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A friend from Albuquerque, New Mexico was just telling us about swamp coolers which are commonly used instead of AC to cool homes, and works on the same princip
by jberryman 15y ago
A friend from Albuquerque, New Mexico was just telling us about swamp coolers which are commonly used instead of AC to cool homes, and works on the same principle.
I'd never heard of it before.
- pnathan 15y agoYeah. They fail miserably when it gets humid. If I ever end up there, AC for me!
- timr 15y agoI used one of those in college. I lived in an un-air-conditioned apartment in Denver, and during the summer it could easily get over 90 degrees inside. The swamp cooler would bring the temperature down to about 75 (so long as I closed the blinds). Also, one of my friends had a whole-house swamp cooler, mounted like an air-conditioner on the roof of his home. They work beautifully in dry climates.
- code_duck 15y agoYes, I lived there and we had swamp coolers, aka evaporative coolers. They're adequate, but not as deluxe feeling as refrigerated air. It's basically a 3 foot wide wheel that spins in a metal box, blowing air. Water is misted through the air that comes through the box, cooling it and making it more humid. This works quite well in a dry place like Abq, but you can imagine what it would be like somewhere like Houston that is already very humid.
- zerohp 15y agoI lived in Flagstaff, another high altitude dry city. Personally I hated swamp coolers because of the increased humidity and would rather have the dry heat instead.
- hoprocker 15y agoAFAIK, evaporative coolers are more energy efficient than AC, as they just power a small pump instead of a compressor.
- code_duck 15y agoYes, they're far less expensive to operate than refrigerated air, since it's pretty much just a fan with a bunch of water.
- icey 15y agoThey used to be very common out here in Arizona - so much so that the daily forecast would often include the temperature your house would be with the evap running.