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| DC Breeze Manual |
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GENERAL INFORMATION
DC Breezetm, the world's first true 12v/24v stand-alone marine air conditioner. Your Glacier Bay system has been carefully engineered to provide you with many years of trouble-free, energy efficient operation. Many DC Breezetm owners choose to install their new Glacier Bay system themselves rather than hire a professional. An advantage in doing it yourself, in addition to the obvious one of saving money, is that you will increase your familiarity with the system's design and operation. If you do your own installation you are likely to find the process easier than you expected with only a minimal number of inexpensive tools
required. Glacier Bay was founded to provide environmentally responsible systems and introduced the world's first commercial ozone friendly refrigeration system, using R134a. While the refrigerant used in your DC Breezetm does not harm the ozone, it can act as a global warming gas and may not be intentionally released into the atmosphere. 407C is classed in the A1/A1 ASHRAE safety classification, is EPA SNAP accepted, and UL recognized. It is not subject to phase out like the R-22 still used in some systems
.
Application Information How much cooling will the DC Breezetm
provide?
5,000 Btu/hr is the number you should use when doing your capacity calculations. However, the actual capacity of all air conditioning systems vary depending on the ambient conditions. Warmer inlet air will increase the capacity as will cooler sea water flowing through the condenser. The 5,000 Btu/hr capacity claimed for DC Breeze is based on capacity at the "high" setting in 86 degree F (30º C) sea water with an inlet air temperature of 85 degrees F. This amount of cooling might be sufficient for an average volume of around 400 cubic feet in tropical conditions, the volume, for example, of a good sized master cabin. Hull insulation, window space, and personal preference are all large variables in the actual amount of air conditioning that is optimum for your conditions.
What is the temperature difference between the inlet and discharged air?
This will normally be around 25 degrees F, but several factors significantly impact the temperature drop provided at any given time including:
Fan Speed -
The DC Breeze has three compressor and fan speeds. At lower speeds the discharge air temperature will be colder even though the unit will be removing less heat overall. The air temperature is colder at low speeds because the heat that is being removed is being taken from proportionately less air volume. The DC Breeze will use less power at the lower speed settings.
Humidity -
In high humidity conditions, a great deal of cooling capacity is used to condense moisture out of the air. As the humidity levels are lowered by air recirculation within the cabin, the discharge air temperature will become lower and lower. Under extreme humidity conditions, only 25% of the capacity of the air conditioner will be used to actually cool the air. A 25 degree F difference in low humidity may be reduced to only 6 or 7 degrees F in high humidity. Under high humidity conditions it is important to be able to restrict the amount of fresh air entering the cabin so that the DC Breeze can lower the overall relative humidity.
●Inlet air and sea water temperature -
These temperatures affect the total cooling power of the system and therefore directly affect the difference in temperature that can be obtained between the inlet and outlet air. The higher the inlet air temperature and the lower the cooling water temperature, the greater the temperature difference between inlet and outlet air that will be achieved, given the same relative humidity. This also means that the actual cooling capacity of the system will be greater than 5000 btus per hour if the seawater temperature is colder than 86 degrees F, or if the air temperature is warmer than 85 F.
How much dehumidification does the DC Breeze do?
On the “high” setting, under rating conditions of 86 degrees F (30º C) sea water with an inlet air temperature of 85 degrees F., the DC Breeze can remove moisture at the rate of: 3.68 pints/hr (11 gallons per day) or 1.74 liters/hr (42 liters per day)
Why do similarly rated air conditioners perform so differently?
As you can see from the above, the environmental conditions under which an air conditioner is operating dramatically affects the capacity. The federal government requires all commercial and residential "non-mobile" systems to be rated using a standard set of conditions developed by ASHRAE (American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air- Conditioning Engineers). Unfortunately, no such standard exists for cooling systems used in boats, cars, buses,
motor homes or any other mobile application. The lack of a standard leaves the manufacturers free to rate their systems under any set of environmental conditions they choose (such as 70 degree F water temperature.) The result is that a "Brand A" marine air conditioner may have only half the cooling power of "Brand B" even though both are sold with the same capacity rating. Some smaller manufactures who lack testing capability simply base their rating on the capacity of the compressor they use. This can result in tremendous inaccuracy since many other system components will also impact the effective capacity. The bottom line is that without enforced testing standards there is no way to really know what you are getting before you buy. We are proud of the performance of the DC Breeze and want you to understand how our ratings are based and what you can really expect from the system. |
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