I am looking to size an air conditioning unit for a small room (with no windows) containing a heat producing piece of equipment. Where would be a good place to find information on the necessary calculations?
You'll need to know, for starters, how much heat your equipment produces. A good guess is how much electrical power it draws (if it's plugged in to the wall...).
I believe your direct question was: "Where would be a good place to find information on the necessary calculations?"
The answer is: the ASHRAE Handbook, "Applications".
The American Society of Heating, Refrigerating, and Air Conditioning Engineers controls and dictates the standards in the industry and is well organized. They publish all the information you seek and they are the authority on the subject. Their books can be considered expensive, but you may be able to borrow one or find one in a technical library.
and scroll down the page to the blue highlighted text that says "find the right air conditioner". Click on this and it will walk you through the process of choosing the right air conditioner for a home environment. It is very detailed, and will give you someplace to start.
Unfortunately, I am writing from Europe so I won't have the necessary time to access the ASHRAE handbook. I have found some good links for calculating residential unit sizes, but I would like to know what the calculations are behind them so that I can remove some of the assumations that don't apply in my case. I've a good idea of the various heat loads etc, so does anyone know if there is an online source that actually details the calculations and equations used? Thank you for the help so far!!!
to start use this to get heat load just for room
length x width x hieght x 2.5
and add to that total the btuh for equipment
for each watt you should add 3.413 btuh this total will be very close to the same as using the wright j load cal. program I know this from my many years as a hvac instructor ( not a spelling teacher as you may have noticed)
The latest version of Manual J has software with it. It covers almost all aspects of commercial and residential sizing calculations. It will answer all of your questions. It is on sale this month too.
If you don't have the time to research, you should accept the canned programs.