HVAC Design For Beginners - From HVAC Beginner to HVAC Hero

Discover what HVAC is, explore its applications, and understand why it plays an essential role in daily life.

Explore hvac, a subdiscipline of mechanical engineering, uses thermodynamics, heat transfer, and fluid mechanics to manipulate air properties for heating, ventilation, and air conditioning to achieve quality and comfort.

Explore the areas of hvac application, from homes and schools to hospitals, factories, and data centers, and learn how each setting demands design criteria for air quality and comfort.

Design hvac systems with two goals: quality and comfort. Meet air quality and comfort requirements by following international standards and Ashrae codes to start the design process.

Explore the starting point of HVAC design engineering by linking essential elements from mechanical engineering to the HVAC domain, guiding your professional development.

Discover how thermodynamics, heat transfer, and fluid mechanics from mechanical engineering underpin HVAC design to meet quality and comfort, and how university principles translate to HVAC applications.

Explore how the first law of thermodynamics applies to HVAC design, showing energy is not created or destroyed but transformed, with energy entering and leaving balancing in buildings.

Link thermodynamics to hvac by applying the first law of thermodynamics and the heat transfer mechanisms—conduction, convection, and radiation—to manipulate air properties in buildings.

Dive into the HVAC engineering fundamentals and follow the lecture sequence to build essential knowledge for a transformative educational and professional journey in the HVAC domain.

Understand the envelope of construction as the building's boundary that governs heat transfer, with walls, windows, roof, floor, and doors influencing heat gain and loss in HVAC design.

Explore the k value, or thermal conductivity, and its role in heat transfer, and how material properties influence heat flow in HVAC applications.

Explore how material thickness, thermal conductivity k value, and thermal resistance r value determine heat transfer, building toward the core calculations used in hvac design.

Explore how u value, overall heat transfer coefficient, combines k and r values to reveal heat transfer, showing that high u values increase heat loss while low values resist it.

Learn how u-value affects heat transfer through materials and glazing, how to obtain material u-values from catalogs or standards, and use this step zero in HVAC design.

Compute the u-value by summing R-values (thermal resistances) from outdoor air film, plaster, concrete, and indoor air film, then take the reciprocal to guide HVAC load calculations.

Master the fundamentals of psychrometrics and use a psychrometric chart to adjust air properties for HVAC design. Emphasize a pen-and-paper, manual calculation approach essential for cooling load calculations.

Explore psychrometrics, the study of moist air thermodynamics, and learn how heat transfer, humidity, and u-values map air state on charts to meet space conditioning and process requirements.

Explore dry bulb and wet bulb temperatures, relative humidity, humidity ratio, dew point, enthalpy, and specific volume as key air properties guiding psychrometrics and HVAC design.

Map air properties on the psychrometric chart to visualize cooling, heating, humidifying, and dehumidifying, and understand how HVAC systems drive state changes in temperature, humidity, and enthalpy.

Adjust air properties in a space by heating or cooling to control temperature, and humidifying or dehumidifying to manage humidity, guiding changes on the psychrometric chart with the HVAC system.

Explore essential hvac terminologies and concepts crucial to the design process, equipping you to communicate with professionals and build your design approach.

Identify the zones within the building envelope and explain how each conditioned space requires tailored temperature and humidity control via an HVAC system.

Explore how conditioned spaces and zones follow standards, such as Ashrae, to set indoor temperature and humidity based on outdoor conditions and design requirements.

Learn the refrigeration cycle, or the vapor compression cycle, the core of HVAC, featuring the four components—evaporator, condenser, compressor, expansion valve—and the counterclockwise state sequence 1–4.

Explore the various types of hvac systems across the market to gain a holistic view and inspiration for choosing the best match to your design requirements.

Explore the two main HVAC system categories—centralized and decentralized—and compare their governing criteria and key differences.

Analyze decentralized low-load cooling with back-to-back refrigerant components and compact evaporator and condenser, versus centralized systems using a water-based plant and distant condenser for higher loads.

Explore the first decentralized hvac system: the window air conditioner, a self-contained unit in a wall that cools 2–4 tons but is noisy and environmentally phased out.

Explore the decentralized split unit system, a refrigerant-based HVAC with indoor evaporator and outdoor condenser, where indoor-outdoor distance should not exceed ten feet to protect compressor, filtration, and air quality.

Explore the Vph VRF system, a decentralized HVAC setup with a single outdoor condenser feeding multiple indoor units via refrigerant for precise cooling.

Explore how an outdoor package unit integrates the compressor, evaporator, condenser, and expansion valve to cool entire zones, like warehouses, with compact, easy installation and ducted distribution.

Explore a centralized chilled water system that uses a rooftop chiller and fan coil units to absorb heat from zones and transfer it to water via a refrigeration cycle.

Explore district cooling as a centralized hvac solution, using a central plant, cooling tower, and energy transfer systems to cool multiple buildings efficiently.

Explore the fundamental engineering concepts behind HVAC systems, including the refrigeration cycle, heat transfer, and thermodynamics, and learn the design sequence with crucial steps.

Define the concept and design requirements, perform site survey and layout checks, calculate loads to select equipment, and design air distribution and duct sizing for zones.

Tackle the challenging cooling load calculations with a step-by-step worked example, advancing from HVAC beginner to pro in this design course and earning the triple certification.

Learn to determine cooling load by assessing outdoor and indoor design conditions, building envelope heat transfer (u-values and r-values), and internal heat gains (sensible and latent) to size hvac systems.

Learn how to calculate cooling load by analyzing sensible and latent heat sources, including occupants, lighting, equipment, infiltration, and radiation, using formulas and shading coefficients to determine cooling requirements.

Calculate the cooling load by linking sensible and latent heat sources to the required CFM and tons of cooling, using the envelope and walls, windows, infiltration, and the psychometric chart.

Gain complimentary triple certifications through the academy, with guidance to claim them and enroll in multiple HVAC programs, plus exclusive offers and free content for professional growth.