Window air conditioner in the fireplace

I dont have a well placed window to put a unit in, so I am thinking of using my fireplace to hold the window unit.

Since window units dont blow outside air into the house, there shouldnt be much trouble from getting sut/etc into the house I would think. My thought was to use the ash door through the back of the chimney as an air inlet, and then put an exhaust fan atop the chimney to pull air through and cool down the unit. It should have as much cooling potential as one sitting out a window with no wind I would think.

Can this be done? Anyone ever heard of doing this? It is way to hot in my house and I need to do something. Dont really want to cut a huge hole in my wall and my windows are set up poorly for a unit.

Any ideas?

 

I think you would be asking for a heap of trouble if you attempted this installation. Plus, you would have to make provisions for a condensate drain as you sure wouldn't want the unit to be draining to the firebox.

 

A regular one wont work. I have seen regular ones fail to work with far less obstruction. A high pressure discharge one might if you ran the discharge up and out of the chimney. I doubt it would be good for more then one story. Trouble is most of these are only a 5000 or 6000 BTU and expensive.

A split unit might work if you set the outside half on top of the chimney.

 

First time I heard this. From what you said, I have one suggestion. These days there are in-room one duct A/C unit on the market. it is around 8000 to 12000 btu, the unit is set inside of room(free standing) with one duct goes out. Since there is only one duct (goes out only), it may fit your installation, and you don't have to worry about the condening water.you can put it next to your window or your fireplace ...good luck to you.

 

I will look into the one duct units, but i cant get over the idea of having the a/c not take up any space in a room and still be in great position for cooling...

Maybe one of the split units so I can put the condenser on the roof. I will look into it more

 

It will not work.
A window unit barely has enough fan capacity to cool itself let alone push the air to the top of the chimney.
Even if you were to get some of the air up the chimney it would exhaust almost as much air as is being cooled.

Even a portable unit is not designed for that much restriction.

 

I would be using a different fan to cool the a/c, so its own cooling power shouldnt be a problem. If there is constant air motion around the part that is usually hung out a window, shouldnt that be enough?

 

Dude, I did the exact same thing and it totally works.

Our house has a weird layout with one big room in the center and a fireplace. The kitchen, bathroom and three bedrooms are all around the main room. This means there are no windows in the main living area.

I made an insert out of plywood to fit the fireplace opening and ran a drain tube down the ash dump in the basement that drips into a big plastic waste basket. The ash dump door is open with a small electric fan over it blowing cool air from the basement onto the back of the ac unit. The flue vent is wide open and the heat just vents straight up and out.

Just use your imagination and go for it.