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Heating & Air Conditioning

Humidity Level Help

13 years ago

Hi,

I'm having trouble keeping the humidity level up in my 3 storey + basement townhouse. Here are some details:

1) Size is about 2000 sq in 4 floors. Not the best insulated house, but not too bad. built in 1987

2) Had a GeneralAire 1042 whole house humidifier installed by a professional 2 years ago.

3) In winter, with the humidifier on, the RH% won't go above 25%. The house feels very dry

4) I also run a portable bionaire humidifier (4 gal output) all day and night. It helps raise the RH% to about 30%

5) Changed the filter on both units last week, no change in humidity.

6) The GeneralAire does seem to be working, although I don't know how efficient it is. It seems to drain a lot of water down the drain. I tried all kind of settings on the humidifer (M3 humidistat) but nothing seems to help.

7) The GeneralAire is set to work with the furnace cycle only.

8) I boiled 2 pots of water for about an hour. The RH% jumped to 53%. When I removed the pots, the RH% went back to 30% in about 1 hour.

Any experts here can suggest anything? I deally I'd like the RH% maybe around 40 in the winter and would be nice if I can use the GeneralAire alone without having to use a portable one.

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Comment (1)

veesubotee
13 years ago
Assuming that your humidifiers are working properly (and it appears so), it's likely that air infiltration is the main cause of your problem (i.e., a loose construction).

Being that your property is over 20 years old,your furnace is probably of the low efficiency type (less than 90% AFUE). Does the furnace exhaust through metal flue/chimney?

If this is the case, your furnace (and water heater if gas operated and LE) needs to 'pull' in outside (low humidity)in order to maintain a flame.

You should also note that as outdoor temps drop, the indoor humidity should be lowered so as not to cause condensation on windows and inside walls (not good).

Look around for any obvious leakage areas and try to seal/eliminate.

Good luck.

V
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