We all know that Texas can get hot, especially in the summer. While we love all the light that streams in and the amazing water view from the two story wall of windows facing the lake, there is a downside to having so many windows. Heat accumulates and rises in the vaulted area above the living and dining room due to the large windows there.
In 2015 we had all the windows tinted in the living room to decrease that burden and the extra heat there. For that reason we can not use regular cleaning supplies on the windows in the living room, so please don’t clean the windows. Our cleaning crew has special stuff for that.
To make your stay as comfortable as possible, we have added several window units in bedrooms to supplement the central air conditioning. This also allows you to cool the space that you are using. The larger ones are energy hogs by their nature. We ask that you only have them on when someone is in the room.
The central A/C automatically turns off if the doors or windows are left open. As is pretty typical for ac units in Texas if it is asked to run too long at too low a temperature or with doors open, the A/C unit will freeze up. That makes it very uncomfortable in the house. It seems like it is running but it does not cool. You’ll know if you keep dropping the a/c lower but the temperature still rises that the compressor has probably frozen.
If this happens it needs to be turned completely off for at least 30 minutes in order to unfreeze. (At our home in Dallas we have had our AC freeze into a solid block of ice that took 24 hours to thaw out because we kept it running after it froze. This was even in the heat of the Texas summer, which we wouldn’t have believed possible until the a/c technician brought us photos to prove it). You find the A/C controller in the hallway on the main floor, next to the breakfast area.
To keep the a/c condenser from freezing we have put a cooling limit on the thermostat. It can not be set to lower than 72 degrees in the hallway. If the hallway thermostat is at 72 degrees the back bedrooms are likely to reach 3-5 degrees lower than that, as they are generally much cooler than the living room. The downstairs spaces are usually cooler than the rest of the house.
We like to leave the window units all off and the central a/c at 85 degrees between stays in the home. This helps air to continue to circulate and keeps the temperature reasonable without running the electricity bill up too high when the home is vacant.