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Bathrooms Heating & Air Conditioning Electrical Wiring

Bathroom Vent Fan

last year

We removed a ceiling fan from our master bath and are considering putting a vent fan/heater/light combo in its place. There is currently a vent fan in the toilet room to the left which we have removed the door from. My question is if we added the fan in the main bathroom area would we just use the existing vent duct and remove the one for the toilet room? Keep both and create a second outdoor vent? Or somehow vent them both out of the same exterior vent?

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Comments (5)

PRO
Charles Ross Homes
last year
Depending on the configuration of your bathroom, a bath vent fan can serve to exhaust moisture, odors or both.

I suggest you keep the vent fan in the toilet area and add one in proximity to the shower to deal with the moisture--each with it's own dedicated exhaust duct to the exterior. I have a timer on mine that runs the exhaust fan in the shower for 30 minutes after a shower to lower the relative humidity in the bathroom. It's not without expense, but it's a preferable alternative to mold.
3onthetree
last year
+1 on leave the toilet room exhaust. That is historically what exhaust was only required for. Now, code has updated wording to include "bathrooms," but doesn't talk about humidity (yet). HVI has more in-depth recommendations for bathroom exhaust and ventilation.

You can only combine ducts if you are pulling the exhaust from 1 attic/roof sourced fan. When you are pushing the exhaust from ceiling sourced fans, you need to keep 2 separate ducts with each their own discharge.

You have options for the shower. Based on the finishes I see in the pic and thus the level of bathroom, a combo recessed light/vent inside the shower footprint might fit well. Or a light inside, with exhaust/heater outside the footprint. With a combo light/exhaust/heater, it will all be moved just outside the shower footprint, so make sure you're fine aesthetically with that next to the old ceiling fan light outlet - I'd guess you will be putting a chandelier there. And don't have the shower light switched to any of the same switches as the chandelier, toilet, or vanity lights.
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Thanks--your timing is impeccable since we still haven't gotten around to this and I was just working on figuring out exactly which fan to get! We've decided to stick with Panasonic in spite of our bad experience because it is the easiest to fit into the space (same size) and everyone else seems to have good experiences with them, so hopefully ours was just a lemon. Do you have recommendations of specific Panasonics other than the Whisper Fit Lite, though? Our current dead fan is theoretically more than powerful enough for the space (twice what we need based on the linked site) and as far as we know the ducting is good to go (was put in when the fan was four years ago) but we never got very good venting from the first fan. Possibly whatever caused it to die was also he cause of the earlier issues, though.
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We started with Nutones in our 1989/90 whole house remodel. I would hope they have improved their quality as both fans got progressively noisier over the years, to the point where the larger fan in the master bathroom could be heard on the ground floor. In 2003 we dumped both Nutones for the Panasonics. So far so good, no increase in noise. Contractor who did the install was impressed with the build quality on both (one was the 70 cfm size, the other is the big WhisperWarm).
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Comments (1)
There are two ways. 1. Use three way switches so that either bath can turn off/on the fan. 2. Use two single switches wired in parallel. Either switch will turn the fan on but both switches need to be off for the fan to be off. These can be timers if you like. With this set up you can leave the bath and turn off fan. However if someone else is in the other bath the fan will continue to run until they leave and turn off the fan also.
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Comments (3)
Usually the grill that covers the fan is on spring clips that will snap the grill up to the ceiling hiding any unevenness in the fan level. Is yours not like that?
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plan2remodel
last year
Are you in California? If so, you cannot add a light on the same switch as the exhaust fan and you must have a humidity sensor on the exhaust fan.
PRO
Charles Ross Homes
last year
I'll second the recommendation to install a combo bath fan/recessed light in showers. It provides excellent moisture control and it's unobtrusive.

I can't tell the distance from the edge of the tub to the former ceiling fan mount from the photo, but the 2018 International Residential Code, which forms the core of most statewide building codes, (section E4003.11) doesn't permit the installation of cord-connected, chain or cable hung luminaries, lighting tracks, pendants or ceiling-suspended paddle fans in the zone measured 3 ft horizontally and 8 ft vertically from the edge of the tub. Check that before deciding what to install there.
wdccruise
last year
last modified: last year
Note the electrical requirements. Examples:
- Panasonic FV-0511VHL1 - requires 120 volt, 20 amp dedicated circuit
- Broan QTX100HL - requies 120 volt, 20 amp dedicated circuit
You may not be able to use the circuit that was used for the fan. That may be a 15-amp circuit and one shared with outlets and other lights.

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