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29 sats \ 6 replies \ @grayruby OP 16h \ parent \ on: What's something your significant other believes that you find ridiculous? AskSN
Stop the madness. If it is cooler outside and there is enough air flow coming into the house why would I have the AC on? I would just cool the house with outside air. If I want to cool it faster I suppose having the windows open while the AC is on could make that happen slightly faster. That's debatable. But it is certainly not blowing the hot air out. It's called air "conditioning" for a reason.
I'm thinking about a video I saw explaining why you don't save much by turning off the AC while you're out during the day. And, the explanation was that it's so expensive to cool all that air down, you may as well have just kept it cool the whole time.
You might be in a situation where it's warmer outside than you want to make it inside, but it's cooler in part of the outside than the adjacent part of the inside: like maybe the north side of the upstairs. So, if you open those windows while the AC starts, the warm air will flow out of your house more efficiently than the AC unaided.
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i think this only holds true if it was a small space and the AC vent is pointed directly towards the window. I still think it is unlikely as vents in a forced air system merely allow air that is being blown through the ducts by the blower to escape into the room and circulate with the existing air. If there is a breeze from outside the outside air would be entering the room at a rate quicker than the inside air is exiting. If there is no breeze, it is a small space and the vent is pointing directly towards a window I suppose it could aid in some warm air being pushed out.
If the room had an individual air conditioning unit and not central air it seems more plausible.
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Convection is orders of magnitude more efficient than other forms of heat transfer, though, so even if you can only generate a little exchange, that'll offset a decent amount of AC.
Maybe we're quibbling about what "blowing out" the heat means, but I maintain that this can be a worthwhile thing to do.
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AI disagrees with you but there is a heated debate on physics stack exchange about it that doesn't seem to reach consensus other than to never open your windows when it is warmer outside than inside which is likely the case most of the time in the summer when you would be running your AC.
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Full disclosure, I really struggled in my thermodynamics class and still think magic is the simplest explanation for refrigeration.
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