Credit goes out to Pete H. in sunny England for this great build. This version of the homemade air conditioner removes the need to drain water outside by using an aquarium pump, and sits on a rotating base.
Here's the overall view of the unit. You can see the insulated polystyrene box containing icewater and the aquarium pump, along with the fan and attached copper tubing.
Pete did a much neater job of attaching the copper tubing to the front of the fan than I did. Using copper tubing on both the front and back of the fan is a great idea, the more copper tubing, the more heat exchange possible.
Here is a view of the unit from above, allowing us to see the copper coils on both the front and back.
Here we can see the entire system on its rotating base, allowing directional cooling (most) anywhere in the room.
This picture shows Pete's innovation, the Internal Cooler Coil (ICC) ready to be installed. The water first runs through this coil, through the ice water, and then out to the fan. Pete and I are wondering if this actually increases performance at all, but it sure looks cool.
Here we can see the aquarium pump submerged in the ice water. Pete aims to increase the power of the pump, and replace the polystyrene container with something more permanent. A small freezer with its heat vented to the outside would be ideal.
http://www.eng.uwaterloo.ca/~gmilburn/ac/geoff_ac.html
http://www.eng.uwaterloo.ca/~gmilburn/ac/pete_ac.html
http://lifehacker.com/software/diy/make-your-own-air-conditioner-181510.php
