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Swamp Cooler For Older Pickups.......

 
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Fredo
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Joined: 21 Mar 2007
Posts: 251
Location: Kingdom of Nye Area 51

PostPosted: Fri Apr 11, 2014 11:22 am    Post subject: Swamp Cooler For Older Pickups....... Reply with quote

The first part is about making of the molds but the entire thread will finish with a posting of the finished unit. Since I'm filling a provisional patent I'm not worried about losing it by a show and tell online..

Summer being just around the corner inspired me to dig out an old fiberglass proto-type swamp cooler.. I have a special place where I put things I haven't the will to discard. A former wife named it the "Junk Shed."... She said "Out of sight, out of mind."... Just like her now.. Kept the name, lost the wife to a friend in a poker game.... Thank God I had good sense enough not to bet the dog... I'd have missed her...

You'll need a rear window slider in your truck for this one.. I gave this a try 20 years ago, but soon discovered that doing it in fiberglass and gel coat would be to costly and production to slow... Now it seems I can buy almost all the parts I need for about what the fan alone would cost at a parts store back then.... Including the .187 ABS..
I figure if I shrink the unit down about 25% I can make the shell, in ABS, on my 24"x24" vacuum former....
Hot wired the EPS to make new molds for the vacuum former.. A little advice, don't use white foam unless it's all you have to work with... First it's make the foam mold shapes, then a little dry wall mud to smooth them out a bit, then shellac to seal them.. Then repeat that for what seems like forever... After several coats of paste wax, !/2 doz or so, fiberglass chopped strand mat was laid up over the forms...

Reinforcement was added to the outside of the molds [before demolding] to prevent spreading when the Duracal 30 is poured... I'll switch to aluminum filled urethane for production molds if the duracal works out and I can pull the shells.. If not I'll be looking into having the forming of the shells done by a commercial former..

This swamp cooler fits my 82 Toyota SR5 mini truck like it was made for it... ....The new, smaller cooler has a pad size of 18"x18"x2". Down from the original 23"x20"x2 pad... The unit also lost 2" in overall depth, now 6" instead of 8" .. [not counting the fan, 2 .75" depth].. The pad is still 2" thick, same as the original... To maintain the pads shape, it's held upright in a plastic coated wire sandwich....
To keep all the plumbing inside the shell, the 3/8" feed from the reservoir will enter the cooler by way of the inside the 3/4" return drain tube... I think maybe also the wiring from the pump....
The fan and pump will both be controlled by a PWM speed controllers..
The foam forms took the best part of a week to finish... It takes time for the mud to dry enough to sand... Next time I'll use this to prep the foam for polyester resin and CSM mat.. http://www.industrialpolymers.com/product-list/styrospray-product-list/styrospray/?gclid=COmL_7z4_LwCFS1eOgodrgYABA Then it's a trip over the hump to LV.. for plaster. As it turned out they were out of duracal30, so bought 200# of Hydrocal white.




I be back to edit in pics. Sometimes I lose an entire post when posting pics from Photofucket
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If someone has a gun and is trying to kill you,
it would be reasonable to shoot back with your own gun...The Dalai Lama..Seattle 2001


Last edited by Fredo on Fri Apr 11, 2014 7:18 pm; edited 2 times in total
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Fredo
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Joined: 21 Mar 2007
Posts: 251
Location: Kingdom of Nye Area 51

PostPosted: Fri Apr 11, 2014 5:41 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Here's the promised pics..


The 2 white pcs. are the old prototype. The dark ones are the new molds shrunk down 25%.. There's one pic of the new plaster front half mold on the vacuum table. I put the two new fiberglass molds together with the red 12" fan in one pic. to give an idea of what the unit will look like..
The unit is mounted vertically on the slider frame... The channel, top and bottom, behind the sliding window on sliders are empty.. Four screws in the top and bottom channel will mount the unit to the truck.... Total weight of the unit is about 10 lbs so there won't a weight problem...
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If someone has a gun and is trying to kill you,
it would be reasonable to shoot back with your own gun...The Dalai Lama..Seattle 2001
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IMMark
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Joined: 18 Nov 2010
Posts: 189
Location: Columbus, Ohio

PostPosted: Sat Apr 12, 2014 2:58 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Always enjoy reading about your projects Fredo...thanks for sharing.
That StyroSpray looks like an interesting product...will have to keep that in mind!
Mark
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Fredo
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Joined: 21 Mar 2007
Posts: 251
Location: Kingdom of Nye Area 51

PostPosted: Sat Apr 12, 2014 6:08 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

This the first pull with .125 ABS. Although they would work fine in .125 I'll feel better marketing them in .187 so they won't be for sale, just used as pre-production show and tell prototypes to sell the ones made in .187 abs..
I'll pull a couple more in .125 of the front half. They pulled fast and clean... I used the 11 cubic foot tank, and was planing on also using the 6cfm pump with the tank, but stepped on the cord and shut the pump off....It was a tight pull with the tank alone, and didn't lose vacuum until I pulled the top half of the frame and pulled up on the abs.
They won't be cut out until I have pulled several of the back half of the unit to mate to the front.. I figure there'll be less chance of warping if the sheets are left whole till I'm ready for them.. Here's a shot of the outside of the first pull

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If someone has a gun and is trying to kill you,
it would be reasonable to shoot back with your own gun...The Dalai Lama..Seattle 2001
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Fredo
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Joined: 21 Mar 2007
Posts: 251
Location: Kingdom of Nye Area 51

PostPosted: Fri May 02, 2014 7:27 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Here's a unit pulled from the plaster molds.... Have made some changes to the cooler and am making new urethane molds.. Those specifications are the ones I'm using for the provisional patent application.. I figure it's different enough from prior art that I may have a 50/50 chance of actually getting a patent.. Rolling Eyes
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If someone has a gun and is trying to kill you,
it would be reasonable to shoot back with your own gun...The Dalai Lama..Seattle 2001
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jegner
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Joined: 30 May 2003
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Location: Texas, USA

PostPosted: Tue May 06, 2014 10:59 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Very cool! Literally!
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Fredo
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Joined: 21 Mar 2007
Posts: 251
Location: Kingdom of Nye Area 51

PostPosted: Mon Jun 23, 2014 8:03 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I used a 5 gal bucket as a reservoir and a 12v bilge pump to recirculate the water over the pad... This proto-type was used for testing different type pads for air flow volume and temp data... Using PWM speed controllers, air flow and and water feed are controllable from 0-100% ... On a dry day it'll deliver air at 24-28*f below ambient air.. When I say dry I mean 2-8% humidity, with an average of 6% at days end..
Max air flow on this model was 8-10 cubic ft a second.... Measured with a cheap anemometer at +/- 3.5%.. and depending on what pad was being tested... Even with the error factor, the temp. shift between conditioned air and ambient air should be close to accurate.. This morning 10:30 ambient air 92*f humidity 13%, fan on low, air off the cooler 66*f...
My 24/7 shadow couldn't go with me in the summer because of the heat, and the fact that sometimes she needs to stay in the truck for a short time... With this she sits in a cool breeze and keeps an eye on me and we both feel better...

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If someone has a gun and is trying to kill you,
it would be reasonable to shoot back with your own gun...The Dalai Lama..Seattle 2001
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