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| Surprised to see a quail atop the telephone pole near our house |
After a morning hike Becca and I had to get back the ranch to turn on the evaporative cooler. I wish it was simply a case of switching the cooler on, but it needs to be serviced first. I had to dismantle the housing in order to inspect the cooler pads, which I replace every two years. Unfortunately, this is the year for new ones; a look at the old proved it to be necessary. This necessitated a trip across town to Passage Supply Company to purchase 8" pads for a 6300 cubic inch MasterCool II cooler: $86.
Back on the roof I had to remove the old pads, toss them next to our dumpster at the rear of the house, remove the pad support shelf and thoroughly clean the reservoir bottom. I had already cleaned the water distribution bracket and the PVC tube inside, had oiled the blower drum, attached the fan belt, replaced the Teflon tape on the reservoir plug and screwed it in place. Then I put the new pads in, fitted the water distribution device atop them and screwed it down, finally putting the cooler lid back on top the unit.
Afterwards I hooked up the water line that carries water from the house up to the roof and into the cooler reservoir, which has a float much like the tank on a toilet. After making a trip back down into the house to switch on the cooler power via the thermostat, I went back up and plugged the water pump and blower motor in to the outlets inside the cooler. It was only after I had climbed back down, put the ladder away and went into the house that I discovered no cool air being blown into the house and realized the mistake I had made. For the first time ever I had switched the cooler on without first removing the "cookie sheet" damper that allows cool air to be blown into the duct system, the same aluminum damper that is slipped into place under the cooler during winter in order to prevent heated furnace air from escaping through the cooler. After I scrambled back onto the roof to remove the "cookie sheet" damper the evaporative cooler worked properly. Now we have cool air just in time for the summer heat wave.
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| Early hike on the foothills trail |
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| Shade break on the outbound leg |
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| Organ Mountains |
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| Tortugas from the west |
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| Flower girl |
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| Our MasterCool II Evaporative Cooler |
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| Blower drum |
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| 8" cooler pads that need replacing |
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| You can see the calcium and alkaline deposits on the pads |
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| The motor turns the blower drum via a fan belt |
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| View east from our roof |
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| Looking down into our backyard |
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| Another look east |
1 comment:
An evaporative cooler isn't a complicated machine, but it can still be hard work. Packrat to the rescue!
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