Humidifiers

Maintaining the right level of humidity in your home in the Greater Cleveland, OH area probably isn‘t something you think too much about. However, a lack of humidity in the air, particularly during the winter months, can become a real problem. Air that is too dry can cause all sorts of problems.

We offer several styles of whole-house humidification systems to help keep the humidity levels up in your home.

Problems with Dry Air

You probably know that air lacking humidity will quickly cause your skin and nasal passages to dry and crack. This creates a very uncomfortable situation and can lead to itchiness, burning eyes, bleeding and other unpleasant symptoms.

While these things on their own are quite uncomfortable, they‘re not the only health risks associated with air that‘s too dry. In fact, a lack of humidity can also intensify and exacerbate the symptoms of asthma, colds and allergies. This isn‘t just uncomfortable, but can actually become a health problem for anyone in your household suffering from these afflictions.

And if you do have one or more people in your household with asthma or allergy problems, chances are that you‘ve already invested in an indoor air quality system of some sort. Unfortunately, if your indoor air is too dry, it can actually impede the air cleaner or purifier‘s ability to remove contaminants out of your indoor air. And that will basically lead to a drop in the quality of your indoor air overall.

Plus, the dry air in your home won‘t hold the heat as well as properly humidified air does, so you‘ll have to keep turning up the heat to keep the indoor temperature at a comfortable level. With properly humidified air, you can often turn down the thermostat and still maintain a comfy indoor environment. This isn‘t just more pleasant generally, but it will also likely save you a significant amount on your winter energy bills.

The people in your house aren‘t the only ones that suffer from dry indoor air either. The truth is that with too little humidity in the air, many of your wood fixtures and pieces of furniture will begin to dry out, warp and crack. This isn‘t something you can undo once it happens and it can even begin to affect some of the house‘s structural supports if allowed to persist for a long period of time.

Indoor Humidity basics

Our homes dry out in the winter because the outside air is cold, and it leaks into our homes. So the leakier a home is, the more the dry winter air dries it out. All of our home also have humidity added to our homes – from plants, people, pets and our water appliances like sinks, toilets and showers. In some homes there is also a moisture gain from moisture or even liquid water entering the home through the foundation.

The ideal amount of humidity in our homes is 40-60% relative humidity. These levels are the most comfortable and healthiest. In the summer we work hard to try and have our air conditioners bring relative humidity in our homes down to 60%. In the winter we try to get the relative humidity up to 40% or more.

Click to view Skuttle.com Humidity Chart

One of the chief limiting factors of indoor humidity levels is water condensing on the windows. Unfortunately, as outside air temperatures drop, our windows can become pretty cold too. Depending on the quality of the window, we might have moisture forming on the glass at outdoor temperatures below 30 degrees if we have our relative humidity at 40%.

One of the second biggest issues with humidifiers is how to deal with the minerals that are left behind when water evaporates. In some older designs like those with sponge on wheel, this problem was not effectively resolved. Today’s designs use a variety of strategies to keep maintenance from becoming a problem.

Styles of Humidifiers

We offer 4 basic styles of humidifiers, each with unique benefits.

Basic bypass humidifier

This common humidifier style incorporates an evaporator pad on which to evaporate the water, and uses the air pressure from the furnace blower to move the air across the pad. It keeps maintenance under control by using excess water to wash the minerals left behind by the evaporating water down the drain.

Advanced bypass humidifier

This humidifier also uses an evaporator pad with the air flowing over it using the indoor blower to move the air. However this model uses a pulsing instead of continuous water flow saving lots of water. These models save up to 3000 gallons of water per year. When you are paying for water by the gallon and a sewer bill this can really add up.

Advanced fan humidifier

This humidifier has its own fan to move air across the evaporator pad. This is better than “stealing” the air from the system air as it provides more conditioned air to the home. This model also incorporates the water-saving pulsing water valve.

Steam humidifier

Other styles of humidifiers use heat from the indoor furnace to evaporate the water on the pad. The steam humidifier does not need any heat from the furnace as it evaporates water on its own. This type of humidifier is ideal when used with heat pumps or geothermal heat pumps, as they typically have lower temperature heating air.

Humidifier Controls

In the good old days there was only one type of control available to operate the humidifier. This manual control is still in wide use today. The homeowner sets the humidistat at a desired level of indoor humidity. If the humidistat is set at say 40% RH, that is great until the outdoor temperatures drop. Then moisture will form on the windows possibly causing moisture damage to the sill, window or wall. In that case the homeowner turns the down the setting on the humidistat. Several days later the homeowner may notice the home is drier and the temperature has gone up. He then needs to turn the setting back up to get more moisture in the home.

Today we have controls that automatically adjust the humidity setting to track the outdoor temperatures. These controls provide much better home humidification – putting more moisture in the home – which is why you purchased a humidifier to begin with. And it does it all - automatically.

Humidifying Your Home

At Apple Heating & Cooling we can help you select the best humidifier for your home. We will help with the correct size and style that is the best fit for you. We can discuss the cost of installation, and the cost of ongoing maintenance. We can discuss water consumption and the different types of controls.

You‘ll also want to make sure you know how to use and adjust the equipment so that you can maintain a comfortable living environment at all times. No matter what kind of humidity problems you have, the right humidifier can greatly improve the comfort level inside your home.

Of course, it can be hard to figure out exactly what you need in the way of a humidifier on your own. That‘s why our experts are always on hand to answer all of your questions and steer you in the right direction. So give us a call today and start down the road towards eliminating your home‘s low humidity problems for good.

And as always, equipment installed by Apple Heating & Cooling comes with our satisfaction guarantee. You must be 100% satisfied with your new humidifier or we will gladly remove it and refund your money in full. (link to satisfaction guarantee).

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