Installation
location:
Self contained units MUST be placed inside the air
conditioned area of the vessel - NEVER let them suck bacteria laden bilge fumes or possibly the carbon monoxide laden
air from an engine room.
We recommend every vessel
with a generator has high quality CO (carbon
monoxide) detectors installed.
The units must also
recirculate the air conditioned air of the boat,
not hot/humid fresh air. Think
of an air conditioner as a powerful vacuum cleaner
sucking air out of whatever compartment it is in and
blowing this air through the ductwork. Every pass of
air over the evaporator will drop the temperature
about 18-22°F- no unit can take in 95% humidity,
95°F air and discharge it at a dry 55°F!
Typical installation locations
are under a settee, under a bunk, at the floor or
ceiling of a closet, under the V berth, on a shelf
at the ceiling level, etc. Like all HVAC equipment,
it is good form to place the slowly dissolving
chlorine tablets such as "Kontrol" in the wet drain
pan to combat mold/mildew etc. a few times a year.
You can install a unit in an
engine room or lazarette if you box it off so that
the return air comes ONLY from the inside of the
vessel - it must be airtight from the engine room or
liner of the boat.
The most common installation
mistake is to leave even a small opening such as a
1" crack that is open to the liner of the boat -
you will end up mixing for example 50% bilge air
with the air conditioned air - the unit will never
catch up and sweat profusely from the humidity -
the compartment must be air tight from the bilge
or liner.
Discharge
air ducting:
To greatly simplify the
discharge ducting we supply aluminum plenums that
bolt directly onto the blower flange that have the
correct number of 4" collars on them for the size of
the unit. The 4" flexible ducting attaches to these
collars with a plastic wire-tie, and terminates at
the 4" discharge grills. Do not block off any ducts - this will reduce the airflow over
the evaporator which may cause the unit to cycle off
and on via the freeze control switch.
The most desirable location for
our grills is on a bulkhead near the ceiling. In
fact, if you have trouble running the ducting you
can place the discharge grills right next to each
other and simply point them in different directions.
The cold air will bounce off of the headliner and
gently drop down into the room, and our blowers are
powerful enough to de-stratify the air in both the
heat and cool mode if properly sized for the
application.
The discharge air will normally
travel about 8-10', so of course you will have to
run a duct to the V for example if the unit is in
the main salon and you want to cool the V berth.
Common mistake: Make sure you get the cold/dry
discharge air away from the return air intake of the
a/c. If you place your unit in the V for example,
don't install a discharge grill in the V because the
V is relatively small and may be 70° when the
main salon is 85°, causing the compressor to
cycle off on its' freeze control switch. We are
working with approximately 20° temperature
differentials: return air = 75°(24C), discharge
air = 55°(13C), refrigerant = 35°(2C). To
ascertain if you have properly ducted your discharge
system, check the air temperature of the air at the return grill - it should be the same as the room
temperature where the thermostat is located.
Because our units are so
powerful for their size, we do not supply variable
speed fans, however you will not be bothered at all
by the fan noise - we even insulate our blower
motors - these units are very
quiet.
If you design your own ducting
system, do not have
excessive runs of ducting or restrict the air flow
return. If inadequate air is passed over
the evaporator, the unit will develop frost on the
evaporator and will eventually ice up unless it is
equipped with a freeze control, whereby it will
cycle on and off.
Our units are designed to bring
the air temperature down to about 70°F - if you
try to attain a lower temperature you will either
develop a freeze up or cycle on the freeze control.
Return air
ducting:
There is no need for return air
ducting - these units are like vacuum cleaners,
sucking air from whatever compartment they are in
and blowing the cooled or heated air through the
discharge duct-work system. If you use our pre-designed ducting system you will be assured of having the
correct amount of air flow and air velocity to
successfully de-stratify the air in a properly sized
application without having excessive noise or
uncomfortable drafts.
The blower motor and rotary
compressors are air cooled and do get warm,
therefore it's good form to have the return air
travel over these components in route to the
evaporator. There is no need to have the evaporator
up against the return air grill, in fact it's better
to have the opposite - make sure the evaporator has
at least 2-3" of space from a bulkhead.
We manufacture vertical or side
discharge units - although it is possible to change
this after production it is difficult to do so and
we don't recommend it.
Plumbing:
The intake through hull should
be as low as possible in the water in a location
that is always underwater and not exposed to the
backwash of the propellers whereby air bubbles could
be ingested. Almost every marine air conditioning
pump is a flooded volute pump and must be mounted below the
waterline. For
boats that are in dry storage, you may install a T
fitting at the discharge of the pump with one line
running to a vertical location with a valve for
releasing the back pressure to simplify priming.
Frequently you can "T" off of a
head intake, however we don't recommend having the
a/c share a through hull fitting with any other pump
such as the engine or generator because of the
hazard of the more powerful impeller pump sucking
air backwards through the a/c rather than water from
the through-hull fitting, possibly overheating and
damaging you equipment.
The units' discharge through
hull fitting should be between 4" and 8" above the
waterline - if below 4" it would have to be treated
as a "below the waterline" through hull and would be
required to have a valve - above 8" the noise of the
running water may be bothersome.
Care should be taken to avoid
crimping the suction line. If long runs of plumbing
are required or if the unit is placed well above the
waterline you may end up with too much head pressure
necessitating a higher volume pump. We have a
variety of pumps in stock, and the charge to
increase the GPM capacity is nominal - see our pump
page.
The sea water requirements for
cooling our equipment is about 200 gallons/hour/ton
of air conditioning(12,000BTUs= one ton) at a
maximum temperature of 100°F. The only metal the
salt water touches is the inside of a 90/10 CuNi
condensing tube which is inside a copper shell. We
do not use a serrated, knurled or enhanced tube to
increase the surface area because we find our slick
inner tube to be less prone to trap debris and much
more durable - we make up for this loss of surface
area by extending the length of the condensing tube
ensuring long-term trouble-free operation.
All of our condensing tubes are
5/8"OD, and for systems of up to about three tons of
A/C (36,000 BTUs), a single 3/4" intake through hull
set up is adequate - larger systems may need a 1" or
larger, depending on the total GPH requirements.
In multiple unit installations,
we often suggest using one large pump with a pump
relay box whereby each unit has a 24 volt wire
returning to the pump relay box (usually mounted by
the pump), and if any one of the units engage, the
pump will supply water to all of the units.
Depending on the number of
units and pump size, we often run one 1" supply line
from the pump from which 5/8" T's supply individual
units. The sea water discharge from each unit can be
individual by each unit or tied together into one or
more discharge through hull fittings.
The condensate drain line
should never be connected to the raw water
discharge line-
if there were a blockage in the discharge line, the
raw water pump would pump raw water back into the
drain pan and ultimately into the boat causing a sinking
hazard.
The condensate drain line is a
gravity line and the highest point of this line will
determine the water level in the condensate pan. A common mistake is to have the condensate line run
a couple of feet at the same level of the chassis -
if there is any section even 1" above the bottom of
the chassis,you will have excessive water in the
drain pan.
Under normal operating
conditions, the condenser (the copper tube within a
tube on the unit) should be warm to the touch - if
you cannot feel any heat in the condenser whatsoever
when the compressor is running, you have too much
cold water passing through it. This is only a
problem in some areas where the water temperature is
40°F and the air temperature is 90°F! This
can be remedied by installing a gate valve on the
supply line at the unit to throttle down the water
flow. Remember to never
restrict the SUCTION side of a centrifugal
pump, conversely there
is no harm restricting the DISCHARGE side of a
centrifugal pump.
If the condenser is too hot to
hold your hand on constantly, you are not getting
enough cooling water. This is not a very scientific
way of determining water flow but it works. Most of
our units have manually resettable high pressure
switches on the condenser, whereby if the unit is
operated without enough cooling water and the
refrigerant pressure on the high side reaches the
limit, the switch will activate, shutting down the compressor until
it is manually reset by
pushing in the button.
Electrical:
All of our units are pre-wired
onto two clearly marked terminal blocks. We
recommend the use of GFI (ground fault interrupt)
breakers for any high voltage equipment near water,
and always use
stranded wire - never use solid core wire on any
vessel because
the motion of the vessel may eventually cause a
failure and can be a serious fire hazard.
Be sure to use the proper
size wire for our equipment. Undersized wire or poor dock/ship
connections will result in a voltage drop that may
damage the equipment and be a fire hazard.
Use a minimum 12 gauge power
supply wire - never
use 14 gauge for even our smallest units if wired
115 volt.
Be sure the breaker capacity
is less than the current capability of the wire - for example, with a high quality
#12 wire @120VAC, don't use a breaker of more than
30 amps. Use quality wire - cheap #12 wire may be rated at less
than 30 amps, typically
the larger number of strands and the higher the
voltage capability of the wire determines its
capacity - use wire rated at a minimum 600V.
Many marinas have inadequate
wiring -we suggest you test the dock line voltage
during peak loads -it may be 120 volts on a cool
weekday morning and 90 volts on a hot weekend
afternoon!
The high voltage block has
three connections for the power supply and three
connections for the pump - don't mix them up! This
terminal block is clearly marked, however if you
wish to confirm which is which, the heavier gauge
wires are the power in and the lighter gauge wires
are the pump output terminals. With 120V systems, the black wire is your line (L),
which goes to the circuit breaker, the white wire
is your neutral (N), which goes to the neutral
buss bar, and the green wire is always ground (G),
which goes to your ground buss bar. With 230V
systems there is usually no neutral, (the white
wire) and there are two lines, one black(L1) and
one red(L2), both of which must be on a dual
terminal 230V breaker.
The low voltage terminal block
connects to the digital control - we use the HVAC
industry standard - red, white, green, yellow color
code - any domestic thermostat will operate any of
our equipment and you will never have to helicopter
in a rocket scientist to figure out our digital
control, in fact, one can cross all of these wires
except the white for cool or all of the wires except
the yellow for heat! The 24 volts for the digital
control output is produced by an internal
transformer in the a/c unit.
The internal electronics of our
digital control are powered by two AA batteries,
therefore these delicate components are not subject
to line voltage spikes, etc. To replace these
batteries simply remove the four #1 Phillips head
screws on the face plate to access the batteries.
You will find a reset-able
breaker on all of our equipment - safety is our
primary concern and we strive to make our equipment
as fool proof as possible.
Our unique and time tested
heating element does not "burn" the air - it never
gets red hot because it is in the direct discharge
of the blower motor - these elements are actually
mounted inside the blower chamber and have a
controlling temperature sensor that affords one a
"post purge" feature (the fan continues to run until
the element is less than 110°F after the element
is de-energized) and two high voltage, high
temperature safety shut off temperature sensors
wired in series.
With a Flagship Marine a/c
there is no need for the troublesome reversing
valves and component wear and tear for heat - the
many benefits of electric heat far outweigh the
slightly more efficient reverse cycle heating
systems, and you will find the reliability and
simplicity of a straight cool unit to be a great
advantage. Please visit our "Electric Heat" web
page.
The use of rotary or scroll
compressors has greatly reduced the problems with
"start up surge"- and we have further reduced this
surge by installing as standard equipment, hard
start capacitors on all units over
12,000BTU's(scroll compressors excluded - inherently
negligible start up surge). Typically, the dinosaur
like piston compressor have a 350% startup surge,
the newer rotary compressors a 150% start up surge
(without the hard start capacitor- about 120% with!)
and the scroll compressors a mere 110% start up
surge.
Miscellaneous:
Our freeze controls will
prevent the compressor from starting if the
refrigerant temperature is below 38°F, therefore
don't think there is a problem with the unit if you
test the unit in February when it is cold - it will
not start. Once the return air temperature is below
70°F, or if you have excessively cold raw water
in the spring, it is a
normal function for the compressor to cycle off for
a few minutes occasionally to prevent ice from forming on the
evaporator.
NEVER CHECK THE FREON
PRESSURE! There
are no hoses, seals or gaskets to leak or "migrate"
freon molecules into the environment - this is a
totally closed system that is of a "critical
charge"type, using capillary tubes - even the small amount of freon
lost by connecting and disconnecting the gauges
may affect the units performance. There is no need
to ever check this pressure for if it were to be low on charge
there would have to be a leak and a need for the
unit to be repaired on the bench - this is an almost
non-existent situation.
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