In the house, why does heat set at 68 feel different than ac set on 68? It’s the same temperature but they feel very different!
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Worked in AC business for 16 years, the difference is based on where your thermostat is compared to where you are “feeling” the temperature difference. When your AC turns on there are only two things that change on most modern AC units.
1: the compressor or the heating element is on or off
2: fan speed (even this is for units less than 10 years old)
When your Air conditioner is told by the thermostat “it’s cold, we need heat” it turns the heating to on and the fan to on. No matter what that heat is at 100% and it’s forcing air through the duct to the different rooms. So if you are in your bedroom with the heat on it is actually a bit hotter than if you were standing next to the thermostat because heat takes some time to travel and the thermostat takes time to recognize its at the correct temp. And for cooling the opposite happens, cooler Temps further from t-stat. Also as mentioned before the humidity is a factor as well. Heating a house does not remove humidity while cooling does.
Edit to add: this is how most residential AC systems work, there are some that are smarter and have a few more bells and whistles that try to even it out but usually come with a premium cost and maintenance so I didn’t delve into those systems.
At the heart of those systems the above still applies generally. If your interested in some of those let me know and I’ll delve deeper.
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