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How to install proper 'split system' air conditioning in your office
Even in the UK, during the summer months temperatures in non air-conditioned
offices can reach 30 degrees celsius. This is clearly not conducive to
productive work. Depending on how profitable your business is will
depend on what air conditioning is worth to you. How many days of time
can you afford to lose? Irrespective of this calculation, it is obviously
always preferable to find a cheaper way of achieving a result.
If you've been quoted thousands of pounds by a professional air conditioning
installer, you might like to consider one of the various self-install split
systems available now.
We purchased our system from Global Cooling.
It is a 12,000 BTU system, with separate indoor and outdoor units, connected together with
cables and refrigerant lines. These refrigerant lines are insulated copper tubes.
Preparation
After doing a parts check, the first task in our install was to arrange the bracketing
to mount the outdoor unit. We decided to use a system called "Unistrut", because we needed
flexibility to install the mounting bolts into the load bearing beams of the building. Ordinarily,
using standard outdoor air conditioner brackets, you would use masonary bolts straight into
the brickwork. Our system used two short lengths of Unistrut rail, and two cantilever arms. The system
all slots together like enormous meccano! Try to make sure your brackets are as level as possible.
Mounting the outdoor unit
Getting the unit up into position is a job that needs plenty of people, some ropes and a lot of
care and caution. The outdoor unit weighs over 30KG, so will make a mess of whatever it falls on! Therefore
we took our time and gently hoisted the unit up. Dropping it onto the brackets and bolting it down took
relatively little time. We chose to tidy up our brackets by cutting them down to size, and installing plastic
end caps.
Running the pipework and cables
Drill a large hole. Do this with a drill that is powerful enough for the job. Our installation was slowed
by breaking two consumer style drills! Once the hole was drilled, running the pipework and cabling did not
take long. Taking care to radius all bends in the pipework (avoiding kinks) and connecting up the cables
at the outdoor unit was not difficult, following the instructions.
Connecting and mounting the internal unit
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