Abstract

Recent air-conditioning systems aim to provide thermal comfort for an unspecified number of residents. However, office workers may perceive the feeling of comfort differently depending on their clothing, metabolic rate, and personal activity level. This may cause difficulties in maintaining an optimal thermal environment. To address this problem, personal air-conditioning has attracted attention, which is highly versatile and can reduce thermal discomfort and provide comfort to all office workers by enabling individual thermal control. Therefore, the authors focused on developing an office chair, the “Cool Chair”, as a chair-type personal air-conditioning system with a cooling function from 2003 to 2016. The authors then added a warming function for year-round operation, creating the “Cool Chair with Warming Function” in 2017. Subjective evaluation results are reported. These experiments using the new chair indicated that the warming function achieves steady state in 30 minutes and the equivalent temperature of the entire body increases by +2℃. In subject experiments, the warming and cooling functions were adjusted according to individual preferences, and the cooling function was used even during winter by some individuals. The authors also confirmed that the feeling of comfort by the subjects improved at both 19°C and 22°C.

Highlights

  • BackgroundAir-conditioning systems, which have uniform temporal and spatial variations for environments, have caught attention

  • It is thought that the thermal comfort of office workers is improved because these systems can control planar temperature with less cold draft

  • It was confirmed that “Comfort” changed to “Pleasantness”. These results indicate that the Cool Chair 2017 can change “Comfort” to “Pleasantness” under the two temperature conditions

Read more

Summary

Background

Air-conditioning systems, which have uniform temporal and spatial variations for environments, have caught attention. It is thought that the thermal comfort of office workers is improved because these systems can control planar temperature with less cold draft. Evaluation of thermal comfort based on conventional indexes involves considering a single person in a room as a representative of a group of people with common characteristics. Even if the indoor thermal environment is categorized as comfortable, workers who are sensitive to cold or heat will presumably complain of discomfort. As a solution to this problem, personal air-conditioning systems have been attracting significant attention as a means of improving the thermal comfort of office workers. With a personal air-conditioning system, each worker can adjust the thermal environment to his or her desired preference

Transition of Cool Chair
Specifications of Cool Chair 2017 model
Cooling function
Warming function
Control and operating method
Battery The battery of the Cool Chair 2017 has a large capacity of 50 Ah
Outline of evaluation with thermal manikin
Sensible heat loss amount by thermal manikin
Equivalent temperature by thermal manikin
Usage rate of cooling and warming function
Equivalent cooling and warming temperature
Evaluation of comfort
Overall satisfaction
Conclusions

Talk to us

Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have

Schedule a call

Disclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.