I ordered a swamp cooler to help deal with this summer heat, but now I worry it might have chosen one that was too big. Should have looked at their marketing materials before I hit buy.
@Alex Ah swamp coolers, the most overhyped devices on Earth. They only work I'm places that have water shortages, and then only sometimes.
You definitely have to use them under the right conditions. I was skeptical at first if they would be worth anything in Seattle, but it really looks like a game of turning it on at the right time.
If it's humid or already cool, just use it as a fan. But really anything above 80F and below 60% humidity should have some effect
It should be 85F and 35% tomorrow, so that'll be its first real test. If it even knocks 5F off of my living room, that would be a welcome change.
@Njord One neat side-effect I'm learning testing it out today is that it seems to make my air conditioner more efficient.
I have a floor unit in my bedroom, and I put the swamp cooler in my kitchen, and the increased humidity turned my bedroom arctic.
Downside is that on a more humid day like today it just makes the rest of the apartment feel dank.
@Alex In the right conditions (~27c, 30% or so humidity), i get air coming out 7c lower, which I can direct to blow on myself to be pretty comfortable, despite the cement block oven I live in (Thermal mass is NOT good in heatwaves, let me tell you.)
I probably get to use it 20% o the time, get to use the fan part of it another 20%. The rest of the time it really isn't as good as my air conditioner (which I set to 26c/79f)
It's possible that a larger, more powerful unit might help, but mostly it's a very nibbles at the margins kind of device