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Whole house humidifier?

cyflier

cyflier

Active Member
Apr 13, 2006
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My house is insanely dry. Thinking about having a whole house humidifier installed. Any cons to doing so? My house is around 2200 sq ft. Has anyone had one installed and does it work? Any ideas on roughly what the cost would be? Any recommendations on HVAC companies in Ankeny to install one?
 
I've always heard that they are only marginally effective and are prone to getting pretty gross unless you're really on top of the maintenance.
 
Our hose has one. It was here when we bought it so I can't give any recommendations on companies.

We like having it during the winter. My biggest advice however is to get one that is tied into an external thermometer. There are different settings based upon outside temperature. Ours isn't automatic and I just leave it at a dryer setting then it should be otherwise it can get too humid in the house if it is at the wrong setting.
 
MNCyGuy said:
I've always heard that they are only marginally effective and are prone to getting pretty gross unless you're really on top of the maintenance.
Click to expand...

We did a trial where we shut ours off just to see if there is a difference. In our experience it made a huge difference. Couldn't imagine not having one in the winter now.
 
My wife and son suffer from dry skin, so we installed one. It does it's job. Helps with static as well. If you have too high of humidity when it's really cold we get droplets freezing on the window, so we pay attention to that and adjust the humidistat. I spent a half day installing a Honeywell that I bought at Home Depot for $80. We change out the humidifier twice a season.
 
I just set a pan of water next to the furnace every day. Seems to help a bit. I don't notice any shocks like I used to.
 
FarminCy said:
Our hose has one. It was here when we bought it so I can't give any recommendations on companies.

We like having it during the winter. My biggest advice however is to get one that is tied into an external thermometer. There are different settings based upon outside temperature. Ours isn't automatic and I just leave it at a dryer setting then it should be otherwise it can get too humid in the house if it is at the wrong setting.
Click to expand...

Mine (also came with the house) has a dial you're supposed to adjust based on outside temperature. Sure is a real PITA. I typically set it to something in the fall and turn it off in the spring :twitcy:

And yes, I understand psychrometrics, I just don't take the time to mess with it :realmad:
 
We have one and like it but you do need to monitor it closely. Too much humidity can be real bad. I had it too high one winter and got condensation in my attic. This caused water to start discoloring my ceiling in different spots.
 
I've had them in two different houses and think they make a huge difference. Neither one was very hard to take care of.
 
My old one died and I did the same thing, water valve went out and it was cheaper to buy a new one then fix the old.. Honeywell is easy to install and run. Huge difference on how we sleep and we do not wake up all stuffed up.
 
My humidifier says the colder the temp the lower I should set the humdity. Is that right?
 
This is what we have:

Shop Honeywell Whole House Humidifier at Lowes.com

It works great. Need to replace the media a couple time a season. I installed my own. Instead of the sail switch, which is a cheesy device, I put a current sensing relay on the fan that controls when the humidifier will run. If the fan comes on, the humidifier runs and controls to the humidistat set point.

However, I don't think this model has an outdoor air temperature sensor. I will say I really wish I had one because, it adjusts the amount of humidity put into the house automatically. As it gets colder out, condensation on the windows becomes an issue. The the sensor, you can tune your system to keep the condensation from happening.
 
When we got a new furnace ~5 years ago we had one installed at the same time. We still have to run a big evaporative humidifier in the dining/living room area and a small room warm-mist in the bedroom to keep the main living area manageable. The unit is serviced twice a year when Neighbors comes out to do the maintenance work.

If I had known how little it actually does in our house I would have saved the money.
 
I have one installed on my furnace connected to the water heater and i can definitely notice a difference.
 
MNCyGuy said:
I've always heard that they are only marginally effective and are prone to getting pretty gross unless you're really on top of the maintenance.
Click to expand...

You just have to change the filter twice a year during the winter and make sure you shut it off in the summer. That being said, I am not sure how effective they really are. My house has 31% humidity with the thing cranked.
 
Don't do it. Worst thing I've done so far in my house. Used it for about a week and the moisture in the house was so insane. The windows were just dripping with condensation and at night some would freeze on the windows. This is only at a 30% setting as well (they'll tell you to set it at 35 or 40%).

Worst $400 I ever spent.
 
Having a humidifier will let you run your thermostat a couple degrees colder and still feel warm. Plus they are a must if you have a lot of woodwork and do not want it to crack during the winter.

Do not go the bypass duct route. I had one and it did a horrible job of maintaining humidity. Get one with its own fan like the one posted earlier from Lowes. Maintenance is not bad if you keep up with it. Ignore it and you can get a mold or scaling problem.
 
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