Old fashioned "air conditioning" -- Does this work?

[no_hypocrisy]

You take a block of ice and put it in front of a fan and the icy air cools you but with a limitation: you have to stay in one place. This isn't likely to cool the room.

I only have a fan and am not interested in getting an air conditioner. I was told this might be a compromise.

Have any of you tried this?

[PoliticAverse]

1. It is certainly better than a fan alone...

http://curiosity.discovery.com/question/how-ice-block-cooling-work

[Downwinder]

2. Can you still get block ice?

[PoliticAverse]

5. Yes but it's no longer delivered by horse and carriage...

http://www.iceexpress.com/ezpickup.html

[Downwinder]

9. It was always cooler to go sit in the Ice House.

[hlthe2b]

3. That's the principle behind evaporative coolers ("swamp coolers") that still remain very viable

alternatives or supplements to A/C in NON-HUMID areas of the country--especially the west. They work quite well in lowering temp about 10-12 degrees as long as the humidity is low.

So yes, the principle does work...

[JayhawkSD]

7. Actually. that's not quite accurate

Swamp coolers work with water at ambient temperature, which is allowed to evaporate. As the water changes from liquid to vapor the "latent heat of vaporization" required to accomplish that is absorbed from the air and thereby cools the air flowing over the evaporating water. Air flowing over a block of ice is merely being cooled by the cooler air surrounding the ice, by a process called "adiabatic heat transfer." The ice is sufficiently cold that the localized effect is noticeable, but significant cooling of actual air mass is a great deal less than that accomplished by a swamp cooler.

It does indeed require low humidity, or the water will not evaporate. Air passing over a block of ice will be pretty much equally effective (or ineffective) regardless of humidity, because evaporation is not involved.

[hlthe2b]

8. thank you...

However, apparently, simply throwing some ice into the water within a portable evaporative cooler's water reservoir, can allow both principles to be at play? Sorry-- my year of college physics was some time ago.

Regardless, my point remains. This can be an effective means to affect, at least some local cooling effect.

[TreasonousBastard]

4. It works, sorta, but raises the humidity...

and, since some heat is released by melting the ice, it could make the place a little hotter after the ice is gone.

FWIW, my grandmother had a fan with an "ice cage" on it just for this, but she never used it.

[Little Star]

6. This guy has some pretty good suggestions.....

His Blog is called:nothingtobegainedhere:

Most of my life i’ve spent without air conditioning. When i was growing up we didn’t have it because the air conditioners were to expensive, then when we could finally afford one we rarely used it because it made the light bill so high. Even to this day i only have one air conditioner in the bedroom. Over the years i’ve found three ways to stay cool, three ways to Combat Heat, i call them the Poor Mans AC.

1 – This one came from my grandfather. When things got really bad he would get a bucket or a pan or a foot soaker and fill it with ice and cold water sit on the couch and stick his feet into the bucket or pan or foot soaker and make his feet cold. When your feet get cold the rest of you is sure to follow.

2 – This next trick i learned while working as a production assistant in the film biz-mess. Get a bowl or empty water bottle fill it with ice water and ice. Take a facial skin astringent like Sea Breeze and pour some into the bowl or bottle with the ice and water and mix it together. Take a bandana or a dish towel and soak it into the mixture. Take the bandana or dish towel and wrap around the back of your neck. You’ll go from overheating to deep freeze in a few seconds. The Sea Breeze opens the pores of your skin and the ice water seeps into your pores and cools you down immediately. Whenever you feel hot, wet the bandana or dish towel and wrap it around your neck or tie it around your head. (WARNING: This works so fast it might give you brain freeze like when you drank a cold drink too fast.)

3 – When i was a kid i learned about pressure points on the body and when all else failed and you needed to get cool before you got heat stroke we would get some ice and put it on the inside of our wrist, which is a pressure point and it would immediately cool you down. Other pressure points are the temples, the jugular, the inside of your elbow, behind your knee and of course your feet. If your feet are cold the rest of you is cold, just think about navigating the deep corner snow ice slush puddles of February when you wanted to wear those boots that lack the necessary insulation but looked really cute with that outfit.

The heat is serious business. It’s life or death out here in the heat and the stupidity. People die from prolonged exposure to this kind of heat and it can be prevented. These three tips or tricks will not only keep you cool but they could also save your life. It’s also a green alternative to running the AC all the time. This has been a Public Service Announcement of Nothing To Be Gained Here and it has been suggested in some quarters that this is not enough. Well then GET OFF THE STREET and into somebody else’s AC!

http://nothingtobegainedhere.wordpress.com/2011/07/31/combat-heat-the-poor-mans-ac/

[Curmudgeoness]

10. I assume that your end result is to keep cool

without a/c. Your suggestion of using ice (I would even just use ice cubes in a shallow bowl) sounds like it might work and I might try that----just experiment with it, you will know soon enough if it works. Why listen to us???

I do have one thing that I do whenever the heat gets too high and unbearable. I have a piece of fabric (from an old percale sheet), and I wet it, then put it around my neck. The material that I use seems to matter---towels do not work, t-shirt material does not work, but sheet material does. As soon as it gets warm, I take it an flip it in the air (just needs one flip) and it is instantly cold. I will wipe down my arms, legs, face, feet, whatever, and keep flipping it to cool it. It really works for me. In fact, I am using my fabric right now.

And a window fan turned on AFTER the sun goes down will really cool a room off. That is how I am able to sleep. The night air really is cool. I used this even in Houston in the worst of the summer when the a/c went out for a week and I was fine---at night.

[NMDemDist2]

11. folk lore has it that in Arizona's deserts before AC folks would

wet sheets and hang in open doors and windows, or create a 'wet sheet room' on the porch so that any airflow would be cooled and humidified

especially in the evening when it was time for bed. I bet the same principle would work with a fan blowing though a wet sheet

[RebelOne]

12. Many, many years ago, I lived in South Florida and did not have A/C.

But I had a cooler that you put ice into and the fan in it blew the cold air out. Just like your "air conditioning," I had to sit in front of it as it did not cool the room, but it cooled me.

[Cairycat]

13. My grandfather told me about doing this

in the furniture store he managed in 1936 when it was over 100 for weeks in Iowa. He always thought the effect was mostly psychological.

[grasswire]

14. my Kansas inlaws told of wetting the top bedsheet...

.....wringing it out, and pulling it over oneself at bedtime. They said the hope was that they would fall asleep before the sheet dried out.

My routine is a wet hand towel on the floor under my feet. Cool damp feet really do make a huge difference.

It was 102 here today -- our first really hot day this year. In my place, with no AC, it was 78. That's pretty good!