20/05/2019
What’s Dry Mode?
“Air Conditioning Modes & What do they mean ? In a nutshell what are the standard modes I can use on my Air Conditioner?”
My home is humid / sticky and not very warm – Dry Mode
My home is hot; I need refrigerated cooling – Cool Mode
My home is cold; I need heating inside – Heating Mode
My windows are open for ventilation- Fan only
“What is Auto Mode ?”
This cycle will cause your system to switch between heating and cooling throughout use. In winter, your office may require heating in the morning and cooling during the day. When the system reaches above its set temperature it will either blow out cool air or warm air until it reaches its set point. The set point is the temperature the thermostat is set at.
Auto mode has the potential to use more energy, and in residential applications Ford & Doonan recommend to not use Auto and save on your power bill. We recommend that if you would like the area warmer, set the system to heating and if you’d like it cooler then set the system to cooling.
“Dry mode, what’s that all about? Isn’t that what cooling does?”
Dry mode is intended to be used when the conditions are humid and temperatures are not hot. It’s for those days where the weather has a tropical feel and just a little too cool to use cooling mode. An example of this would be those days when it’s been raining, or about to rain and the humidity is high.
We recommend using dry mode when it might be raining, damp and sticky inside and not that cold, but it’s too cool to want to run the a/c on cooling mode. Dry Mode won’t perform well on a hot summer’s day. We recommend using cooling mode.
Likewise in your car. Turn your heater ON with the Cooling (in your car this engages the compressor) and this dries the air. This is very handy to defog windscreens internally and helps to dry you if get caught in the rain. It will even help dry your wet hair!
The energy efficient clothes dryers use similar technology, with a refrigeration system that uses three times less power than the cheaper element-only clothes dryer. Let’s get technical
Dry mode works very similarly to cooling mode, only it senses temperature differently. In cooling mode your air conditioner is only concerned with cooling the room. It therefore regulates according to the air temperature returning back to the indoor unit. When the system approaches set point, the cooling capacity and compressor speed reduce along with dehumidification. Eventually the system cycles OFF, stops cooling, and stops drying the air.
When dry mode is initially turned ON, the unit will record the room temperature and decide at what temperature it will cycle OFF. Dry mode then considers and regulates with regard to the room/ return air temperature and the cooling coil/ heat exchanger temperatures. Fan and compressor speeds will be controlled to maintain desired temperature differences between the return air and cooling coil temperature, and therefore controlling the humidity of the supply air.