Make This Simple Air Conditioner in 8 Easy Steps

Step 1: Gather parts

To get started you’ll need to gather some parts and some simple tools. None of these are fancy or expensive. In fact, you probably have some of these items around the house or your garage already.

Parts and tools you’ll need:

• 5-gallon plastic bucket with a lid, like you can find at any Home Depot or other hardware/building supply store
• Drill with ‘hole saw’ type bit. Any common electric drill should do the trick. You can get a cheap hole saw set in any hardware store or at a home center like Home Depot. We’re only cutting plastic, so you don’t need anything fancy, 1.5 inch and 2 inch are good sizes to have for this
• Evaporative cooler pad that is at least 14×31 inches. Dura Cool makes some that are available from Amazon and you can get them at Home Depot or other hardware suppliers.
• Utility scissors or shears to cut the pad to size
• Long straight-edge ruler to help make accurate cuts
• Permanent marker or tape to indicate max. water level
• Fiberglass screen as used for windows and screen doors or garden cloth
• Sturdy utility knife
• Small DC powered fan
• Submersible aquarium or fountain pump (look for a 12 V DC submersible water pump on Amazon)
• About 4.5 ft. of aquarium tubing to fit your pump (usually 1/4 inch or 5/16 inch clear vinyl)
• Small clamp to pinch hose
• Have a thumbtack handy

When you have your materials and tools collected, get started by preparing the plastic bucket, as described on the next page:
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