The swamp cooler: Mike Hosking's DIY tip to beat the heat

By Steph Rowe, Newstalk ZB social media producer

Desperate times call for desperate measures.

And given these are desperate, heat-stricken times, let us introduce Mike Hosking's DIY swamp cooler - made out of items you'll (possibly) have around your house. If you don't have the luxury of air conditioning, this is the next best thing!

You'll get the general idea by watching Mike Hosking's very instructional video above. (His best quote of the video? Possibly "I have air conditioning, but some people, I'm lead to believe, don't …"

To start, you need a chilly bin. Any sized chilly bin will work, but mid-sized chilly bins come with a removable lid which makes life easy. Or you can easily remove the lid from the bigger sized chilly bins as we did for this cooler.

Your local hardware store should have polystyrene or a similar material. Layers of cardboard would also work. Just be mindful that it needs to be waterproof and air tight so you may need to cover them with tin foil.

Here's a list of items you'll need:

•Chilly bin
•Small USB powered fan
•Polystyrene
•Tubing for the cool air to escape
•Fisherman's ice
•Craft knife or scalpel
•Hot glue gun or PVA glue
•Pen for tracing

Step 1: Place the chilly bin lid on top of the polystyrene and trace around the lid. Cut the polystyrene.

Step 2: Grab your fan and pipe and place them on the polystyrene lid. Trace around them. Be careful not to place them too close to the outside edges - around an inch or two space either side should be sufficient.

Step 3: Cut out the holes for the fan and tube then check they fit correctly. You may need to readjust a couple of times.

Step 4: Once the pipe comfortably fits through the lid, glue it into place. Feel free to add extra smaller pipes and aim them in different directions. Feel free to decorate at this point!

(As Mike says in the video, our cooler is a cracker: "What I've done here is aesthetically beautiful. Doesn't need to be paint, doesn't need to be black. You could go copper and spend some money.")

Step 5: Fill chilly bin base with party ice.

(Again, to quote the Hosk: "Everyone's got party ice because everyone loves a party. Everyone loves drinking, I love drinking. Since I've quit television I've never drunk more.")

Step 6: Place lid on top and hit the start botton on the USB fan. Then the party really gets started!

No-one spells it out better than our star presenter: "Beautiful, cold, refrigerated air. That's going to keep you cold for the rest of summer and this is going to last you for years to come."

Bliss!