Re: [mh] Whole-house humidifier

[Chris H. <chr...@ya...>]

One of the things I like about my AprilAire whole-house humidifier *is* the flow thru aspect.  There is no water sitting stagnant in a tray on the unit.  The Desert Spring setup looks like a more-modern version of a drum bypass humidifier.  True, there is no drum screen/sponge to replace, but you still have the water sitting in the tray.  Granted, you can buy the Desert Spring add-on to flush the water and minerals out at timed intervals, but thats an extra expense (and may actually be whats driving up the cost you got for the unit).

Water panels in Aprilaire/Honeywell humidifiers are not hard to swap out at all.  I do it once a year (whenever Im down there changing a filter around winter-time), and once I year I pull the panel completely out (when I change over to summer use).  After moving into a house with a drum-type that no one ever bothered to clean, I was grossed out enough to buy one that flows thru and just drains whatever water it doesnt evaporate.  Keep in mind there will likely be maintenance on *any* humidifier you buy (strainers on the water inlets, etc).

The humidistat on mine is mounted on the return ductwork, in the basement.  One good thing about the Aprilaires is that some of them are automatic..........I have a resistance sensor mounted outside that tells the unit what relative humidity the house should be at.  Its really a set and forget system.  Sure beats manual :)

-Chris

Greg Satz <sa...@ir...> wrote: I have humidifiers on all my heating units. I live in a very dry 
climate and they are very useful in the winter months. I don't run mine 
during the summer. I use the screened-type units with an external 
humidstat. My humidstats are in the air space with the heaters and 
presumably that space gets enough outside air that outside humidity is 
taken into account. I have never attempted to automate this part of the 
system.

I also have water issues and need to change the screens yearly.

One word of advice that I have learned the hard way. Do not allow the 
installers to put the humidifier over any critical electronics or if 
you must make sure they install a protective pan. I have lost one 
heater control board this way.

Good luck,
Greg

On Jan 4, 2006, at 11:43 AM, Kirk Bauer wrote:

> I'm looking to put in a whole-house humidifier and am looking for some
> advice if anybody else has experience in this area.  I'm going to get 
> it
> professionally installed as I don't know much about HVAC systems and,
> more importantly, water is my arch nemesis and running water pipes
> through my attic is a sure path to disaster.
>
> So, online I found this product which seems to not require an 
> evaporator screen that needs to be cleaned and/or replaced:
>
> http://www.desertspringproducts.com/products/humidifier.asp
>
> But so far the local installers have mentioned the Trane, Carrier, and
> April Air 700 Series units.  These all seem to have the screen which
> seems like it would be higher maintenance than the disc unit from 
> Desert
> Spring, assuming that is even a reliable product (I'm still
> researching).
>
> One installer said it would be $500-$700 to install the Desert Spring
> humidifier if I was to order it myself, which seems a bit steep.
> Generally the installers will put their own units in for about $1,000
> total.
>
> It seems that the typical installation is to put a humidistat in the
> airflow that controls the humidifer, which runs when the blower is on
> and when the humidity is too low.  To me this is a minor problem as for
> about 6 months of the year our HVAC system rarely runs.  But I have an
> RCS thermostat hooked up to Misterhouse.  So I should be able to run 
> the
> fan only from time to time.  I can do this based on a minimum run-time
> per day (say at least 2 hours a day of the blower running) or better 
> yet
> if I had my own humidity sensor, I could run the fan if the system is
> not running and the humidity is low.
>
> Any recommendations for exactly how to do this, any humidity sensors I
> could use, etc?
>
> -- 
> Kirk Bauer 
> http://linux.kaybee.org | www.autorpm.org | www.logwatch.org
>
>
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