Question:
I've been interested in purchasing an evaporative cooler to cool-off some
places in my home which either don't get cool enough via the central air
conditioning unit or, like my garage, lack any forced ventilation
Presumably this could result in respiratory etc. problems.
Are evaporative coolers safe? Are they breeding grounds for bacteria?
My other alternative is to buy a portable wheeled air conditioner which can
be moved from room to room.
Answer:
Since the day we installed the MC II, we have not run our 3.5 ton Amana A/C except
to exercise the machine. During ~ 4.5 months of summer each year, on average we
have saved $110/month on cooling over the Amana.
Later in the summer each year, early July, our humidity goes way up, sometimes 60%
and the temp comes down (~105) with dew point of ~ 55 degrees. Common knowledge
here is that a swamp cooler will not do its job above a dew point of 50 deg.
Contrarily tho, we have found this machine will still do its job just great. There
is a kind of a permanent flap (a solid cover which angles down and out at the
bottom) of the machine which we have not needed to buy. The object of this 'flap'
is to rarefy the air coming into the input of the machine so that the air will take
on more water (and therefore be cooler). Claim is that with this flap, the machine
will do well to 70 deg dew point.
I can't address the fungus thing - we've never had any of that. There is no smell
from our machine (except the first few hours after the media was new). There is a
tank at the bottom of the front of the machine which catches and allows the reuse
of the water which tumbles over the media. This tank is dumped (via pump and hose)
once a day so that the water does not have a chance to become contaminated. The
air coming into the house is always fresh.
