My house does not have central air conditioning. Every year during the swampy summer weeks, I bring out a loud, huge, awkward, and ugly air conditioner from the back of my closet. I wedge it in the window of my kids’ bedroom, wince every time I turn it on, and check the forecast every day to see when I can put it away again.
Last summer, a direct-to-consumer startup called windmill sent me a test unit of its air conditioner. Before I could write a review it was sold out and the expected shipping times for pre-orders were delayed by more than one year. The company is finally accepting pre-orders again and now sells directly through Home Depot. If you need to freshen up a bedroom or playroom, I suggest you jump on it. It works, it is easy to install, and it is reasonably priced.
The best part? It’s so attractive that I fair realized I left it mounted for a full year without counting down every second until I could remove it. This is probably the best recommendation I can make.
Fun size
Air conditioners typically measure power in UK thermal units. For every square foot of living space, you need about 20 BTUs, while taking into account factors such as the height of the room’s ceiling, the amount of sunlight the room lets in, and the number of people occupying it. the room and for how long.
At 8,300 BTUs, the windmill sits at the lower end of the spectrum. This makes it a good size and electrical capacity for my 10 x 15 foot kids room, especially since my kids are still quite small. It’s not powerful enough for a living room, but it is very reasonably priced. At $ 395, it’s still cheaper than its much uglier competitors, like the LG unit it replaced for us.
You will need a double hung sliding window, with an opening height of at least 14 inches and an opening width of 23 to 37 inches. It weighs around 60 pounds which surprised me as I had no trouble lifting it to set it up. The company’s clear installation guide says it takes about 45 minutes for installation, but it took me less than 15 minutes, even taking into account the time spent cutting and putting the insulation on. square.
You will probably notice first how the inlet is on the front panel of the windmill and the outlet is at the top. I really appreciate this design. You can’t direct the cold air directly at your sweaty torso, but it seems to circulate the air faster and allow us to use the bedroom space more efficiently. My daughter’s craft table is directly under the window, and the windmill doesn’t explode in her eyes or blow all of her colorful paper hearts.
The unit’s controls are located on the top, and these are several small buttons labeled under an LED fadeaway panel. You can either set the temperature automatically or set the fan speed and mode manually, be it Cool, Fan, or Eco (somewhere in between). There is also a tiny remote control, but my kids and I lost it almost instantly. It does support Google Assistant or Alexa for voice control, but I found myself using the app on my phone more often, especially since I usually turn off the device remotely after the day has cooled down.
