Hello BHPians,
Need your help to finalize window AC for one of the bedrooms. Per online calculators 1.26 Ton would be sufficient and hence have decided to go for a 1.5 T window AC.
Went out to shops and Croma and looked at various options, narrowed down to LG. The window AC looks good (is subjective) and had a good warranty (10 years on compressor and 5 years on PCB).
Am leaning towards a 5 Star model since it offers more cooling capacity (as per the salesperson, something that is much needed during the summers with temperatures above 40 degrees) and will hopefully save some money on bills. Our usage will be 4-5 hours during the day and then during the evening / night another 6~8 hours.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Aroy Both Inverter as well as Non Inverter AC have a mother board for controlling the various functions of the AC, unlike good old days when there was no electronics, three or four speed fan selected with a rotary switch, a fixed speed compressor with an electro-mechanical thermostat, no swinging louvers and of course no failure of electronics.
For consumer ease all the functions are now controlled by mother board (my Hitachi had an MB 15 years ago), hence there is not much difference in failure rate between Inverter and Non Inverter AC. |
This helped tilt the decision in favour of inverter ACs. I did read about fellow members experience being not so good with inverter ACs as well but am thinking will give an inverter AC a try this time around. Am hoping that by now inverter AC technology would have improved and become more stable so hopefully should have a pleasant experience with them, fingers crossed. Also, LG does not offer any non-inverter ACs
However need help on 2 fronts:
1) Installation. The Croma person said that LG engineer who would visit the residence would inspect the AC upon unboxing and only install the AC. Any associated carpentry work that is needed would not be done by the engineer. This I found surprising because we normally do not have a rectangle void in our rooms where we can just plonk an AC. In our case the window has a grill and glass (held in place via a wooden beading/piping). The showroom person said that we would have to arrange for a carpenter to a) remove the glass and grill and b) post installation add wooden board for packing up. Wanted to check from fellow forum members who would have gotten a window AC in recent times, whether this is indeed the norm?
Our last AC purchase was a Hitachi window AC, around 10 years back and the dealership sent two guys over who did everything; a) un-install grill and glass b) install AC c) provide wooden packing to cover open spacing. Have things changed now?
2) Electrical wiring: The AC unit comes with a wire which will not reach the power socket. So we would need additional wire. Any specific wire that we should be looking for and how much should be a reasonable charge for it? Also the salesperson said that better to have the AC connected via an MCB rather than using a plug since the plus will not be able to handle the load (no idea what that means). Is getting an MCB a must? Having read that installation guys can mess up things wanted to be better prepared for when the actual installation is done at home
Quote:
Originally Posted by Aroy In short it is better to have a spike protector (for ease of mind) than a stabilizer. |
If we get an MCB thingy based setup then can we still add a surge protector.
Any good recommendations for a surge protector. Also since we are not getting a stabilizer with the inverter AC, does it handle power cuts well or should we switch off the inverter AC when power goes off? In case of the non-inverter AC (with stabilizer) we don't need to do anything (switch off) if a power cut happens.
The only thing which may change my mind is a visit to General store today. Have heard good things about General as being well built ACs which could last long and they have both inverter and non-inverter AC options.
Thanks In Advance,
S