Buying a portable air conditioner can be a great way to keep a room or small home comfortable during the summer heat. Portable air conditioners are affordable, and they’re fairly easy to set up since you don’t need to hoist the heavy unit up to a window or cut a hole through a wall.
Owning a portable air conditioner does have a slight drawback, though, in that maintenance can be a little difficult since you don’t have unrestricted access to the coils. You can keep a window air conditioner clean by taking it outside and hosing it down, but that’s difficult to do with a portable air conditioner because the plastic outer shell is designed to be difficult to remove. Eventually, the unit is going to smell a bit musty, and you’ll want to do something about it.
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When a portable air conditioner starts to smell bad, it means that muck and algae have begun to grow between the coils. That’s not just a bad thing for the aroma in the room; it’s also bad because the sludge is eventually going to work its way down to the drain pan under the coils. When that happens, the unit will stop managing the drainage properly. It’ll either leak or spray water out the front, and you definitely don’t want either of those things to happen.
Deodorizing a portable air conditioner is an important aspect of maintenance. If you don’t do it, your air conditioner won’t last very long – and you definitely won’t like the way your home smells. Here’s what you need to do.
Cleaning the Coils
To clean your portable air conditioner’s coils, you need a can of foaming coil cleaner. Most coil cleaner formulas are self-rinsing, but you’ll want to confirm that before buying the product because you won’t have the ability to rinse the air conditioner’s coils indoors. It’s also helpful to have a wet-dry vacuum, a cleaning brush with stiff nylon bristles and a spray bottle filled with clean water. Here’s what you need to do.
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- Remove the air conditioner’s main filter to access the coils. For even better access, consider removing the air conditioner’s rear panel. You’ll find several screws encircling the panel, and the panel should pop off once you’ve removed them.
- Spray the coils generously with the coil cleaner. The cleaner will expand rapidly, and you may see flecks of dark material in the foam. If you have a wet-dry vacuum, consider vacuuming the coils to remove the flecks and re-spraying the area to clean it more deeply.
- Wait about 10 minutes for the cleaner to saturate the coils fully and loosen the grime.
- Scrub the coils with the cleaning brush in an up-and-down motion, following the direction of the fins. Vacuum the coils again.
- Spray, scrub and vacuum the coils again if they still look dirty after the second pass.
If you’re using a wet-dry vacuum and have removed your air conditioner’s back panel, you can rinse the coils by spraying them liberally with clean water. You should only do this if you can access the water collection pan at the bottom of the air conditioner because you’ll need to vacuum the excess water away to prevent the pan from overflowing. Rinsing the coils is useful because the residual cleaner will create bubbles when you turn the air conditioner back on, potentially causing water to spray out.
If you’re unable to rinse the coils manually, you should prepare for the spray by putting paper towels around the outside of the air conditioner before turning it back on. It’ll subside once the remaining cleaner is fully rinsed away.
Giving Your Portable Air Conditioner a Deep Cleaning
Was your air conditioner already spraying water due to a drainage issue before you used the coil cleaner? If so, you’ll need to give the air conditioner a deeper cleaning because coil cleaner can’t fix a drain that’s blocked. To do this, you’ll need a bottle of 3 percent hydrogen peroxide or an enzyme-based drain opener that contains no caustic chemicals. You’ll also need a wet-dry vacuum, and you’ll need to have removed your air conditioner’s back panel for full access to the bottom water collection pan.
To give your air conditioner a deeper cleaning, follow these steps.
- Use the vacuum to remove as much water as possible from the air conditioner’s top and bottom water collection pans.
- Pour the peroxide or drain opener into the top collection pan. Pour the liquid slowly because there could be a good amount of foaming action. You should also watch the bottom collection pan to ensure that it doesn’t overflow.
- Wait about 10 minutes for the peroxide or enzyme cleaner to thoroughly disinfect the pan. If the drain was blocked, you should begin to see liquid flowing into the collection pan at the bottom of the air conditioner.
- Vacuum away as much of the peroxide or drain opener as possible.
- Flush the top pan with clean water and vacuum away the water. The air conditioner should now be ready to use.
Maintaining Your Portable Air Conditioner
Once you’ve given your portable air conditioner a thorough cleaning, you need to maintain it properly if you want to keep it smelling nice for as long as possible. Here are some final tips to remember.
- Remember that an air conditioner recirculates the air in the room while it’s working, so smoking around a portable air conditioner is a serious no-no. Grab a vape by a well-regarded company like Voopoo and use that instead.
- Put a couple of pan tablets in the air conditioner’s top drain pan once a month. You can find pan tablets online and in many home improvement stores. A pan tablet contains detergent and a mild antimicrobial agent that helps to prevent bacteria and fungi from growing.
- Clean your air conditioner’s filters once a week by removing them from the air conditioner, rinsing them and drying them thoroughly. This helps to ensure good airflow, which will slow microbial growth and prevent the coils from icing over.