Heating & Air Conditioning Booster
by Suncourt
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Our Price: $28.99 Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours Buy Used: from $20.00 (click here) Category: Tools See more product details |
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Tools and Hardware Reviews of Heating & Air Conditioning Booster
Customer Review: Solved Our Cooling Problem
Summary: 4 Stars
Our master bedroom is on the top level of our house, two levels above the central A/C blower unit for that part of the house. Our master bedroom is also at the very end of the HVAC run, and has large windows that take up most of the east wall of the room. As a result of all of these factors, in the summer our master bedroom was about 5 - 10 degrees warmer than the rest of the house. We had tried everything we could think of to force more cold air up into the master bedroom, including shutting off the vents to the lower levels of the house. Nothing seemed to help in any noticable way.
Finally, I decided to try out the Suncourt Equalizer EQ2 register booster fan. I bought two, one for each register in our master bedroom. I do not bother with the automatic controls, so cannot speak for how well they work. I simply put them on manual mode and let them run constantly. The difference in the temperature of our master bedroom is amazing. During the hottest part of the day, it is now the same temperature as the rest of the upstairs rooms in our home (due to the open construction and high cathedral ceilings in the house, the upstairs rooms are almost always a couple of degrees warmer than the downstairs rooms), and in the morning the master bedroom is actually the coolest room in the house! The only downside is that the fans are not exactly quiet, but they're not so loud you don't get used to them pretty quickly, either.
All in all, this product worked as advertised, and better than I expected. I would certainly buy this product again.
Customer Review: Works Great In Our Home
Summary: 4 Stars
Since it had so many good and bad reviews, I hesitated buying it online due to return issues, but then found it at a local "big box" hardware store. I figured it was worth the risk at that point, and have been VERY satisfied with its performance.
I am using it in a 169 square foot room with vaulted ceilings (no attic above) and three exterior walls, including West and South (with windows on the West and South walls!) This room is furthest from the blower, and generally stays 6-8 degrees warmer than the adjacent room. After installing this unit that room now is within 1-2 degrees of the adjacent room and I no longer have to turn my air condictioner down so low just to cool off one room!
Pros: While some may find it noisy, it is quieter than the fan I use to circulate the air in that room, and find it no more than a background hum. It comes on automatically, which means it will only run when the AC is blowing cool air (you can bypass this option). Relatively easy to install with a long enough cord to reach far away outlets. With our HVAC configuration it has lowered the temperature of the room by around 5 degrees.
Cons: I had a typical 6x10 opening, and I did have to trim out around it to make it look more finished. While this was not necessary for function, it makes it look more complete. For a wall mount installation you need to install it so the label is upside down. I know that sounds like I am being picky, but just about everyone who has seen it has asked why I installed it upside down. Strange.
Customer Review: LOUD! But works, if...
Summary: 2 Stars
To clarify why I think there's such a huge discrepancy between reviewers, it's probably because this thing is only effective if you have a LOW AIRFLOW REGISTER. That is, if your register is working properly and blowing out a sufficient amount of air already, this won't help at all (it may actually restrict airflow). However, if your register barely has any airflow through it, then this will make a huge difference. In my case, I have a central air system that was poorly designed and get little airflow through some registers. This makes all of the difference for those registers.
PRO's:
- Pulls air through registers with low airflow
- Relatively easy to install (hang it over a register and plug it in)
- Adjustable thermostat for heat and cool (causes the fan to turn on when heat or cool air is flowing through)
CON's:
- EXTREMELY LOUD FAN!!! (I hate that the fan is so loud; this cost it 2 stars in my rating)
- Single thermostat means that you need to readjust it every time you switch between hot and cold (a pain in the butt in the Spring, with warm/cool days)
- Poor construction (cheaply made)
- Designed for short registers (it doesn't properly cover standard 10"x6" registers)
The noise is definitely a HUGE PROBLEM with this thing. I would not buy it again because of this. I need another register booster, but am looking elsewhere.
Customer Review: great idea, poor execution.
Summary: 2 Stars
I have had one of these for many years now. Its used in a corner bedroom that has two windows. The room is too cold in the winter, and too hot in the summer.
This product has remained functional and dependable ever since I bought it 4 years ago. It has been tolerant of dust buildup on the interior of the unit, and does well at keeping the dust away from the motor. The controls are simple and easy to operate. The unit is moderately quiet during operation, but is a bit on the noisy side for use in bedrooms if you like it very quiet.
The problem comes in that the design of the interior of the unit is very poor.
The fan itself is good, but absolutely no effort was made in positioning the fan properly in the housing, or designing the chassis around the fan. The end result being that a large amount of the air will churn inside the casing of the unit instead of being forced up and out of the unit. This means that any suction that the unit could produce is lost inside the unit itself. Also, I think this contributes to the unit being noisier than you would expect.
Unfortunately, there are few products on the market for this job, especially at this price. My use of this has been helpful in alleviating the problems where I am using it, but frankly, its only good for a couple of degrees and I only use it when its absolutely necessary.
Customer Review: This sucks, really.
Summary: 2 Stars
Like me, you might be thinking that this is the perfect solution to your problem and maybe, just maybe, it will work for you. I thought the same thing just praying that it would work.
No.
Its a great concept. The problem is that it just doesn't work. I sat with this thing the better part of 8 hours just tweaking and retweaking. According to my digital thermometer in that room I never gained more than 2 tenths of a degree.
One problem is that this is just a small fan that conveniently fits over your register. When you take warm air and run it through the fan...you guessed it, you are now blowing cool air.
Another problem is that its nearly impossible to sync to your furnace. It has one swith that you can adjust increment by increment so that it hopefully will turn on when your furnace does and turn off similarly. After 8 hours I came close. But there is still a solid 60 seconds after the furnace shuts off that the fan is still going. So rather then now turning warm air to cool it now blows COLD air...defeating the entire purpose.
I am going to do what I should have done to begin with and thats install an inline duct booster. The only problem I see with that is that they are all made by Suncourt and after this Register Booster debacle, I'm not sure I trust the Suncourt name.