It has been very hot in the garage over the last several weeks, temperatures in the garage were about 95 degrees F (35 degrees C) – I finally did a functional test of my portable air conditioner. This is not a new idea, I saw this several years ago on some maker/hacker site, and there is a commercial version of something very similar to this sold at recreational vehicle and camping stores.
Basically, it is an ice chest filled with ice water, some 12VDC fans, an automotive heater core, a marine bilge pump and some hose. Ice water circulates through the heater core while one fan blows air into the cooler and another fan blows air out of the cooler.
I need to cut a notch in the cooler to make way for a bracket, but it is otherwise complete.
This thing made me think about making a water-cooled vest, using a smaller pump and my back-mounted water carrier – it would be perfect for events like Burning Man and ROCstock!
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- The KH6WZ Air Cooler under its first test. Ambient temperature was 95 degrees. The cover does not fully close because of some mounting bracket interference. This will be corrected and more tests will be run.
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- Fan only running, with ice. A drop of almost 10 degrees.
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- With fan and pump running, an additional 3 to 4 degree reduction. I think the effectiveness will improve if the container is fully sealed and more ice is added.
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