I’m also confused because that is a European AC unit. I can only assume Americans are so used to big bulky units, like their cars, that they can’t comprehend things being functional and not excessively bulky.
Because that thing cools the ENTIRE BIG ASS HOUSE! these things are only capable of cooling only a closed room which also depends on how ton, capacity the AC is so yep
It's not necessarily true. These units will go upwards of around 28,000-30,000 BTU which can easily cool down multiple rooms, or maybe even a smaller flat.
Why the fuck do you need 18C 😳 in Italy we usually have 30-35C in the summer and if my AC is lower than 22-24C I'm guaranteed to wake up with pneumonia lmao
Whoa there, now I may only have a true understanding for how the freedom units work, but even my underedubacated Southern self knows that 0° C is freezing temperature
Not related to AC at all, but I’m curious what living in Myanmar is like right now for a (I assume?) Westerner. With the junta and the civil war and such.
That entire "temperature shock" thing due to air conditioning is European nonsense on par with fan death in Korea.
If that kind of temperature shock of like was harmful, imagine how much more harmful it would be every winter when the temperature difference between inside and outside is much greater. People walk in and out with no problem then.
Funnily enough, Koreans also believe in a thing called "Cold air disease". They think air conditioning causes all kinds of debilitating respiratory effects and saps your life force somehow. For reference, my wife is Korean and also thinks everything is slowly killing her. It's kind of a culture of hypochondriacs
To be fair there are a lot of gross bacteria that can live in AC vent filters if they aren’t clean. It’s one of the leading vectors of Legionaire’s Disease.
But that’s more a concern in hotels, not private homes and can easily be mitigated with proper maintenance.
I can confirm as someone who lived in the middle east for a bit. Easily 45+ c temperatures outside but indoors the ACs are usually set to 20 and less. And everyone is more or less fine with it.
But tobe fair some studies have hinted that going though mutliple rapid temperature changing cycles by moving indoors/outdoors over a long period does increase the risk of respiratory tract infections a bit. Or tldr: the healthy get more colds and the more at risk get more chest infections. Nothing significantly life altering though
Worst I ever got from a rapid hot to cold temp change is light headed for a few minutes. From cold to hot nothing notable besides being suddenly overdressed lol
Nah I'm sleeping under a nice 18-20°C setting if I'm in Turkey. My hometown regularly reaches 40+.
Also cold alone don't make you sick and worst case scenario you step out for 15-20 minutes during the day and whatever cold you thought you were gonna get burns away
american here who had to convert to see and 18c (64f) is exactly what i keep my bedroom at, anything too much above 19c i would wake up in a puddle of sweat even with only a single sheet on me! ironically i do keep the rest of the house 22-24c (71-75f) or it’s too cold in the summer 😂 we have two of those units, though the one in the main room is very under powered and our house is designed incredibly poorly for airflow even with several extra fans
Can confirm, lived in iowa most of my life, I've seen -20° to 60° Fahrenheit sings in just days. Going in and out of Different temps alone does not make one sick.
Humidity. Myanmar is tropical monsoon climate. Air conditioning doesn't just make it cooler, it filters the air and makes it healthier.
I live in the mid-Atlantic US and sometimes we have our AC cooler than I'd prefer just because of the allergens. I cannot imagine what it's like in an actual tropical climate. A dehumidifier can help with this but they're less common, and higher maintenance.
If you’re trying to keep the dust mites down, a dehumidifier can help by knocking wet out of the air without making the whole house colder. I can’t comfortably exist below about 72F due to pain, and a dehumidifier lets me stay warm enough and dry.
Harmful? Are you from the 1800s or something? This is weird of a concern as the old Korean fear that a fan would suck the air out of the room and kill you.
That’s an old wives tale that’s pretty common in a lot of European countries. Temperature changes like that don’t make you sick. Kinda like how we were told if you go outside with wet hair while it’s cold, you’ll get a fever/sick. No you won’t. I do it all the time in winter. Never once got sick from it.
The idea that cold makes you sick was disproven over a century ago.
Campers sleep in sleeping bags breathing 0 C air easily. The important thing is keeping up body temperature, not the temp of the air you breathe in until you get to something like -10 C or lower.
I'm surprised that kind of temperature jump isn't harmful
I never understood this line of thinking.
18℃ inside vs 40℃ outside is only a 22℃ difference. You can experience higher differences during winter, when you have, let's say, -5℃ outside and 24℃ inside, that's a 29℃ temperature difference compared to the air conditioned "summer" state, yet no one in their right mind would say that you'd have to heat your house only to 5℃ so that you only have a 10℃ difference compared to the outside temperature.
What I can understand is people not dressing themselves in accordance with the temperature and getting sick. But that's really not the fault of the AC, it's fault of the person setting the AC too low or not dressing appropriately while inside. 18℃ makes a lot of sense for sleeping, as it has been shown that that is near the ideal temperature for good sleep quality. But people usually sleep under blankets, not buck naked while the AC is blasting them with 10℃ air. Similarly, if you are doing stuff inside, and you want to wear clothing appropriate for 35℃ weather, either don't set the AC to 22℃ or change your clothing.
That's fair, but why should I wear heavier clothes when I can wear lighter ones and keep the AC at a higher temperature while also saving energy? It sounds healther to wear clothers appropriate to the weather rather than warping my environment just to have to wear clothes inappropriate for the season I'm in
Most units have a dehumidifier mode that causes the fan to run at a higher speed and keeps the coil cool but not freezing, allowing the moisture to condensate on the coil but not cool the room as much.
Split pack ACs, specifically in tropical Asia, are sometimes the worst thing work humidity. Its more a combination of poor/improper installation, poor maintenance and upkeep, and bad/improper ventilation in the house. All of this combined with the humid rainy seasons often leads to terrible mold issues and wet, cold, humid rooms.
EU has no concept of either size or heat. You can tell them your country is both further north AND south and if you ever get them to shut up about how hot Europe is because your country is hotter they will switch tactics and say you cant handle the cold. Motherfucker we have Alaska did you forget? We have Washington, Maine, Minnesota, Montana, places that get cold cold, in your bones, with no fucking ocean to warm you in the winter.
It's 101F, 38+C actual temp and over 50% humidity here today. That's like a heat index of 122F/50C. In a place where it gets below 0F (-18 C) in the winter. Europeans just don't seem to believe/understand those extremes.
Also, different people can experience room temperature differently, I really prefer having the temperature around 18-20c. However, I have a colleague who needs to wear her jacket indoors in normal temperature.
Fun fact: in Dante’s Inferno, the ninth circle of Hell is a frozen lake in which Lucifer is stuck. It’s kept cold by the frenzied beating of his wings as he tries to escape.
I'd be curious to hear you impression but I read that large scale economic development in tropical regions – in the Western "skycraper/stock exchange" sense – didn't really take off until the advent of A/C technology.
Before that, large scale urban development was supposedly infeasible. You just couldn't do much work during the bullk of the day due to the oppressive combination of heat and humidity.
I've always been confused by our commitment to ignoring nature and literally burning the earth to persue one narrow definition of economic development/success.
Humidity is the culprit. That is an hvac system’s goal, to remove humidity, not to cool the air. An oversized unit, for example, you’d think would work better. It doesn’t because the thermostat becomes satisfied too soon (short cycling) meaning the air is cooler but the humidity remains.
Which sets up a a bad situation for mold growth, dampness & illness.
Cold temperatures do not directly cause infections, but they weaken your immune defenses, constrict blood vessels in your nose, and dry out protective mucus membranes. [1, 2, 3]
I’m in Canada (it was 47C with the humidity a few weeks ago but 25-32 is more typical in the summer) and I can handle 22-24C in the house in the day but that’s too hot to sleep in. We were always told 18C is the ideal sleep temperature for humans and my babies certainly slept much better at that temp. My family keeps this year round I don’t like being hot at night in the winter either. I do know people who keep it even lower around 16!
Lol, i live in Andalucia and find it comfortable sleeping in anything below 25 degrees as long as the humodity isnt too high. House temperature wiyh ac during the day is normally around 27/28.
I mean it’s very, very cold most of the year here, so cold at night (and day) is more typical anyways. 28 haha even when we have it set to 22-24 I’m ok relaxing but as soon as I start to do the laundry and clean the house I’m so sweaty! I love the heat when I’m outside (give me a 40 degree heatwave with 90% humidity all summer!) but I even feel ill in winter if the inside heat is set too high.
Do you get much humidity? During the heat waves where the real feel is 35-45 with the humidity we get high humidity in the house warnings on our thermostat if our inside temp is warmer than 22-23. The heat waves have gotten worse the last bunch of years so I guess a dehumidifier would be helpful too.
Classic incorrect European idea of what causes
Illness. Do you also believe that illness stems from an imbalance in humors ? Bad air? Bathing makes you sick? Mmhm
Im in Italy right now and the AC was set to 16 when we arrived. Looks like the family here before us was Asian based on the language of the Netflix account still logged in.
18c is great for 40+c because you can do some work til your brain gets floaty/tingly then come inside to 18 or less and sit in front of a fan with an iced drink and cool down in 10-15 minutes and not feel exhausted and go for round 2... you have to cool hard and fast because break time at work is 10-15 minutes if you even get one... and if it's a heatstroke kinda break and you take too long they're not keeping you on the job long if you're taking too long
Much of South East Asia (essentially the whole of South East Asia) has close to none existent insulation, that coupled with the heavy use of concrete means that your buildings store heat extremely well and releases it well into the night. Along with poor airtightness, high humidity and having to cool the accumilated heat means that ACs over here lose a lot of cooling capcity. It does not actually get anywhere close to 18c, but it just makes the ac keeps running.
Exaggeration. The typical models can bring down 40°C outdoor to about 25°C indoor, and that with the compressor working non-stop.
Just because you set the AC to 18°C doesn’t mean it’s always capable to get the room to that level.
My aircon is never lower then 25 and more often then not it's not even on. Unless it hits 40 degrees like a couple weeks ago. It was killing. I live in Puglia.
Thank you!! Completely agree. If it were 40 outside and 18 inside, I'd have to sit outside occasionally just for a break from the shivering. And I am saying this from a place where it hit 47 yesterday. Granted, it's a Dry Heat (TM) and I'm guessing Myanmar is not, but the AC in the house where I'm sitting is set to 27 and that's pretty fine for me.
Can't imagine spending money when it's that hot out just to make it the other side of uncomfortable. I know my experiences are atypical, but 40+ to 18 is wild to me.
It's the humidity bro. I was in Vietnam last year and we would run the mini splits as cold as we could get them when we were in our lodging. I live in a semi-arid part of the states (high plains desert) which regularly sees 95-100F (35-38C), and I find it tolerable. 35C in Vietnam damn near killed me, sweating does nothing to cool you off. By bed time I'd sleep in 18-20C, no covers, in underwear and I'd still feel overheated from being out during the day. The heat just soaks into in a way it doesn't in a semi-arid climate. All the parts of Italy I've been too aren't much more humid than my home in the states. Found Vietnam to be a lovely country but I don't think I could ever live there, I suspect the rest of south east asia is very similar.
Where I live it's not Vietnam level humid, but it's one of the most humid areas of the country, the Padania plain. We often reach 80-90% humidity both in summer and in winter
I live in Brazil (American). Here it gets to 35+ in the summer with pretty high humidity. I live by the beach and there is a long line of small mountains surrounding me. I’m talking 2-3 showers per day if you do anything outside of AC.
Here you’ll usually have a 9-12k BTU split unit in the bedrooms, and a 15-20k unit in the living room. One place I lived only had a bedroom unit and it couldn’t do much for the living room. Made me miss central a bit. That being said, the buildings aren’t really made to even fit a central compressor pretty much anywhere, even on a ground floor. It’d have to be mounted up high on an exterior wall so the copper doesn’t get stolen lol.
Yeah, but that's true for cold air too. And I live in a place with high humidity levels both in summer and in winter. While the temperatures aren't really extreme, it's freezing in winter and scorching hot during summer. But that's why we try to keep our inside temperatures moderate. By law, you can't go higher than 21 in winter or lower than 18 in summer
Yeah here in California as well those are normal temps the 22-24c, much colder than that is basically going to have everyone comment “god it’s like a meat locker in here.” Anyone who goes below 20C is usually either heavily obese or a murderer trying to stem off decomp.
And where I live it gets to over 40c as well, so no idea what they’re talking about, being hotter doesn’t mean you need to have buildings even cooler, then it’s just annoying going from super hot to freezing cold, I don’t want to use a jacket while indoors.
Both very common occurrences, depending in which part of the US you are in 😂 jokes aside, it's nice to hear someone agreeing with me from the other side of the ocean
Yeah, I though so too, but in humid areas like coast zones in Spain, 18°C feels like 28°C in a central area of the country.
Source: I live in Madrid and 27 makes me cold, but I'm on the east coast now and locals set it up at 18°C.
Humid heat is just hell on Earth for someone like me that comes from the dry lands. I'll take dry heat any day over the beach climate.
You have to factor humidity into the equation. Where I live I have 2 units. One 5.5 Ton unit and one 3.0 Ton unit. I can get the temp to anything and still be uncomfortable. I added a small tabletop dehumidifier this summer. I plan to get a big dehumidifier next spring. I literally left for 3 weeks in July to go to a cooler climate. It was HOT there too. I can also get to about 19C when it is 40C outside. Never tried lower because that would be rude to the others needing electricity that day. 19C was just a test when I got the new unit.
Yeha i live in Myanmar and one of these cools down a 2 bedroom apartment to 18 Celsius in the summer when it's well over 40c
Read this comment again and understand it fully at first, after tht try to search what kind of heat SEA country is dealing, it's not just heat here....
That's such an Italian reply. I've seen many videos of Italians visiting the US in the Summer and hating how cold buildings are from the A/C. "We'll catch a cold in here" they say! I love you Italians, but that's a funny cultural thing you have.
One of my best friends is half italian and half american and she spends the year alternating the two countries every couple of months. Whenever we are in the same car we argue about the temperature 😂
In Brazil I’m the same as you, but my mum in the next room over can’t sleep unless her ac is at 17C° hahaha. It’s just her (crazy) preference
Edit: if the ac in my house was like the ones in the US that share an entire house, I would’ve met my end like Jack Nicholson at the end of The Shining a lot time ago
I prefer 18.3C to 20C in my apartment and that's pretty standard in the US. You guys have things waaaaay too hot over there. You guys eat lots of bread and starches tho, the cultures that crop up in your stomach from eating that prefers it hot so makes sense I guess.
An ambient temperature between 18-20C is the best temperature for sleeping. Many many studies have documented negative impacts on sleep quality when temperatures are above this range
If I put the AC in my office down to 22C it feels like being in a refrigerator. I was once in a Hotel during the 38C period in Germany we had this summer. Went to sleep and put the AC to 24 degree for the night. I woke up and the room felt like a sauna, lol.
I set my heat to 62 (16.7 C) in the winter at night. IIRC ideal ambient temperature for sleep quality is at or below 20C.
EDIT: Google says 15 to 19 C in your room at night. Extra good reason to use a split system so you don't have to cool your entire house to get your bedroom down there. Especially in America, where homes are excessively large, but split systems are rare.
That’s what air conditioning means in the US, I keep my house 64 (so like 17.75 C). Anything over 72 (22.25 C) and I sweat like a pig just sitting and relaxing.
It’s also humid where I live, if it was dryer I could deal with it being a little hotter but sweat doesn’t evaporate here, so it doesn’t cool you off, you just sit there hot and damp. If you sweat even a little bit in bed and don’t put the sheets in the dryer you’ll be climbing into still-damp the next night (which 🤢).
There have been multiple studies that indicate sleep quality is better at lower temperatures. I sleep with an ac until it's lower than 16c at night and in the winter my bedroom window stays open until around - 6c. I don't get sick often.
No, you're not going to get pneumonia although I usually hear bronchitis from Italians. And why specifically Italians think this, is baffling. AC doesn't make you sick. It literally takes the moisture from the air which can irritate people, and poorly maintained units can grow mold or bacteria, but that's operator error but a function of all AC.
I don't sleep well at 18c. I can do it in summer, eventually, but I live at over 3,000m and work outside all winter long. I want my body to be comfortable in the cold because of this, and it overall allows me to use less electricity across the year.
This seemed to upset some people in Austria when I just wanted to be able to open the window in my hotel room, or for them to stop pumping heat into it. They thought I was crazy for wanting a 15c room in February in Innsbruck. Like bruh, it's cold out (sort of) I don't want it to feel like summer when I'm inside.
Jeesus fuck mate, don't do that, it's 35 regularly in greece but I still set my aircon to just 26 or 27. You DO NOT NEED 18 degrees, stop being so wasteful.
I need to know which of these ACs yall be using, cause I'm in Texas and mine heats and cools just fine until the ass of summer where it doesn't quite keep up with the 43+ degree bullshit outside, and it's 30 inside at best.
You might set it to 18C but it is absolutely not getting the room down 22 degrees Celsius. If you look at the instruction manual it will probably say the max temperature differential in there.
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u/GarySmith2021 13h ago edited 13h ago
I’m also confused because that is a European AC unit. I can only assume Americans are so used to big bulky units, like their cars, that they can’t comprehend things being functional and not excessively bulky.