In the first post xcnick wrote:
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The yellowing on top of the cooling pad happened with one hour of use. Jack writes that this is normal. "This pad is extremely unique, as it filters impurities from the air, ...
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I think Jack (of Swampy.net) is 'selling the sizzle' and ignoring reality. The pad's they use are unusual -- unusual in how often they have to be replaced. Swampy's website says their pads should be replaced every 100 to 200 hours. Here in the high desert I want to run my MW2 all day and most of the night. Doing the math 24 hours X 4 = 96 hours. That means you might have to replace the pad every 4 days! Indeed, I had to replace my first pad after about 100 hours of use and the pad was dry and very crusty.
The discoloration and build-up of crusty stuff on the pads is normal. One maker of cooler pads says "DURA-COOL can withstand hard water exposure ... and will stop more airborne dust and particulates from entering your home. This means cleaner, fresher air to breath." And
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"DURA-COOL traps dust from the air and also collects salt and minerals from the water due to evaporaton. In small amounts these collections cause no problem. However, under some water conditions this buildup of dirt and mineral deposits will eventually restrict the flow of air through the pad."
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Because of the usually (uniquely?) small size of the pad used by the Swampy design their pads seem much more prone to this problem. Most of the air in my WM2 seems to pass through an area only a couple of inches across so the crusting up process is concentrated.
Contrast the 4 days useful life with the pad used by the competition: The Kar Kool 312
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KAR KOOLtm - use a 6 or 8 inch thick fluted type pad as the wet cooling media, it is the most efficient evaporative cooling media in the world, and it should last for FIVE YEARS, WITH MINIMAL MAINTENANCE! (water quality is a factor)
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http://www.nvo.com/southwestsolar/productcatalog/
Southwest Solar tells you where they buy their pads and says their pads can last several years. Southwest Solar has a really funky looking website -- so much so that I wrote them and asked if they were still in business and could I buy a Kar Kool directly from them. The answer: Yes, about $350 shipping included. Big contrast between Southwest Solar and Swampy. Southwest seems much more into making great swamp coolers for a good price than they are in into marketing. Southwest tells you where they buy their pad, Swampy claims theirs are "unique".
(FYI: I have no financial interest in either company. But I do have experience writing technical marketing copy.)
As I said, after about 100 hours of use I noticed the air coming out of the WM2 wasn't so cool anymore. It seems like I had lost about %50 of the cooling effect. I got out my phillips screw driver, removed the four access screws, replaced the pad, replaced the screws and I got cool air again. I mention the access screws because this is another example of the uh... un-impressive design of Swampy's products. Could you imagine having to take out a screw driver to get to the gas cap of your vehicle? Or to replace the dust bag of your vacuum cleaner? Of course not. Once again my $50 shop vac is much better designed in this regard than the WM2. The swamp coolers installed on most homes have latches and those pads are only replaced once or twice a year! I call this sub-standard design.
Also, a mechanical engineer pointed out to me that screws going into plastic threads may not hold up to repeated use.
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Meanwhile, I built myself a swamp cooler out of a 5 gallon bucket and parts mostly from Amazon.com. The fan is a bilge fan, 4 inch in-line blower ($20). I used a small pump ($10) that puts out about a gallon a minute. 10 feet of 4 inch duct host ($20). The biggest cost was the roll of blue Dura-Cool pad I got from a local hardware store ($35). I now have excess pad to build several more of these things.
I tried aspen pads (made from shavings from Aspen trees) because they are cheap ($4.50) but I now have a combination of aspen and Dura-Cool pad which seems to work better than the aspen alone. The combined pads are now 3 to 4 inches thick. I can't say if the difference is the thickness of the pad or the material. The makers of Dura-Cool and other manufacturers claim their products are more efficient than the older apen pads.
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Also, I tried cutting a double thickness of the Dura-Cool pad to fit into the Swampy cooler. Works poorly. The MW line replies on 'wicking action' to draw water up into the pads. Part of the 'secret' of the MW2 is a small pad that wicks well. The Swampy pad appears to be a craft-paper design similar to that used by the most efficient designs on the market.