- When you first enter a home or building that is using air conditioning you feel two things in the air, coolness and dryness. Both of these physical sensations are accomplished by the air conditioning unit. Although you feel cooler that is not really what the unit does. It removes heat and in the process also pulls moisture from the air. In other words, the air conditioner does not cool the air it removes the heat from the air. In the absence of heat is cold.
- Every air conditioner has a compressor. The purpose of the compressor is to move the heat capturing gas from the low side, or suction, to the high side, or pressure. This action allows the air conditioner to pull heat from the air.
- Window units utilize one fan motor and two fan blades to move air across separate coils. The fan blade for the heat gathering side and the cooler side passes air from the room across the coil and then back into the room. The other outside fan passes air across the hot gas side coil to rid the unit of the heat collected from the house or building. Whole house units do exactly the same task, but they use two fan motors. The interior fan motor is located in the ductwork in the home. The exterior fan for the outside is the fan in the large coil unit which sits outside your home.
- The evaporator coil is the coil that is exposed to the house side of the air conditioner unit. The fan passes air across this coil and any moisture will condense and collect on the coil's fins. In this process the heat that is in the air is pulled out from the air stream. The absence of the heat is now cooled or cold air. This conditioned air is mixed with the air of the house.
- The condenser coil is placed on the outside of the house. This is where the gases that have carried the heat from your home is released to the outside. After passing through the compressor, the gas now releases its heat and condense back into a liquid. This is the function of the condenser coil.
- The liquid that carries the heat in most common air conditioner systems is a Freon-based component. This liquid along with a lubricating oil is suctioned from the evaporator coil into the pump then pushed through the condenser coil as a gas. In the condenser coil it becomes a liquid as it releases the heat. This liquid then is re-circulated into the evaporator to perform the job all over again.
