Teardrops n Tiny Travel Trailers

Greetings, everyone-
My wife and I are about to purchase a 1970 Shasta Compact camper. What with the 100 degree temps we've been having here in south Georgia lately, the first thing on my mind is air conditioning. I hate the idea of taking up a window or cutting a hole in the camper for a small window unit, and have been trying to research as much as I can about portable air conditioner units. Is anybody out there using one? Any recommendations/ideas, etc?
Any input would be greatly appreciated!

We have one that we move between a couple of rooms for my wife. It works as well as a window unit. They do cost a little more than a comparable window unit. They make about the same amount of noise. I would think it would be preferred to window or rooftop units in about every way. I looked at a Scamp that had one in it and thought it was a great idea.

Several people use the external units ( you need to put holes in the wall and have external power outlet)

http://www.climaterightair.com/applicat ... eater.html is a good example.

The smallest size ( 2500 BTU) is almost big enough. The next size is 5000 BTU which should be more than enough.

There are people that built their own. Follow the "Cardboard AC plenum experiment" posting stream.

A big issue with any unit that does not have any holes in the TD is that there needs to be some opening to allow in air or at least let the hot air out. Opening doors means bugs, critters, etc can get in. Pointing vents, ducts at windows/screens is not particularly effective or efficient. And you will want the unit outside which is problematic for some as there are only built for indoors.

We've been using the ClimateRite 5K btu unit for the last year and it's been great for cooling, and heat in the morning to take the chill off. Mounted it on the tongue and put the ports on the front wall of the trailer. The remote won't work from inside our trailer so I got the wired thermostat. ClimateRite currently shows they are out of stock on the 2,500 & 5,000 btu models. They do have a new 10,000 btu model but I would think that would be too much cooling for tiny trailers.

Take a look at the AC hacking thread under the Electrical secrets section of the site. Shadow catcher has a nice write up on setting up a window shaker unit to sit outside and use a couple of pieces of flexible duct to bring the cool air in. You don't have to cut that massive hole and it keeps the noise outside as well.

viewtopic.php?f=30&t=44561

We will be using it this week, the article also includes what others have done. The BIG advantage is that it is not particularly expensive, I have a spare AC unit when this one quits.
You actually could adapt it to use the window hoses from the outside, we did that with a 2500 BTU Climate Rite which did not have enough coolth.