While other types of fans, like circular rotating fans, are great for moving air around inside your home, they’re less effective at bringing in air from outside.
If you need to, measure the dimensions of your windows and take a tape measure with you to the hardware store so you can measure the fans as well. Avoid fans that are too large for the window. If you position them near the window and outside the window frame, they’ll fall over.
Bear in mind that setting up 2 or 3 smaller, less powerful fans is roughly equivalent to 1 large, powerful fan. If you have an uneven number of windows and can’t have equivalent fans blowing inward and outward, it’s better to have more blowing inward. This creates a slight positive pressure inside the home, which prevents dust and insects from coming in when the doors are opened.
Noises outside the home will also become louder inside with the window open, although the fan noise may mask some of this.
Creating air intake near trees or flowering plants will bring pleasant smells into your home.
If you’re using fans during the day, set 2-3 fans to blow inward from the coolest side of the home. This will typically be the side in shade or the side facing north.
If you live in a single-story home, set up fans to blow inward on the shaded side of your home. Set the fans blowing outward in windows on the opposite side. Leave the doors inside your home open for maximum air flow.
If your windows open sideways rather than vertically, open the window wide enough to accommodate the width of the fan. Then close the window so the fan is held in place between the sliding window pane and the wall.
Blocking the gaps beside fans blowing outward is difficult. Tape up paper or cardboard on the outside of the window, if it’s accessible. If you can’t access the outside of the window, securely tape the paper or cardboard down on the inside of the window.
This will also reduce your need to use air conditioning during the day, since your home will have cooled off at night.
Removing fans from windows when not in use might be difficult for the elderly or disabled individuals. In such cases, leave the fans in the windows.
The air propelled by the fan will push past the towel and the cold water will lower the temperature of the air.
