DIY swimming pool cooler.

Build a mechanically drafted, counter-flow cooling tower for your swimming pool. These would be especially useful to people living in gulf coast states and the SW deserts.

For more detailed instructions: DIY Pool Cooler

Step 1: Obtain or build some kind of "tower".

First you will need a "tower". Pictured are a couple of options we have used. The first was made from a couple of HDPE barrels. The second is made from PVC pipe, fittings, and corrugated roofing material. Your tower will need to have some sort of catch basin at the bottom, and area for fill material in the center, an area for a water sprayer systems, and finally you'll need a fan that fits the top.

Learn more at: www.davidwilbur.com

Comments

[HotinDallas]

Great idea Dave! I did find a small product that looks great and worked amazing! Check out www.swimminginbathwater.com. I purchased these and ran them through the summer. In Dallas we had consistent 105+ degree days and the pool remained at 86 degrees!

[kstanley4]

I also live in Dallas my pool temp 93 it feels like bathwater.Great ideal !!! I was thinking of a tower letting the water run down pine slats with the tower open allowing the wind to be your evaporating fan..??do you think that would work??

[cmorris12]

looks like you turn the fan down ..... blowing over the water tricling across the fillers(coils)... in that your making a radiator ( some what ) right.

[Bartboy]

So it cools the pool? lol

[Dave7F]

It cools the pool and in turn, cools me! I am just about to hook it up and run it for the a third season, with some minor modifications to improve efficiency (fan is now integrated into the barrel to remove nearly all parts that could rust, larger pipes for better water flow, etc.),. If I get around to it, I will post some pictures of the current version.

[Bartboy]

I've never been somewhere where the pool was too warm...

[james1913]

Guess you haven't been to Dallas after months of 90 degrees.

[Bartboy]

Nope. Although, it was 110 in alberta where I'm visiting currently.

[cowscankill]

LOL. When I walk into my pool, my body temperature goes up.

[enomis1971]

You should live in South Louisiana.....

[Bartboy]

Mmmmmm...... hot sauce Canada is nice...:P

[Redgerr]

im with Bartboy, i have never heard of one of these however it seems like it would work, very cool

[Bartboy]

Well, I might use it in my house in Ontario, but I don't have a pool there. In Canada, we pay a fortune for pool heaters...

[Redgerr]

pool heaters is where its at, expencive.. but warm none the less

[mikewrobel]

I assume the fan blows up (based on some other internet research)?

[harry88]

you could do the reverse with a metal jug and your old baseboard heaters

[miiwii3]

if only this worked in reverse...

[Tray]

Im going to give this a shot, in a smaller size for my worm hotel.   Composting worms slow down when they get too warm.  There is another Ible that details building an ice chest based worm hotel that is plumbed with cooling tubes fed from an iced water bucket.  This system would eliminate the need to periodically fill a feed bucket with ice.  Run all the pumps off of a battery that is solar charged, and viola.  COOL IBLE!!

[TrPPnN]

Hahaha... heater?  daniel... here in the desert, we can't turn off the sun when we want... can you? if you can... you've got to show me how... perhaps write an instructable!

[teslafan100]

nice!

[Danny_Payne]

 cant you just turn the heater down? that way, you will save energy!

[Dave7F]

It occurred to me that this, or a smaller version, might be useful to the water cooled CPU crowd. If you live in a dry climate, it would act as a humidifier for your computer room/office keeping static electricity down at the same time....naah, nobody out there is crazy enough to build that.

[kill-a-watt]

Yup. Try searching for: bong|Evaporative cooler mod|overclock|cpu

[thermoelectric]

You would be suprised, Many people would be interested in that but the CPU wiuld most likely make too much heat for the cooler to disperse.

[beehard44]

PLAN B: Grab an ice maker and plug in the inlet to ur pool and put the ice outlet to your pool. Added feature: Millions of floating toys in your pool!!!!!!! PLAN C: Pour liquid Nitrogen to the water!!!

[mr.incredible]

This is the same way commercial air conditioning works. Large buildings use cooling towers which is the same thing you have here. The water temp from the evaporation process gets down to 60 deg even in the hottest Florida heat.

[Sandisk1duo]

well if it's 110 outside, and your pool temperature is 90, using your device would be warming the water

[Dave7F]

Actually, no. Please see my comment to crazyrog17.

[crazyrog17]

Could you clarify this a little bit? In the first few steps, explain the ambient wet bulb temperature for everyone and how it works to cool your pool. Did you pump the water into the barrel/sprayers? How? Is the fan blowing down into the barrel and being exhausted at the bottom or pulling up out of the barrel blowing out the top?

[Dave7F]

The easiest way to explain how it cools the pool (even if the water is 90 and the air is 110), is with an phenomenon many of us have probably experienced. If you are wet (even with 90 degree water), and you stand in the wind (even 110 degree wind), you will feel cold. This is because of the heat that is removed by the phase change as the water turns from liquid to vapor. In the case of the pool cooler, the wind is produced by the fan and the cooled water is returned to the pool. The water is pumped by the pool's normal pump. On many pools there is an aerator device (a simple sprayer nozzle). I removed this and installed a threaded reducer to allow attaching a short garden hose that feeds the sprayer assembly. The fan is blowing up and pulling air in at the bottom. The water is flowing down. The design is based on industrial "counter-flow" cooling towers.

[hleon]

since it is evaporative, wouldn't the pool LOSE water, since it is being transferred to the air?

[Dave7F]

Yes it does, but only just enough to cool the water to the ambient wet bulb temperature. It is a small price to pay compared to not being able to cool myself in the pool.

[altgrave]

i've never seen this idea, either, but i do recall lukewarm pools in new jersey. ugh! nicely done!

[Patented]

Lol! In Canada we try to make our pool warmer!

[bmlbytes]

I was thinking the same thing. Here in Minnesota, we make our pools warmer. Some people put hot tubs outside, so you can swim with the snow all around.

[Dave7F]

Living in a desert, I envy that!

[T3hpw9ag3]

You live in a desert? you must take great care of your lawn, it looks more green than my lawn in Illinois! anyway, nice instructable

[Dave7F]

That nice lawn is actually my brothers -- he lives in area that has flood irrigation. MY lawn is much smaller and only looks that nice after a couple of monsoon storms.... Anyway, Thanks!

[jojo200517]

That is pretty nice, I hope you washed the barrel out damn good, since I spy a corrosive placard. The pool place tossed in a cheapo fountain when we got ours, and occasionally I put it in when its horribly hot in the summer. It does seem to drop the temperature a few degrees.

[looking4ideas]

My mom lives in Doha they have cooling and heating lol

[curecreator]

Nice job with the pool cooler i live in a hot area but my pool is surrounded by evergreens

[LinuxH4x0r]

Awesome!

[Chefboy6382]

very ingenious idea! I assume you are using a pool "jet" to carry the water into the sprayer to cool?

[Dave7F]

Thank you very much. If I am understanding correctly, a pool "jet" is another name for the "aerator". Yes, the gray hose connects the sprayer to where the pool "jet" was. I replaced it with a threaded reducer that fits a standard hose.

[Chefboy6382]

Thats pretty awesome cool. Thanks again and keep up the great work

[SeamusDubh]

Wouldn't this increase the evaporation rate of your pool requiring you to fill it more often?

[Dave7F]

I have not attempted to measure this. I assume it does somewhat, but the design of the cooler is such that it will evaporate only enough water to reach the ambient wet bulb temperature. At that point the evaporation stops.

[Mr. Rig It]

Cool idea. Pun intended. Isn't this the same thing/concept as a swamp cooler?

[Dave7F]

It is very similar, but this is designed to cool the water rather than the air. The air coming out the top is very warm and humid.

[killerjackalope]

yeah evaporative cooling, though I think in this case the idea is to minimize evaporation to just enough to cool the water...

[Dave7F]

Exactly!

[killerjackalope]

As a reverse system you for winter you could preheat water going to the heater using a set of black pipes as a solar water heater...

[killerjackalope]

Nice one, really simple and useful project, it's also better than using active cooling, which probably doesn't achieve much better results...

[=SMART=]

Nice , ive never seen a pool COOLER before :D