This post is the fifth in a multi part series on swamp cooler maintenance, repair, and replacement. If you haven’t read parts 1 – 4, I recommend you do before continuing.

Winterizing your swamp cooler (continued)

• Clean the body of the cooler. Since swamp coolers rely on a very high airflow rate to to their work, they end up pulling in a lot of debris over time. If you sponged out the water from your cooler’s pan, then you can use that same sponge to give the cooler body a wash. Remove as much dust, dirt, sticks, leaves, cobwebs, and hard water scale as you can. Keeping your cooler clean will not only make it work better, but will prolong its service life as well. If you really want to maximize your cooler’s lifespan, you can use this as an opportunity to coat the pan in a metal sealant to prevent rust.
• Change the pads. Over time dust, hard water scale, dirt, and debris will accumulate in a swamp cooler’s pads, eventually clogging them. Once this happens, they can’t pull enough air though to work, and their cooling capability drops. Clogged pads also put an unnecessarily heavy load on the fan’s motor, causing premature wear. A swamp cooler’s pads typically need to be changed once a year – it’s up to you if you want to do it in the fall or when you start it back up again next spring. The advantage of doing it in the fall is that when spring comes around, all you have to do is inspect it, hook up the water, and flip the switch! Well, there’s a little more to it than that, but not much.

Check back soon for How to do swamp cooler maintenance, when to replace it, and what to replace it with, part 6. In the meantime, check out our page on swamp cooler maintenance.