With the onset of Summer and the inevitable 'dogs in hot van' worries I am really pleased that one of last year's Iconix prizes was a DogBox crate fan. I think it is a great idea and the fact that it fixes on the crate makes sure it is always there when you need it.

However the immediate problem is that I only have one. I have four crates and just one source of moving air so I just looked at sourcing three more… the secondary problem is that they are nearly £100 each inc shipping. (gulp.)

Maybe I could stretch to that and maybe the dogs are worth it but for that money I start to become a bit more picky about the performance. There are a number of niggling concerns that you start to focus on when you look harder;

• The fan isn't the quietest thing around. Indeed I would say when turned on it is downright noisy. Multiply that by four and it would really annoy the neighbours let alone the dogs.
• The fan isn't thermostatically controlled in any way so you have to turn it on and off manually. When you are not there and the sun comes out the dogs are going to get warm.
• The fan is quite blowy. By that I mean it actually ruffles the dog's hair in the crate. Partly that overspeed contributes to the noise, partly that means that the animal is constantly in a draught. It also means that the fan is quite power hungry. It is equipped with a cigarette lighter plug but ideally you would want to be running it off a leisure battery. Especially if you were considering an additional three!

Is there a better way? Maybe there is….