Hey folks,
Apologies if my questions are ignorant, first time home owner and don’t know much about these things. I am looking to find out if my idea is possible or suggested. Bought a house last year and noticed the house gets pretty warm in the summer.
We have what looks to be a mini-split system - wall mounted unit that shoots out cold air. There is no central air (not common in this area or when these houses were being built), but we do have an air circulator system.
The wall unit is located at the top corner of the central stairwell but the way our house is laid out, it doesn’t do a good job of getting cool air into the upstairs bedrooms or the mid-level main bedroom because it is around the corner of the stairs and then opens up into a much bigger room.
I have noticed that all the rooms (aside from the main bedroom) have an exhaust for the air circulator system. My thought are, is it possible to leverage those ducts and connect the mini split system to it, that way cool air can flow through the air circulator system into the bedroom.
It doesn’t really solve the main bedroom issue, for that we might need to add another wall mounted unit directly in the bedroom since summers are humid here and a fan doesn’t often cut it.
What do you think?
There are ducted mini split systems that may be useful to you.
Pushing (or pulling) air from an existing duct system is not a great path forward, as balancing the flow is challenging and critical. For example, if you could plumb the mini split into your circulator, what happens if they’re both on at the same time? The mini split could frost over. And if the circulator isn’t on, you could be back-flowing the air intake of the circulator.
I have a ducted ductless for my upstairs: three bedrooms and a bathroom. Works just fine for me, OP. The install is obviously a bit more than just a standard mini split system.