Pulley
Sunday afternoon after a drive through the Eastern Rocky Mountain range by Denver and visiting the Red Rocks Amphitheater I came home and discovered my swamp cooler was making a lot of racket. Squeaking and sounding like nastiness. My neighbor approached my house as I exited my vehicle to say, “Did you hear me knocking? I wanted to tell you about your swamp cooler making a lot of noise”
“Nope, I was up in the Rockies.”
“Let me know if I can help!”
I’m glad to have a friendly, helpful neighbor, but the idea of fixing the swamp cooler was not on my top ten list. I crawled up on the roof after shutting the cooler off and took several panels off and hollared down to have it turned on.
Squeak, wobble, rotate. Squeak, wobble, rotate. I hollared to have it turned off again. The pulley was spinning along with the motor, but it was not sitting correctly on the motor’s shaft. I tightened the pulley on the shaft, turned the swamp cooler back on. Squeak, wobble, rotate. Apparently the pulley was funky and beyond de-funking.
I drove down to Lowe’s and picked up a new pulley. I came home, installed the pulley on the motor shaft, re-attached the drive belt, and hollared down to have the cooler turned back on.
Hummmmmm.
The cooler turned on more quietly than it had before while we’ve lived in this house. Apparently I could have had a quieter cooler for just under $8.00 had I noted the pulley was getting wonky. I need to get new pads to hold the water for the cooler, but those can wait until next season. I was glad I didn’t have to pay $85.00 to have a technician come out and service this with the pulley costing $15.00 with $40.00 in labor (or some other made up number). All was well, quieter, and I think we’ll be good for at least another couple years in the pulley department.
Related posts
