Easy Slow drip for a swamp cooler

I use a swamp cooler to keep my carboys cool quite a bit. Throw some water in a rubbermaid, put a shirt on the carboy, and set a fan on my turkey fryer's burner, and blow it at the carboy.

Problem was, the shirt wouldn't wick up moisture fast enough, meaning it would just dry out. Which makes it worthless as a swamp cooler.

So I devised the following setup-


Basically, I stuck a hose on my bottling bucket's nozzle, opened it up slightly, and let it drip. It can keep the shirt wet for at least 12 hours, which is about 11 more than before.

I put ice in the rubbermaid and in the bottling bucket twice a day, and move water from the rubbermaid up to the bottling bucket, and let gravity do its work.

It's not a crazy techno thing, but I've been trying to figure out how to keep the shirt wet for awhile, and am psyched that this is working, especially since it took no new equipment.

Wouldn't it have been easier to either slow down the fan, or move it farther away?

Fan is on the slowest setting, and I figure that this way there is more evaporation and more cooling.
Although, that makes me wonder if I could turn up the fan and drip, and if that would a significant difference.

Turning the fan down so it evaporates slower is counter productive since the cooling is coming from the evaporation of water. I like the set up, keep the fan on high

Very sweet idea... I've been looking for a use for my bottling bucket since I started kegging. It looks so lonely sitting up on the shelf all the time. Kinda like the mop on the swiffer commercials! This will give it a purpose again! Thanks!

I'm surprised that the shirt didn't have enough wicking action to continuously pull the water from the tub. I haven't had a problem with mine drying out, but I don't use a fan either. How much water do you have in the tub?