oldest central air conditioner

[bobofhollywood]

I wonder how old is the oldest central air conditioner that is still in service. There is one here that I maintain regularly which was installed in 1968. It has its original compressor and coolant although I have replaced the evaporator fan motor 2 years ago and one of the condensor fan motors this season. That's 42 years old and still working beautifully. Does anyone have or know of another this old or older? My other central unit is 21 years old and also still kicking out the cold.

 

[washernoob]

Our house was built in 58 plus or minus a few years. Its still got the original air conditioner. Which is far underpowered for the size of the house. We got it refilled with freon. (spelling?)

That thing is old! You should have seen the look on the kids face when he came to recharge it! He said it was the oldest one he has ever worked on.

 

[bobofhollywood]

cool !

Over 50 years is awesome washernoob. Any chance of a photo? Mine is an odd brand made by Universal Oil Burner (even though it is electrically operated).

 

[washernoob]

Yea I will get a picture later today of it! Its kinda cool. Its greenish in color. So Im thinking maybe right around 1960.

 

[dj-gabriele]

Gosh, that's old! I wonder how much juice they suck for running! What was the EER (W/W) back then? 1,5/2?

 

[whirlcool]

I was wondering the same thing. Our last house had a 1969 Magic Chef central unit outside, with a Fedders unit upstairs. It cooled OK, but had a efficiency rating of 1.0. We had $400.00 per month cooling bills. It was still working when we had it changed for a more efficient unit.

In 1994 or so we changed it out with a matched Carrier set. Wow, the air came out of those registers like a hurricane. It cooled the house down very quickly, it had a SEER of 12. Our next bill was about $165.00. I calculated that in 4 years, the change out paid for itself.

I remember growing up a lot of people had gas air conditioning. They had a huge (by todays standards)compressor out in the yard with a little blue flame logo on it. I think most of them were made by Homart(Sears) or Carrier. You never see these today. I wonder how they worked?

 

[ironrite]

23 Years

This old Carrier unit came off the roof last Summer. It had date of 1986 on it. It was a 5 ton unit, combination gas heat/electric AC. It was replaced by a new Carrier combination unit. It's final death knell was when the tech tried to service it and black glop started shooting out the service valve. The unit was just shot. The tech was surprised that it was still cooling, though not very well.

 

[bobofhollywood]

E E R

Amazingly the 42 year old units tag says it has an E E R of 10. That's part of the reason why I keep repairing it.

 

[norgeway]

I know of one!!!!

There is a Carrier unit in a store in my hometown that was installed in 52, Its a great big console thing about the size of a big refrigerator,and has a water tower on the roof,operates quiet as a mouse and is so cold if you stand in front of it it will make your teeth hurt!! The store it is in used to be Shields Refrigeration and Hardware,they were the Carrier dealer,as well as Bendix and Kelvinator,this unit was installed, not only to cool the store,but to show people how well a Carrier worked, the compressor looks like a car engine!!

 

[yogitunes]

Had mine blow out last night....electrical storm....blew the capacitor to hell....a blessing in disguise....got it repaired and running today.....at 7 years old and it time for a newer, larger one....their coming out next Wednesday to re-evaluate my home for the proper size unit....I have a 3 ton unit which is not only under-powered, but my electric bill runs $700.00+ per month, it never shuts off, EVER!....the guy claims with a newer, better built, higher capacity unit, my bill should drop to under $200.00 a month....crossing my fingers

 

[whirlcool]

Wow! $700.00 per month. The only time I have ever seen someone with that kind of bill is someone with a old inefficient a/c unit and a pool where nobody ever cleans the filter. Yikes!

 

[ronhic]

Martin...

...I would concur with that.

We moved into an 'L' shaped house (since sold) that had a flat steel roof with negligible insulation. The main heating/cooling was by split system Carrier in the loungeroom. Unfortunately the doorways didn't align so the airflow through the house was poor and coupled with some hotter than usual summers, the lack of insulation, flat roof and 2/3 of the west side of the house being glass, the house was furnace - try 36c INSIDE...

We bought a small unit that sat on the only panel of wall in the hallway on the outside of the house...it was tiny - about 2'6" long...

The difference this made to our house cannot be overstated. The main airconditioner would now cycle on and off as the, effectively, 2 zones of the house were being cooled and the air a more uniform temperature throughout - not icy in the lounge and roasting in the bedrooms....

...and our power bill dropped...not by much, but about 10%....given the house was actually livable, I would have paid more.....HAPPILY

 

[athanasius80]

For early air conditioning... the Davenport Hotel in Spokane, WA installed both central vacuuming and an air conditioning system when it was built in 1914. AFAIK the air conditioning was just a water cooling and filtering system. Parts of it might still be somewhere in the building.

 

[washernoob]

Picture!

Ahh I will go take one now. I keep forgetting.

Its been a VERY busy day!

I got my LICENSE!!!! Now I can put my old faithful
to work! my 1997 Ford expedition that can haul EVERYTHING!

And I bought a hoover platinum carpet cleaner today so I have been having the time of my life cleaning my carpets for real!

 

[bobofhollywood]

1993

Noob - My car is a 1993 and I notice that was your birth year. I guess old is relative. Its a mazda 323 that still gets 36 miles per gallon and being a hatch back it has hauled many appliances and now has 215,000 miles on the original engine and clutch . Congratulations on getting your licence .

 

[washernoob]

Thanks!

My brother had a 323 a few years ago. Nice car!

I like my truck because it has SO much room, and I can haul almost anything except a piano in it. (well maybe a spinet!)

It only gets like 16mpg I swear. Its terrible on gas!
Just replaces the serpentine belt, alternator. Flushed the power steering, oil, and tranny fluid. Runs excellent now!

We have owned it since new, so its kinda a family car for us, and its been passed down to me! My parents drive a 2003 expedition when we got our boat last night. My truck with 135k miles just was too old to pull a 25 foot boat.

 

[dj-gabriele]

Gas air conditionig

I selected 2 articles on wikipedia if you want to have a look, they explain the principle of absorption heat pumps, systems that exploit thermal energy, instead of electric driven compressor to generate the temperature difference:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absorption_heat_pump

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absorption_refrigerator

Anywyay, there still are such systems, a lot used in the industry and a little in domestic.
An Italian firm, don't remember the name anymore makes a combined system heat and cooling that could drive even the house refrigerator other than the air conditioning and water heating (at the same time!) using an absorption cycle based on ammonia. The size is comparable to a wall mounted gas heater of the same power.

 

[tolivac]

$700 per month to use the AC?sound like the refrigerant level is VERY low.In that case call a HVAC tech right away.I would not want to use it in that condition-you might blow the compressor.If the refrigerant is that low-there may not be enough to circulate the compressors lubricant.
the oldest HVAC systems I see are in workplaces-a former one I worked at in Wash DC was considered the first govt office building to be airconditioned-the Cohen building.They had 6 600ton centrifical Carrier chillers to cool the building and the neighboring one.This was in the 90's the Carriers were replaced with Trane chillers in late 90's.And the Tranes had greater capacity and more efficient.The old Carries had open Croker Wheeler 700Hp open frame motors.The carries have hermetic motors of less than half the HP.About the size of a 55Gal oil drum.The older motors were about like the size of a small car.In Florida in the Ft Walton beach area-there was a hardware store that had a console type AC unit-It was also a Carrier.Sure felt good to stand in front of it on the hot humid day we were there.

 

[volvoguy87]

AC

My Volvo is a 1987.

Last I heard, the Fox Theater in Atlanta, GA still runs its 1946 Carrier AC system with a water spray. It works and works VERY well. The building is beautifully restored and maintained and, so far as I know, there are no plans to change it.

Dave