HouseHold Hacker’s simple steps to making a USB-powered mini air conditioner

Summer is here and for many of us it means hot weather and air conditioners. This year, why not make your own air conditioner?

If you’re up for the challenge, Dylan Hart, producer of the “HouseHold Hacker” YouTube channel, which brings viewers life hacks, cheats, science, and DIY tech projects, created a DIY video that explains how to create a USB-powered mini air conditioner.

Hart's USB-powered mini air conditioner. (Image via YouTube)

According to Hart, all you’ll need is a small box, two PC fans, a USB cable, a 9-V battery connector, and some ice. You can buy PC fans at the store, but in his video, Hart just uses two from a dead computer. To make things simpler, he even wires the device up to a switch from the electronics store to easily power the air conditioner on and off.

Here are HouseHold Hacker’s steps to creating your own USB-powered mini air conditioner.

1. Cut holes in the box for the fans.
2. Glue the fans into the holes with hot glue (or Super Glue, Elmer's glue, etc.).
3. Connect the fans’ cables together. To do this, tie the red cables to the ACC connection (usually found in the center) and tie the black cables onto the ground connector.
4. Get a 9-V battery connector and tie the red cable to the power input and the back cable on the ground.
5. Seal everything together with hot glue.
6. Take your USB cable and cut off the white and green wires at the end. (These are for data and unnecessary to the project.)
7. Wrap the USB cables around the 9-V battery connector.
8. Plug it in and test it.
9. Pour ice into the back of the box. (If the ice melts, dump it out or use an ice pack.)
10. Turn it on and cool off.

In his video, Hart explains that a USB carries about 5 V of electricity, but these fans typically run on 12 V, so they will run a little slower than usual. “It will still put out plenty of air to cool you down,” says Hart in the instructional video.

When testing the air conditioner, he turns it on in a room that is 84ºF. After 15 minutes, the temperature went down to 73ºF.

One cool aspect

Summers have been known to bring about black outs and power outages, so Hart hooked up the 9V battery so that you can use your air conditioner even if your power is out.

Stay cool and watch HouseHold Hacker’s instructional video below to see how Hart makes this USB mini air conditioner.

To learn more about HouseHold Hacker visit its website or go to the company’s YouTube channel for more hacks and DIY projects.