POWER SAVER For Air-Conditioners

POWER SAVER For Air-Conditioners

- SURESH CHANDRA DWIVEDI

This air-conditioner (AC) power saver circuit can control the operation of two separate AC units, reducing energy consumption during preset periods and cutting overall load and electricity bills.

Compact and cost-effective, it is especially useful for large rooms or halls where two ACs are installed, enabling load balancing and energy savings without compromising comfort. Fig. 1 shows the author’s prototype on a breadboard.

Fig. 1: Author's prototype

Circuit and working

Fig. 2 shows the circuit diagram of the AC power saver. It is built around IC CD4060 (IC1), a 2 × 6-way rotary switch (S1), two 12V SPDT relays (RL1 and RL2), two 1N4007 diodes, two 2N2219 NPN transistors (T1 and T2), and a few other components. The 2N2219 transistors are used to drive the 12V electromagnetic relays RL1 and RL2. These relays control the two AC units alternately based on timer intervals. The rotary switch (S1) is used to select the on and off times for each AC unit.

The heart of the circuit is the CD4060 IC, a 14-stage binary ripple counter with an inbuilt oscillator, which functions as a timer to generate automatic switching intervals. The blinking of LED1 indicates that the oscillator is functioning.