EVAPORATIVE COOLER MAINTENANCE

Most Coolers are both not cleaned regularly and pads changed too infrequently

Evaporative cooler pads are filters that are outside directly in the elements. Dirt, mold, smoke, pollution and allergens are being pulled into wet filters as the cooler operates. These build up in the filters and water pan. Pump screens and baskets do build up and circulate fine particles back through filters. Clean the tank and change filters in both March and June yearly.  If you have celldeck (Corrugated, cardboard media), drain the tank and blow out dried media, clean the tank and water distribution tube twice per year.

 

Coolers Do Not Re-circulate Cooled Indoor Air Like Air Conditioners Do

Air conditioners recalculate air. Coolers do not. Air comes from outside and needs to be exhausted from areas being cooled. Opening windows, doors and having Upducts (Exhausts air into the attic) installed will help exhaust air. Otherwise air pressures will, if air has no other place other to exhaust, go back into your cooler and poor cooling and excessive moisture will result.

 

The Blower Section and its Woes

New coolers need bearings oiled right out of the box. From that point, bearings need two drops of oil every 90 days of running time. The hot weather season here where people are still running their coolers in San Joaquin Valley California is March through October. Bearings should be oiled on regularly used coolers 3 times during that period.

Cooler bearings are bushings. This means they aren’t sealed bearings (There are commercial coolers that use sealed bearings. There will be another section about that coming). Bushings move and absorb shock to reduce vibrations. The shaft turns inside the copper collar. When the bushing is oiled through the oiler, the oil is pulled through little pores in the copper collar, lubricating the shaft as it turns. When the rubber starts to turn, the bearing needs to be replaced. If it’s let go too long, the bearings will fuse to the shaft and will have to be cut off. If the shaft breaks, you may find yourself in quandary because you may not be able to get the shaft out of the blower wheel because it has fused to the shaft as well due to the heat generated by bad bearings. You may find this has happened to the blower pulley as well. Oil the bearings and keep eye on them to ensure you don’t end up with a disaster on an over 100 degree day.

 

Leaking Pans and the Yeti Pan Liner

Over time metal cooler pans rust and plastic coolers become brittle.  Newer coolers’ metal is not has thick or tough as it used to be.  New coolers can be coated with certain types of pan sprays but not tar. You can also keep your pan up by touching it up regularly with cooler paint. Spray tar coating is best done when the paint becomes chalky and before there is too much rust.  Using tar seals on new paint will cause the tar to peel, allow water under the tar and rust out your metal pan, which was what you were attempting to prevent. Once a pan begins to leak, if it’s seeping, you can drain, dry and attempt to seal the pan with brush-on tar coating. This is a messy and lengthy process that may buy you some time or it may fail. If you have a hole, a dab of silicone can temporarily solve a leak until you can replace the cooler.  If you’re dealing with many holes, it’s time to replace the cooler immediately. If the leak is coming into your home around the “throat” where your cooler sets upon the roof jack, this can signal the need for cooler replacement. You can run brush-on tar sealer around the throat, but most of the time this fails leading to slow, undetected leaks that let you know they’re there by suddenly caving in your ceiling. Don’t wait to take care of them.  I am often asked if there is a plastic insert for the cooler pan. I call this the Yeti, because I’ve “yet to see one.” And if I did, I wonder how it could possibly work on a down mounted cooler.

Plastic, polypropylene, coolers get brittle over time and can begin to leak.  They generally begin to have problems around the panel areas because the edges have become brittle, frayed and do not fit into the cabinet that leads to dripping and leaking.  The bottom can also begin to crack. Fiberglass can be lined into the bottom but generally this only buys time until the bottom cracks somewhere else.

It’s best to replace coolers with leaking, rotten or brittle bottoms or cracked polypropylene before they create extensive damage to your home.