Cool Attic CX1000AM Power Attic Roof Mount Ventilator with 3.4-Amp 60-Hz Motor and Steel Flange, Galvanized Steel Dome

Install was a breeze. Pretty much a quick plug and play for a confident handyman. Construction was decent and the motor "appeared" to be of decent build quality. Problem is that after 2 season, the fan motor took a dump. The unit no longer functions as a fan, but rather a simple vent. I am not sure if other brands have a better quality, this was my first purchase of the type so I will try my luck with another vendor. When it did work, it worked well. The noise that people mention, its a fan moving air so any fan worth its salt will make some sort of noise, especially if you never had a fan before. While the sound of the fan is there, its nothing truly unbearable. Its just a new sound that wasnt there before. I might buy another if it were cheap enough to offset the work of removing the old and reinstalling a new one.

First of all, I'd like to say that I live in Houston, TX. For those who don't understand what that means, please boil some water and stand over it. That's a hyperbole, but it's Hot & it's humid. I've lived along the gulf coast all of my life and am used to this. We purchased our home two years ago (it was built 2003) and have had a hard time cooling our home during the summer barely making it to 77º or 78º (F). From the moment the sun comes up our air conditioner fights a losing battle. During one summer I was up in the attic and discovered through using a thermometer that we were hitting 140º to 150º in our attic. We had 3 passive roof vents which were not allowing enough air to escape. This reminded me of the home inspector who stated something similar to that before we purchased.After much research I discovered that hot air rises through the soffit vents on the ridges of our house and is supposed to escape through vents in the roof. While that may happen in properly designed systems, ours was failing the test miserably. I researched solutions from adding more passive vents, to replacing our smaller (10" diameter) vents with larger, to having a roofer install a ridge vent (super-expensive option), to solar powered vents, to these electric powered vents. After debating the pros and cons of each I decided on these. At the time there were only two reviews, which gave me concern, but I decided to try them.I found numerous websites which helped me on how to install them. I replaced two of my passive vents on my roof with these. This entailed removing the old vents, expanding the hole in the roof to the 14" diameter requirement (Used a hand held jigsaw from Home Depot), cutting back the tiles by 1.5" to account for the raised cylinder portion (Box cutters) and then shoving the vent's upper flashing under the upper half of the roof tiles. This sounds complicated, but it's really not. I did have to remove several of the nails in the way, but replaced them or used roofer's cement ($1.50 at Home Depot). The entire roofing installation process took about 3 hours. If you've never worked much on roofs like me, please be slow and sure footed. We have a fairly sharp pitched roof and I don't want anyone to get hurt.After the vents are installed on the roof, the next step is to wire the fan into the house electricity. I connected the two different fans on two different existing circuits in the house. Before the fans were even running I noticed that air was moving in the attic. I set the main fan to 95º as many recommend and the secondary one over the master bedroom to 90º since it is a southern exposed section of the house and is constantly hotter than the rest of the house.Results? The best result I can give is this since it isn't summer yet. During the installation the outside temperature was 71º. The attic was hitting 98º before I turned them on, so we had a 27º difference from the outside temperature without the fans. Yesterday March 20, 2011 it was 85º outside my home at 3PM. I climbed up into the attic and the attic was only 90º. I call that a huge success.What about noise? While some people are concerned that attic vent fans make noise, I can say that these cannot be heard in a one-story house. Once you climb into the attic you can hear them running, but it's a soft sound.I can't give results on better energy efficiency yet. I have noticed that on multiple days our A/C never even came on, which is a positive sign. If the attic is not heating up as quickly then the air conditioner can stay off longer cut off sooner at night and since it is the biggest energy hog around our home during the summer that should translate to an overall savings of electricity. I will update towards the end of summer to inform of my findings.UPDATE: 25JAN11After surviving a record breaking summer here in Houston, I thought I'd give some statistics. First off, we literally had a record-breaking summer with over 20 days of +100 degree weather. In addition we experienced a prolonged drought which caused many wildfires. That information is only to give an idea of what we were dealing with.In any good experiment the house, the weather and the number of people using electricity would be the control that stays exactly the same except for the attic fans. In reality, we had a houseguest stay with us for several months which meant extra electricity being used throughout the day. That alone makes it hard to give an apples to apples comparison of August 2010 vs August 2011 aside from the record heatwave. With that being said, if you take into account a standard summer (2010) against a record-breaking summer (2011) along with another adult living in the house, you get the following breakdown.August 2010- 1943 kwhAugust 2011- 1965 kwhWe used an extra 22 kwh above what we did in the previous year. We did notice that the house stayed noticably cooler during the day. We were able to get the temperature down to 76° during the 3-6PM timeframe which we have never been able to do during the summer. The attic temperature stayed typically 10-15° warmer than it was outside, so if it was 105° outside it was about 115° in the attic.On the downside I noticed one of my fans was not shutting off at night. I spoke to the vendor and they were willing to send out a replacement thermostat, which was very nice of them. It was pretty simple to swap out.

First, the packaging and prompt shipment from Amazon was excellent = 5 stars.Second, the install was a snap. I just had to enlarge the two existing turbine hole diameters. I installed a junction box for power. Another reviewer suggested to wire in a switch for more control. I may do that as well if I stay with powered units instead of solar. What I did not do was test product before install, these are brand new and should work, right? One of the thermostats does NOT work and the other fan motor was D.O.A.. The wiring is very simple and I double-checked just to make sure it was not the problem. I immediately contacted Amazon on July 13th for replacement. They are now "out of stock" and won't be available through Amazon for some time according to their agent. No refund until they receive items, so now I have two gaping holes in my roof until I find a replacement. I agree with other reviewer, the sheet metal screws are barely enough, replace them w/ nuts, bolts & lock washers for longevity. The idea was to reduce my monthly bill, but what I have now is just a headache. Home Depot online lists same ones for $66 w/ free shipping if you want to try your luck...I purchased a gable vent at the same time for my garage - Cool Attic CX1500 Power Gable Ventilator Fan. It was simple to install and price was great! I wish these worked as well as that unit.I will edit and/or update review after resolution....

I live in Houston and installed one in the house attic and the other in the detached garage. They are working great, move lots of air, and are quiet. They have an adjustable thermostat to control when they turn on and off. I painted the one grey that went on top of the 2 story house so it would blend in. The metal has a light oil film on it, so had to wipe it down with mineral oil first. Can't wait to see the power savings on A/C. But the comfort level in the house and garage is very noticeable. Very happy so far. The attics (and the garage) were insanely hot before these fans. Much better now.Update , It has been 1 year since these were installed and the one in the garage has seized up. I ordered a CX1500 to see if I can replace just the motor and fan. From reading other reviews, I guess you have to oil the bearing periodically.I have a zoom spout turbine oil bottle and will try to oil these fans every couple months. I guess since these are so low cost, the bearings are not sealed.2nd Update 5/26/2014 - The unit in the house roof was letting in Red wasps. An exterminator pinpointed the fan as the problem and I added hardware cloth under the fan to keep the wasps out. The one in the garage failed a second time and I replaced the moving parts again. (Luckily I had bought a spare motor to have on hand.) The replacement is not difficult except you have to bend the motor supports.