hey guys today we’re gonna be taking a
look at DIY air conditioning we’re gonna
be putting to the test of design made
popular by the household hacker and then
we’re gonna see if we can tweet that
design just a little bit to make it a
little more effective one of the things
I like best about the household hackers
air conditioner is how quickly it goes
together you can make the whole thing in
just a few minutes as the household
packers design showed we’ve got a
styrofoam cooler and a fan that we had
lying around the house or one that we
had to pick up at Walmart because we
don’t have many fans his original design
showed using two dryer vents angling the
air out of the cooler to wherever we
wanted it to point however I couldn’t
find those for the low price he said he
found his so instead I’ve got two two
inch PVC elbows these should work pretty
much the same way allowing our air to be
angled up and out and winnings choose
where to point it here’s the basic idea
we’ll build the air conditioner with the
fan and two elbows following the design
given to us by householdhacker will then
see if we can improve on the design
using cubed ice and a few methods to try
and improve the circulation within the
container to get started let’s get our
fan prepped and ready to go on our
cooler we want to remove this front
grille and this base clip as well so we
just have the fan by itself and we’ll
have the blades exposed which will let
us put the fan closer down onto the
cooler without losing any air off to the
sides with our fan prepped it’s time to
cut a hole in our lid that will let the
air flow into our cooler the lids on
this particular Styrofoam container are
not quite as flat as the one he was
using but it should work pretty well
anyway we want to cut a hole that’s just
barely bigger than our fan blades you
can see that on this cooler that’s going
to involve cutting down into the slope
portion of the lid I’m pretty sure it’s
still going to work got that circle
trace let’s cut it out with a razor
we’ve measured this correctly we should
be able to place our fan onto our lid
turn it on and not have the blades hit
any of the size of the container hey I
think we did it I think we’ve also
invented a super cheap hovercraft which
only works if you’re actively blowing a
fan into it by holding the fan above it
we now need to cut two holes for our PVC
elbows and those are going to go on the
sides of the center hole
[Music]
because of the slope I think it is gonna
be just a little bit tricky to get our
hole cut to the perfect shape but I’m
not too worried it’s just gonna take a
little bit of trial and error a pretty
good fit right there tube is coming up
out of the inside of the box pointing at
a 90-degree angle and if we want to
change the direction that it points in
it spins quite easily let’s do the same
thing on the other side we’ve got all
the holes we need for both the fan and
the elbows we should now be able to put
this lid onto our container place the
fan on top with some cooling elements
inside and get some nice cold air
conditioned air flowing out in the
household hackers video he used frozen
water bottles as the source of the cold
air so it slowed up seven of them into
our cooler put the lid and the fan on
and see what kind of cool there we can
get blowing out of the elbows we’ve got
air flow I attached these little strips
of plastic on there not because they are
important to the function but just
because they show when the fan is on or
off although there’s enough static
electricity on this styrofoam that they
still like to just hang out sometimes
you can see how much it’s being drawn to
my glove here now by putting my hand or
my face in front of this I can say that
it does feel like the air coming out is
colder than what’s around or even if I
just had a normal fan blowing on me but
just to make sure I’ve got some actual
measurements I have here a little
thermometer and this is actually a food
thermometer but it should work pretty
well right now it says that it’s about
72 point one degrees in this room let’s
see what happens if I place the
temperature probe in front of the air
coming out of our cooled box
[Music]
on this thermometer it seems to have
stabilized at about 65 degrees
that’s certainly cooler that’s about
seven or eight degrees cooler than the
ambient temperature so if it were 75 and
you thought that was a little too warm
you could bring it down to maybe almost
65 degrees that wouldn’t be too bad
10 degrees colder is nothing to be upset
about but I think by adjusting the
design we can get some better results
with the current design on this
air-conditioner all of the air moves
from the fan over to the vents and then
leaves and hopefully circulates down
among the ice before it does that but I
think we might be able to get some
better results if we force the issue if
the air had to travel down past all of
our ice before it got to the vents we
might get some colder air out of it here
I’ve got a piece of 2-inch ABS tubing
which is designed to fit right into
these elbows I want to cut this ABS pipe
to just the right length so that it
almost reaches the bottom of our
container forcing the air to go down
past all the icy bottles before it goes
[Music]
you can see that now the error will have
to flow down past the ice bottles into
the entry at the bottom up out the top
vent where it should be a little colder
than before ambient temperature
measuring at just about 70 to 72 and a
half degrees Fahrenheit for any
interested that is 22 and a half degrees
Celsius let’s try and measure the air in
front of the vent that doesn’t have the
extension and then the vent that does
have the extension we’ll see if there’s
a difference in the temperature
alright seems to be leveling off it’s
not a huge difference but we are looking
at three three and a half degrees
Fahrenheit cooler on the one that vents
down below the ice so we definitely have
a proof of concept it is colder when it
has to travel down past the ice before
it can vent out to us well that worked
on one side I’m gonna put another pipe
on the other side to see if we can just
get that same effect out of both vents
we’re getting pretty good results with
our vents being fed by pipes that reach
all the way down past the cooling
Heights but I think we can probably do a
little bit better frozen water bottles
certainly have some advantages they’re
cheap they’re easy and they’re reusable
once they melt you can pop them back in
the freezer and refreeze them again then
they’re ready to go a second time
however because of their shape and the
plastic around them they don’t conduct
the heat quite as well as some plain ice
cubes so I want to try this test using
some ice cubes rather than the frozen
bottles
our thermometer is now reading under 50
degrees Fahrenheit when the air has to
travel through the ice to get to the
vents I would say that’s quite an
improvement we’re getting some pretty
good results less than 50 degrees
Fahrenheit is going to keep you cool on
pretty much even hottest of days there
does need to be a fair bit of the ice
down in there for the air to really
circulate through it so I have one more
modification I want to try that
hopefully will let us circulate the air
through the ice without having to have
quite so much of it in there I got this
sink mat at a dollar store for you
guessed it one dollar and I want to try
using it to suspend the ice up off the
ground with the pipes passing down past
it so all of the air has to travel
through the ice
down below the mat and then enter the
vents from below we’re going to go for
about halfway down and it looks like
right there we have a width of about 8
inches so that’s what we’ll trim our mat
to
[Music]
that’s a pretty good fit right there
although with the weight of all the ice
I’m pretty sure that would still fall
down so one more thing that I do want to
do is use a couple of thin dowels stab
through the sides of our carton to
[Music]
lovely look at that little tray already
to suspend ice and just let air flow
right down through it of course we’re
gonna need our pipes to reach down
through there as well so let’s throw our
lid on drop these down and then Mark off
where we need to cut some holes
[Music]
all right ambient temperature of about
72 degrees let’s see what this drops
down to 46 BAM 46 degrees Fahrenheit
that is pretty chilly you’re almost down
to the temperature of her refrigerator
right there that’s not bad at all
there’s one more thing I do want to try
though and that’s to see what happens if
we also put ice on the very bottom of
the cooler so we’ve got ice and then the
vent opening and then more ice suspended
above it so the air has to travel down
through ice and then there’s still even
more ice below I think this could give
us our best result yet let’s give it a
shot it’s just gonna fall on its own
we are leveling off right about in the
42 degree range that’s a fahrenheit of
course switch this over to Celsius and
we can see that we’re measuring at less
than 6 degrees Celsius five and a half
approximately that is nice and chilly
now as for whether or not one of these
will cool down a whole room it’s hard to
say I don’t have a perfectly enclosed
room that I can do side-by-side tests
with but this is the kind of thing you
probably want to set on the couch next
to you while you’re just sitting
watching something that has some very
nice cold air blowing on there right now
the original version of this DIY air
conditioner was designed by
householdhacker and he called it an $8
air conditioning system now of course
that assumes that you have a little fan
that’s just the right size and some
water bottles water bottles are very
cheap but you do still have to get them
this version does cost a little bit more
I had to actually go out and buy a fan
because I didn’t have one lying around
these elbows were a little over $2 each
I think about two dollars and 20 cents
the fan was ten dollars the elbows
together were about five the cooler was
less than three dollars I think it was
two dollars and eighty cents at Target I
then out of the plastic grate which cost
$1 and the two pieces of the dowel I
think that dowel was about 60 cents so
altogether after buying everything
including the fan and the ice this air
conditioner costs about $20 that’s a
pretty good price if you live somewhere
hot and you don’t happen to have air
conditioning or maybe there’s just that
one room in your house where the a/c
doesn’t quite do it this might be a good
solution for you it’s pumping out very
cold air and it should last quite a
while guys that’s not all we’ve got more
for you to see that little box up at the
top will transport you directly to our
last video and you should go check that
out the box at the bottom will show you
what you tube things you need to be
watching now this bomb here in the
middle will subscribe you to the channel
so you never miss a video don’t forget
to ring that Bell and we’ll see in the
next one talk to you then [Music]
look at DIY air conditioning we’re gonna
be putting to the test of design made
popular by the household hacker and then
we’re gonna see if we can tweet that
design just a little bit to make it a
little more effective one of the things
I like best about the household hackers
air conditioner is how quickly it goes
together you can make the whole thing in
just a few minutes as the household
packers design showed we’ve got a
styrofoam cooler and a fan that we had
lying around the house or one that we
had to pick up at Walmart because we
don’t have many fans his original design
showed using two dryer vents angling the
air out of the cooler to wherever we
wanted it to point however I couldn’t
find those for the low price he said he
found his so instead I’ve got two two
inch PVC elbows these should work pretty
much the same way allowing our air to be
angled up and out and winnings choose
where to point it here’s the basic idea
we’ll build the air conditioner with the
fan and two elbows following the design
given to us by householdhacker will then
see if we can improve on the design
using cubed ice and a few methods to try
and improve the circulation within the
container to get started let’s get our
fan prepped and ready to go on our
cooler we want to remove this front
grille and this base clip as well so we
just have the fan by itself and we’ll
have the blades exposed which will let
us put the fan closer down onto the
cooler without losing any air off to the
sides with our fan prepped it’s time to
cut a hole in our lid that will let the
air flow into our cooler the lids on
this particular Styrofoam container are
not quite as flat as the one he was
using but it should work pretty well
anyway we want to cut a hole that’s just
barely bigger than our fan blades you
can see that on this cooler that’s going
to involve cutting down into the slope
portion of the lid I’m pretty sure it’s
still going to work got that circle
trace let’s cut it out with a razor
we’ve measured this correctly we should
be able to place our fan onto our lid
turn it on and not have the blades hit
any of the size of the container hey I
think we did it I think we’ve also
invented a super cheap hovercraft which
only works if you’re actively blowing a
fan into it by holding the fan above it
we now need to cut two holes for our PVC
elbows and those are going to go on the
sides of the center hole
[Music]
because of the slope I think it is gonna
be just a little bit tricky to get our
hole cut to the perfect shape but I’m
not too worried it’s just gonna take a
little bit of trial and error a pretty
good fit right there tube is coming up
out of the inside of the box pointing at
a 90-degree angle and if we want to
change the direction that it points in
it spins quite easily let’s do the same
thing on the other side we’ve got all
the holes we need for both the fan and
the elbows we should now be able to put
this lid onto our container place the
fan on top with some cooling elements
inside and get some nice cold air
conditioned air flowing out in the
household hackers video he used frozen
water bottles as the source of the cold
air so it slowed up seven of them into
our cooler put the lid and the fan on
and see what kind of cool there we can
get blowing out of the elbows we’ve got
air flow I attached these little strips
of plastic on there not because they are
important to the function but just
because they show when the fan is on or
off although there’s enough static
electricity on this styrofoam that they
still like to just hang out sometimes
you can see how much it’s being drawn to
my glove here now by putting my hand or
my face in front of this I can say that
it does feel like the air coming out is
colder than what’s around or even if I
just had a normal fan blowing on me but
just to make sure I’ve got some actual
measurements I have here a little
thermometer and this is actually a food
thermometer but it should work pretty
well right now it says that it’s about
72 point one degrees in this room let’s
see what happens if I place the
temperature probe in front of the air
coming out of our cooled box
[Music]
on this thermometer it seems to have
stabilized at about 65 degrees
that’s certainly cooler that’s about
seven or eight degrees cooler than the
ambient temperature so if it were 75 and
you thought that was a little too warm
you could bring it down to maybe almost
65 degrees that wouldn’t be too bad
10 degrees colder is nothing to be upset
about but I think by adjusting the
design we can get some better results
with the current design on this
air-conditioner all of the air moves
from the fan over to the vents and then
leaves and hopefully circulates down
among the ice before it does that but I
think we might be able to get some
better results if we force the issue if
the air had to travel down past all of
our ice before it got to the vents we
might get some colder air out of it here
I’ve got a piece of 2-inch ABS tubing
which is designed to fit right into
these elbows I want to cut this ABS pipe
to just the right length so that it
almost reaches the bottom of our
container forcing the air to go down
past all the icy bottles before it goes
[Music]
you can see that now the error will have
to flow down past the ice bottles into
the entry at the bottom up out the top
vent where it should be a little colder
than before ambient temperature
measuring at just about 70 to 72 and a
half degrees Fahrenheit for any
interested that is 22 and a half degrees
Celsius let’s try and measure the air in
front of the vent that doesn’t have the
extension and then the vent that does
have the extension we’ll see if there’s
a difference in the temperature
alright seems to be leveling off it’s
not a huge difference but we are looking
at three three and a half degrees
Fahrenheit cooler on the one that vents
down below the ice so we definitely have
a proof of concept it is colder when it
has to travel down past the ice before
it can vent out to us well that worked
on one side I’m gonna put another pipe
on the other side to see if we can just
get that same effect out of both vents
we’re getting pretty good results with
our vents being fed by pipes that reach
all the way down past the cooling
Heights but I think we can probably do a
little bit better frozen water bottles
certainly have some advantages they’re
cheap they’re easy and they’re reusable
once they melt you can pop them back in
the freezer and refreeze them again then
they’re ready to go a second time
however because of their shape and the
plastic around them they don’t conduct
the heat quite as well as some plain ice
cubes so I want to try this test using
some ice cubes rather than the frozen
bottles
our thermometer is now reading under 50
degrees Fahrenheit when the air has to
travel through the ice to get to the
vents I would say that’s quite an
improvement we’re getting some pretty
good results less than 50 degrees
Fahrenheit is going to keep you cool on
pretty much even hottest of days there
does need to be a fair bit of the ice
down in there for the air to really
circulate through it so I have one more
modification I want to try that
hopefully will let us circulate the air
through the ice without having to have
quite so much of it in there I got this
sink mat at a dollar store for you
guessed it one dollar and I want to try
using it to suspend the ice up off the
ground with the pipes passing down past
it so all of the air has to travel
through the ice
down below the mat and then enter the
vents from below we’re going to go for
about halfway down and it looks like
right there we have a width of about 8
inches so that’s what we’ll trim our mat
to
[Music]
that’s a pretty good fit right there
although with the weight of all the ice
I’m pretty sure that would still fall
down so one more thing that I do want to
do is use a couple of thin dowels stab
through the sides of our carton to
[Music]
lovely look at that little tray already
to suspend ice and just let air flow
right down through it of course we’re
gonna need our pipes to reach down
through there as well so let’s throw our
lid on drop these down and then Mark off
where we need to cut some holes
[Music]
all right ambient temperature of about
72 degrees let’s see what this drops
down to 46 BAM 46 degrees Fahrenheit
that is pretty chilly you’re almost down
to the temperature of her refrigerator
right there that’s not bad at all
there’s one more thing I do want to try
though and that’s to see what happens if
we also put ice on the very bottom of
the cooler so we’ve got ice and then the
vent opening and then more ice suspended
above it so the air has to travel down
through ice and then there’s still even
more ice below I think this could give
us our best result yet let’s give it a
shot it’s just gonna fall on its own
we are leveling off right about in the
42 degree range that’s a fahrenheit of
course switch this over to Celsius and
we can see that we’re measuring at less
than 6 degrees Celsius five and a half
approximately that is nice and chilly
now as for whether or not one of these
will cool down a whole room it’s hard to
say I don’t have a perfectly enclosed
room that I can do side-by-side tests
with but this is the kind of thing you
probably want to set on the couch next
to you while you’re just sitting
watching something that has some very
nice cold air blowing on there right now
the original version of this DIY air
conditioner was designed by
householdhacker and he called it an $8
air conditioning system now of course
that assumes that you have a little fan
that’s just the right size and some
water bottles water bottles are very
cheap but you do still have to get them
this version does cost a little bit more
I had to actually go out and buy a fan
because I didn’t have one lying around
these elbows were a little over $2 each
I think about two dollars and 20 cents
the fan was ten dollars the elbows
together were about five the cooler was
less than three dollars I think it was
two dollars and eighty cents at Target I
then out of the plastic grate which cost
$1 and the two pieces of the dowel I
think that dowel was about 60 cents so
altogether after buying everything
including the fan and the ice this air
conditioner costs about $20 that’s a
pretty good price if you live somewhere
hot and you don’t happen to have air
conditioning or maybe there’s just that
one room in your house where the a/c
doesn’t quite do it this might be a good
solution for you it’s pumping out very
cold air and it should last quite a
while guys that’s not all we’ve got more
for you to see that little box up at the
top will transport you directly to our
last video and you should go check that
out the box at the bottom will show you
what you tube things you need to be
watching now this bomb here in the
middle will subscribe you to the channel
so you never miss a video don’t forget
to ring that Bell and we’ll see in the
next one talk to you then [Music]
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