Isthmus House gets a little cooler

Last year, shortly after moving into Isthmus House and while The Roommate was off gallivanting in Jamaica and Europe for 3 weeks (Me? Jealous?), I co-hosted a dinner party with a friend.

It was June. The oven was on. And it was hot at the House on the Isthmus.

I don’t remember if we’d put in the fan yet in the living room but I do remember that we had the windows propped as wide as they’d go and the front and side doors open hoping for a crosswind.

While we eventually got the internal temperature to mostly comfortable, that was one of the first experiences of Summer 2013 that made me very grateful for air conditioning whenever I've had it since.

 This year, I thought I’d start preparing for additional house parties early and get air conditioning.

After my requisite several bids, research and getting to an understanding of terms like SEER (Seasonal Energy Efficiency Ratio – tells you how efficient AC units are) and tonnage (definition here: short version is how much cooling you get), I was ready to go.

The crew arrived a little late after apparently having to run to the store to get a new thermostat when mine wasn't delivered with the rest of the installation supplies. Buh-bye 1960s thermostat, welcome, wi-fi enabled thermostat!

After getting the guys acclimated to my basement, backyard and sideyard (where the unit itself was going), they got started drilling holes in my house.

Getting acclimated - this was a little cozy

That might sound a little exaggeratory but I assure you, it’s quite true.

When the new electrical is run through most of your basement (my panel is pretty much in the opposite corner from where the unit was), there are a few holes getting a few new wires.

After dealing with the fact that there were holes in my duct work from other wiring run at some other time (that’s technically okay), I made peace with the hole also drilled right at the cusp of siding and foundation for the wires into the house as well.

It also turned out that we had to punch a hole in my furnace’s ductwork to put in a new coil. Isthmus House was getting holier by the minute! (pun very much intended)

After fabricating a couple of pieces of sheet metal to keep it in place, we were in business – a coil in place, some wires coming through my wall and an AC unit most of the way installed! Granted, I’m being overly simplistic, but that’s the gist of what I understood with asking lots of questions.

Finally, it was just a matter of getting the thermostat installed.

A while back, I decided that I couldn’t keep looking at the gold one on my wall and replaced it with a white one in the same style (because that was my only option based on the wiring in the wall) so we were actually replacing a replacement.

While the electricians were downstairs putting in the wiring for the unit to run off, they added the necessary wiring for a five-wire thermostat (actually, six wire, but this new one only needed five). For reference purposes, my old one was two!

We cut a new hole in my wall (again with the holey house!), ran the wires and connected up. One very large instruction manual for a thermostat later, the crew left and The Roommates and I were left with air conditioning… that we couldn’t turn on yet because it was only about 60 degrees in Madison…

Soon to come is the inspection and then we can get on with enjoying a sure-to-be-toasty Madison summer from the relative cool of Isthmus House!