A/C for Venture 23.

I'm not holding you to any exact statement, this is a discussion at this point and a discussion that I did not see coming until others assured me of how much I will need AC. I'm not a systems guy. I hate all the distractions of things electric. In a perfect world I'd prefer the peace of quietness.
I had figured battery powered fans would do. But I'm told no, that I'll need AC as the humidity and heat is too hard on old folks like me in so many areas. Dewalt and Ryobi fans that we use when camping are impressive but they only circulate air and they do not cool it.
I like solar. I use solar fans in my 800 cu ft wood kiln. The fans run for days as the wood dries with no juice past what their small solar panels provide. Liking solar and knowing how to discuss it and design systems with it is a whole other discussion.
What is an inverter?
 
See my answer about inverters in your other thread.

I never used air conditioning at Lake Powell even in the summer hottest days. I spent a year total time in the Caribbean (East and Western In Florida--at night I just opened the hatches of our sailboats and put up a wind scoop, and that was enough to sleep most of the time. There was almost always enough breeze to keep us comfortable.

When I got to Florida--there was no breeze in the marinas--and we felt the need for air conditioning--but we still did not get it in our sailboats. Fast forward to our first "trawler"--A Symbol 42 foot motor yacht, and we had 45,000 BTU of air conditioning...including the Flying Bridge.

Full Circle:
This barely replaces what the AC used, and you still need to power all the other systems on the boat. So you’d either need to curb your AC use or find some more charging power.

Solution: add 400 amp hours of LiFePO4 batteries, and keep the current house banks to run the rest of the systems. I just purchased 400 amp hours of Li batteries for slightly under $800. So the prices of some of these batteries (and these were ones recommended by Will Prowse) have come down dramatically.
 
Well Gentlemen Its nice to see what is ahead of me, with a lot of forewarning. I do want to be as free of the shore power as reasonably possible. I'm not terribly against it but don't want to be dependent on it for daily use.
Thanks for all the comments. I hope to see how you all progress. I guess the smaller boats are easier to cool when there is no shore power available.
 
Actually I believe that the smaller boats are more difficult to aircondition since the larger (26/26&255) have more storage space, and a higher cabin top and headroom. I have used the same size window unit through the opening front window for both the 22 and 25. I have run them off shore power or a Honda EU 2200 generator,
 
Kevin,
So looking forward to your final solution. have fun with it and please share the outcome.
Don



KevinMc":hylqmu0p said:
Thanks for all the suggestions,I am still mulling over 120V or 12V and combinations thereof. I did look at the split unit at 12V used primarily in tractor trailer cabs mounted in the cab rear wall with flexible hose line set.
Maybe mounting on the starboard outside bulkhead under the window and running the lines through the cable access hole under the gunnel and mounting the air handler / fan above the starboard window inside.Just thinking,I have not taken measurement at this point but will draw to scale and calculate needed amps.I do have 200 amp solar and two Lipo4 100 amp batteries (partially installed)not active at this time.I will do more research and consult the solar gurus.Please keep the conversation going.KevinMc
 
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