Dehumidifier Buying Guide
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If you've got damp air in your house, buying a dehumidifier is the first solution to fight back. An excellent dehumidifier removes the moisture in the air, thus making your home more comfortable and healthy. Here's how to find the best dehumidifier for your home and budget.
- Finding the Best Dehumidifier for You
- Benefits of a Dehumidifier
- Ideal Places for a Dehumidifier
- Which Type of Dehumidifier Do You Need?
- Choosing the Right Size Dehumidifier
- Draining Methods of Dehumidifiers
- Features That Count
- Noise Level
- Dehumidifier Maintenance
- How Dehumidifiers Work
Finding the Best Dehumidifier for You
Before buying a dehumidifier, you should consider the room size, dehumidifier price, and where you’re going to place the unit.
Benefits of a Dehumidifier
To put it simply, dehumidifiers remove moisture from the air to lower the relative humidity in your home. By doing so, they improve the overall indoor air quality and create a comfortable environment for you and your family. Here are some of the benefits of using a dehumidifier at home.
Reduce Mold and Mildew
Dehumidifiers decrease the likelihood of mold and mildew growth on windows, pipes, ceiling tiles, carpet, drywall, and more.
Water Leakage and Flooding Cleanup
Using a dehumidifier to assist with water leakage and flooding cleanup can be hassle-free. It can also work like a vacuum cleaner to absorb the extra moisture to quicken the drying process.
Prevent Musty Odors
By maintaining a healthy indoor humidity level, dehumidifiers help prevent musty or foul smells to create a a comfortable environment.
Alleviate Allergy Symptoms
Dehumidifiers reduces the airborne dust or other allergy triggers, such as dust mites, pollen, animal or pet dander, mold, and mildew.
Reduce Pest Issues
Less moisture in the air makes it difficult for the pests (such as cockroaches, spiders, silverfish, and centipedes) to survive.
Save Energy Costs
A dehumidifier can supplement your central air conditioner when keeping the desired humidity level. It reduces your energy costs.
Ideal Places for a Dehumidifier
You can place a dehumidifier in places that have the highest humidity level. Common places includes:
Basements
Crawl spaces
Single rooms
Bathrooms
Laundry rooms
Bedrooms
Wine cellars
Water-damaged areas
Which Type of Dehumidifier Do You Need?
Home Dehumidifiers
Portable residential dehumidifier are designed for general home or office use. Typically, they remove between 8-60 pints of moisture from the air per day.
Commercial Dehumidifiers
Unlike home dehumidifiers, commercial or industrial dehumidifiers are larger and heavier-duty. They’re made for businesses spaces such as warehouses, gyms, and factories, and usually remove between 150-250 pints of moisture per day.
Whole-House Dehumidifiers
To remove moisture in all your rooms, the whole-house dehumidifier is built into your central HVAC system. It features a refrigerant system that draws warm air into the coils.
Desiccant Dehumidifiers
A desiccant dehumidifier utilizes an absorbent material called a desiccant to extract moisture from the air. It works by slowly turning a wheel through the humid air.
Choosing the Right Size Dehumidifier
A dehumidifier’s size is measured by the number of pints of moisture the unit can remove within 24 hours. For a dehumidifier to work efficiently, you must consider the room size, moisture sources, and how much moisture will need to be removed at given time.
Small room humidifiers are capable of removing between 30 and 35 pints of moisture a day. They can’t deal with very damp areas like medium or large-capacity dehumidifiers but can be quite affordable.
Medium sized rooms require dehumidifiers that remove as much as 50 pints per day.
Large room humidifiers should be able to remove between 60 and 70 pints of moisture per day.
Draining Methods of Dehumidifiers
There are 3 ways to drain the dehumidifier: manually emptying the bucket, connecting a garden hose to drain via gravity, and adding an external pump.
Manually emptying the water bucket can be really a hassle when the space is very damp or wet. Therefore, most dehumidifiers provide a small length of hose that allows condensate to flow directly out of the dehumidifier. Under some circumstances, you need a condensate pump to drain the dehumidifier.
The inbuilt pump collects condensate in a small reservoir. Once it reaches a certain point, it expels and pushes the water up to 25 ft high.
Features That Count
Most portable dehumidifiers now have many practical functions to ensure convenient use. Here are some of the features to look for when you buy a dehumidifier.
User-Friendly Controls
Electronic controls allows you to set the humidity level easily. Independent touch buttons let you simply set your desired air conditions.
Automatic Defrost
Dehumidifiers usually have an inbuilt evaporator that will automatically defrost to prevent it freezing. This will extend the service life of the machine.
Programmable Timer
You can set a timer to let the dehumidifier work for 1-24 hours. This function will help save your energy cost.
Bucket Full Indicator
When the bucket is full of water, the dehumidifier will automatically turn off and the indicator will light up to remind you that the bucket needs to be emptied.
Washable Filter
Most dehumidifiers come with washable and reusable filters. This eliminates your cost on filter replacements, and helps the environment by reducing waste.
Castor Wheels
The castor wheels at the bottom of the dehumidifier allow you move it from one place to another. This is very helpful, especially for the heavy commercial dehumidifiers.
Noise Level
Most dehumidifiers makes upwards of 50 decibels (dB) of noise. It’ loud enough to be annoying , especially if the dehumidifier is placed in your living room or bed room. Some dehumidifiers have two-speed fan which run quietly at low speed. It’s a good idea to test a dehumidifier’s noise level before you purchase.
Dehumidifier Maintenance
Dehumidifiers require regular cleanings to prevent scaling and mildew growth. You can make the routine maintenance by the following steps:
Clean the Body: Wipe the machine body with a soft, damp cloth.
Clean the Filter: Remove the filter from the unit and run a vacuum cleaner lightly over the surface of the air filter to remove dirt. If the air filter is exceptionally dirty, you can wash it with warm water and a mild cleanser and dry it thoroughly.
How Dehumidifiers Work
Dehumidifiers utilizes a fan to force air over cold evaporator coils. After that, the damp air will become condensate water and the dehumidifier will blow out hot air. Compared with air conditioners, dehumidifiers are designed to remove the moisture from the air and recirculate it back into the room.