Homemade air conditioner for you coup?

[Mrs. K]

You probably need to set up more shade, upright pallets on the west side can help in the late afternoon. Pallets up on bricks give a place to get under.

I would be more worried about shade and water, than the fan.

Mrs k

 

[snow5164]

We gave the meat birds a fan outside the tractor blowing in , for half the day they hid from it but by the next morning they were lying by it waiting for me to turn it on

 

[TXChickenFarmer01]

We live in Dallas and it's reached into the 105-108 range this week. We were so worried about the munckins (8 week old EEers) that i went and bought a small window AC unit and it now sits outside of the "window" of their coop. The coop is about 4x4 and with the unit in the window it cools it down considerably. Was this a brilliant idea (if not stupidly expensive for chickens) or stupid in a way I haven't yet realized?

 

[Nifty-Chicken]

On super hot days I make sure they have lots of cool water, shade, and also soak the ground with water in part of the shaded area. The evaporation cooling effect seems to help.

 

[SurferchickinSB]

i was thinking of building something like this for the coup on 100+ days, has anyone done something like this?

Wow, that’s s cool idea!

 

[BennieAnTheJets]

TXChickenFarmer01, I think there are lots of opinions on how to deal with heat and the birds - some opinions are very strong

My opinion is not all that strong, but I still went with the AC (which is considered extreme by some)

the down sides of AC are : when do you turn it on? when do you turn it off? how can the birds acclimate to the heat when they sometimes get AC and sometimes not?, and of course the expense, but since I could afford it at the time, I got one for the coop that I can use in emergencies now

I wonder if the expense is all that bad, though, if you can afford a small unit, because once you have it, it only costs the electricity to run it for a few hours, when needed, and it works! whereas other methods would require money, too, even if it is just freezing water in your freezer all the time, and they often don't work, so you spend even more in the end

with the AC, you do also have to be careful to clean the filter often, as the dust from the birds can clog up the intake - I do it every time I run it or every other time - just take the plastic filter out and dump the dust in the bin and brush it off before putting the filter/screen back in

I have had my little unit for six years now and it is still working fine since I don't use it that much and keep it in the basement most of the year - I have it out now and use it when I feel like the birds are under stress from the heat more than usual, mostly in the evening between 4 pm and 8 pm to give everyone a chance to cool down and get the humidity out of the coop for the night on bad nights

took it out of the basement and put it on the coop during the "heat wave"-on-the-East-Coast weekend because I also had one very sick bird and needed to treat for parasites which caused more stress on the same, exceptionally hot day

see my pics here: https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/the-heat-can-i-do-more.1256822/#post-20166189

 

[BennieAnTheJets]

TXChickenFarmer01, with a 4x4 coop I would worry a little bit about the strong effect the AC would have on that size space

be careful not to "shock" your birds too much with AC on and off and temperature changes from inside to outside

maybe you could run it for only 10 min at a time and see what effect that has before deciding on how long to run it on a regular basis

outside animals do need to get a chance to acclimate to outside temperatures they need to deal with all the time and there is something to be said/learned about how that can best happen - I am not sure

I would be careful by watching the effect of the AC on the small coop and maybe putting it on a timer and only run for a set number of minutes at a time to take the edge off the heat

I would watch my birds and get more opinions/information from others to learn more

maybe the AC can be set to 90 degrees? there are some units that turn themselves off when reaching the temperature - maybe all of them do - I am not sure

again, I would be careful to give it my best stab at helping more than hurting

can the birds move in and out of the area freely to chose the temperature they like?
are you keeping the same temperature options available for them all the time?

if they are used to having the AC and then you are at work one day and they don't have any that may be worse than if they were used to the heat every day - again, I am not sure

you can be the best judge of all this, knowing your birds and environment - I am just adding food for thought

 

[aart]

If the humidity isn't super oppressive where you live, a "Swamp Chiller" would work a lot better. There are all kinds of diy plans online for large and small ones. They can drop the temp 10-15 degrees in a large room or shop, so it should help in a coop.

That's a big IF.

A big part of how air conditioners cool the air is by removing moisture/humidity from the house/room, which is usually closed off from the outside environment.
Most swamp coolers add humidity to the air from the ice melting,
often leaving the air feeling even more oppressive.

This is the best DIY swamp cooler 'air conditioner' design I've seen, tho I haven't searched extensively.

Depending on how water tight that ducting is, it should not add any humidity to the air from the melting ice.
Wonders if plastic flexi-duct would be a better choice because it's water tight?
Condensed water from the air moving thru would collect in the ducting, how to drain that?

 

[aart]

This is how I provide some 'cool' for my birds.....also giving a dose of Sav-A-Chick electrolytes/vitamins once a a week or so really seems to help.
I also put a fan in the east window blowing into the coop late in day to help push the hot air out with some cooler air blowing in

BIG(9x14x2") chunk of ice lasts all day for wading and sipping.

 

[EggWalrus]

That's a big IF.

A big part of how air conditioners cool the air is by removing moisture/humidity from the house/room, which is usually closed off from the outside environment.
Most swamp coolers add humidity to the air from the ice melting,
often leaving the air feeling even more oppressive.

This is the best DIY swamp cooler design I've seen, tho I haven't searched extensively.

Depending on how water tight that ducting is, it should not add any humidity to the air from the melting ice.
Wonders if plastic flexi-duct would be a better choice because it's water tight?
Condensed water from the air moving thru would collect in the ducting, how to drain that?

@aart, the video you embedded isn't a swamp chiller/cooler. You should try one of those things in the video and report back to us if it actually make the temp drop any in an average size room.

Here is a link to a swamp chiller/evaporative cooler.

https://home.howstuffworks.com/home-improvement/heating-and-cooling/swamp-cooler.htm

They're called swamp chillers because it can make it as humid as a swamp indoors. We used two 5 foot tall models in a 5,000 Sq ft shop and they would cool it down about 10 to 15 degrees on a hot dry day. But if the humidity was high, all we could do was run the fan in them without the water or everything in the shop would get covered in dew.
West Texas to California, they work great in that arid environment.