cooler

Cooler

"When I was young we used to have to sit under the shade of a tree to cool ourselves off. Yes, the good old days are gone forever... the further the better!" - Grandma Nelda Warner

Geoff's Page

The original link I found for the design of this project was at http://www.slashdot.org. The credit for the original design of this project goes to Geoff Milburn of Canada. Check out his sight for his different itterations of the project. I've made a few modifications to the original plans but the basic concept is the same. Thanks Geoff!

Materials Used:

    • 1 Floor Fan ($32.00)

    • 20 ft 1/4 inch copper tubing ( $13.00 @ Lowe's)

    • 6-10 ft 1/4 inch vinyl tubing ($1.50 @ HomeDepot {HD})

    • 2 "All-Tube " union with inserts ($2.50 @ HD A-10)

    • 1 I.D. Hose Barb to MIP adapter ($1.00 @ HD # A-85)

    • Teflon Tape (some cents)

    • ViaAqua Submersible Water Pump ($12.50 ArtFlowDesigns)

    • Cable Ties (a few bucks)

    • Coleman Cooler ($3.00)

    • Rubber Stopper ($0.88 @ Lowe's)

    • 3 RubberMaid Blue Ice freezie thingies ($0.92 each)

Construction:

Lay out the copper tubing, zip-tie it down, attach the tubes and pump and your good to go.

At first I attached the tubing to the back of the fan but wasn't satisfied with it's performance. So I ripped it off and put it on the front. Here is a picture of it while still on the back. You can notice that the tubing has some bumps in it as it circles the fan. These bumps were due to a small ridge the tubing crossed over as I wound it.

This was pretty ugly and not enough air passed directly past the copper to do it much good. So I ripped it off and put it on the front like Geoff did.

After putting the tubing on the front it looked nicer and the air flow across the copper was also much better. This configuration will blow the condensation on the tubes on you occasionally if your're directly in front of the fan making it all the cooler.

The water pump I bought was a ViaAqua Submersible Water Pump. I got it online @ EBAY from a seller by the name of ArtFlowDesigns. My total cost was $12.50 with shipping included. This price is a bit cheaper then other places that I've seen the same model. This little guy pumps a max of 130 gallons per hour, arround 10-12 inches, and is whisper quiet (not that it matters much as the white noise from the fan would drown it out anyway). If duplicating this project I would probably go for a slightly more powerful pump. While this one does the job, sending the water over its max height and through 30 ft of tubing leaves it a little wanting. Next time we'll go for a pump a step or two higher in the power department, but for now this works fine.

The I.D. Hose Barb to MIP adapter (brass thing in the picture) was originally screwed into the pumps flow exit nozzel to give it some threads to follow, then I wrapped the connecter a few times with teflon tape and screwed it back in. No more leaks, works like a charm.

Next came the Coleman water jug. I bought this for 5 bucks and promptly drilled a hole in the top of it. As the wife and I love camping it would be a shame to ruin (fix in this case) a perfectly good water jug. So I bought a 1 & 1/4 inch rubber sink stopper at Lowe's for 88 cents to plug the hole when I want to use it for its original purpose.

Here is a picture of the plug and the (shoddily) cut hole in the top of the cooler. The Hole is this big so that the plug for the submersible pump can fit through.

Finally here is a picture of the tubes and plug comming from the inside of the cooler, as well as pictures of the finished front and the whole setup with the cooler behind the fan. The finished product all fits on a TV tray stand and sits in the corner of our room.

Notice that the copper tubing looks a lot better on the front and doesn't have the bumps in it that were visible on the back (Click on it for a bigger picture). The cooler works great, is portible and unimposing. The fan is a Lasko wind tunnel that has timed and remote controled operation with several different blower modes. The copper pipe stays cool for a few hours before the water gradually rises in temperature. To make sure that the pump doesn't run all night when the fan automatically goes off I plan on using a timer between the plug & wall.

If I make any additional upgrades or adjustments (expand the heat exchanging area/integrating the fan and pump power supplies/ make both run off the remote and fan timer/ get a bigger pump etc) I will post it below. Right now I can say the most likely change is to get a better pump, I noticed durring testing, and Geoff confirmed, that the higher the flow rate the better the system works.