used together with an air conditioning system, the stand-alone dehumidifier removes all the excess moisture from the air making your house more comfortable.
Add ductwork: Installing air ducts in the areas of the house that isn’t air-conditioned disperses the excess air.
