A/C
Planning to gut upper triplex of a 16′ brownstone. Anyone familiar with the Unico system? Either that, or conventional central air. Main goal is to not have lowered ceilings or weird soffits. Any thoughts?
Planning to gut upper triplex of a 16′ brownstone. Anyone familiar with the Unico system? Either that, or conventional central air. Main goal is to not have lowered ceilings or weird soffits. Any thoughts?
As Bruce hinted at, a well planned gut reno should make it easy to plan ductwork in such a way that you don’t have to have soffits or lowered ceilings, especially in a 16 foot wide house.
Chances are, on two of the three floors you’ll have a central core of some kind with bathrooms in the middle so you can save windows for other rooms. It would be easy to have a vertical trunk for the air, and just blow front and back from there.
The other floor where you’ll likely have the kitchen, living and dining areas might get a little tricky if it’s wide open and there’s no core to work from, but if you have as much as a powder room below the core above, you’ve got a similar place from which to blow air towards the front and back. Even if not, there are definitely ways to plan it correctly and avoid unsightly soffits and such.
Jim Hill, RA, LEED AP
Urban Pioneering Architecture
We have done a number of Unico installs, and I also happen to have Unico in my own house, so I am well acquainted with the pro’s and con’s.
Regular duct work is larger and hard to hide, unless you are performing a gut reno, but you are doing a gut reno.
Conventional HVAC is available from many vendors, and in many grades. The actual outdoor condenser is the same in either case, just the air handler and ductwork are different.
If you price conventional HVAC, you will probably be quoted “builders grade”, cheapest, and older technology.
Because Unico is proprietary, and they are in my opinion a premium product, the equipment cost is higher. Also the ductwork for high-velocity is from Unico (not the returns)so again it’s more pricey. By the same token, if you spec better grade conventional, it will be just as pricey as Unico.
Unico is able to slay certain dragons, such as you can fish the “spaghetti” thru a frame wall. And the ducts are smaller and use less space.
If you hold your hand in front of a Unico register,the air coming out is noticebly colder than a conventional HVAC, but, of course, there’s less of it.
Hope that helps,
bruce at jerseydata.net
I did it with a conventional unit on the roof and no sofits or visible ductwork. The contractor used ducts dimensioned to fit between the ducts and it required additional roof penetrations to keep the ducts from having to run horizontally. I also lost some closet space.
So it wasn’t a no brainer and it cost more than just letting them run wild but I have an air conditioned house and no sofits and no regrets.
It took some searching to find someone who used that size ducts. I would not recommend my contractor but keep looking.