Aprilaire 600 humidity output

[Hongyi Kang]

I'm extremely new here so please let me know if I'm posting things at the wrong place. I recently (3 months ago) installed a new Trane 2 stage ECM furnace and along with it an Aprilaire 600 whole house Humidifier. It's upstate New York here, I've been setting the the thermostat to 73 degree, so furnace officially started working since late September.

The furnace and humidifier were installed by a local contractor.
I set the manual humidistat to 45% since the very beginning. And I have another small humidistat clipped right on one of the second floor registers where the hot air comes out. The humidity reading had been between 45% and 50% until about 2 weeks ago.

Two weeks ago the weather here really started to drop(ranging between 29 degree and 50 degree). And shortly after I started to feel air being dry at night. The humidity reading in the bedroom was somewhere around 33%. And when I put the humidistat right by the register(when the furnace is on and outputting hot air), it read 16%, that's what I was concerned about.

Here's the current information about the humidifier:

I hear the water flowing when the furnace is on, when I open it I see water in the distribution chamber and flowing through the four holes. I also see water flowing down the drain and feel hot air supply coming from the open damper.

I called the contractor company a few days ago, a service guy came in and said everything was fine, then he said my 4 inch air filter was plugged, therefore humidity couldn't go through. He charged me for a new air filter and a partial service call, because no faulty equipment was found, even though they told me the filter would last a year when they sold it to me. I was fine with everything if the problem was resolved, but the thing is, for the two days after the filter was replaced, the humidity reading by the register was still 16%. I actually personally went into a hardware store and bought a brand new water panel for the humidifier, still no improvement on humidity.

Me and my wife just had a baby 3 weeks ago and my wife had had this coughing problem for a long time, she feels much better when the air is not dry, so I was trying to give them the most comfort I can by getting the new furnace and humidifier. I'm not sure what kind of humidity level others feel good about, but we really hope we can get to around 45% here. Hope someone can help and sorry about the long post.

[Stormin Mormon]

Some Aprilaire have what's known as a bypass damper,
or valve. On some, there is a round disk that opens
or closes the round tube that comes from the other
duct. This needs to be open (handle points horizontal)
for the unit to work.

If you have AC, this needs to be closed (handle up and
down) for summer.

Please let us know how this works for you.

--
.
Christopher A. Young
Learn about Jesus
www.lds.org
.

[Hongyi Kang]

Thanks for the reply, the damper has been open the whole time. I could feel hot air coming from it when I open the humidifier.

[Stormin Mormon]

That was the only answer I could find. Please
call your service tech back to your house.

[Hongyi Kang]

Thanks Stormin for the effort! Really appreciate it!

[Stormin Mormon]

On 11/21/2014 8:13 PM, Hongyi Kang wrote:
> Thanks Stormin for the effort! Really appreciate it!
>

Quite all right. I worked in heating for years,
and installed a lot of Aprilaire humidifiers.

I also live in western NY. My humidifier is portable,
I have to fill it with a bucket.

[Tony Hwang]

Hongyi Kang wrote:
> Thanks Stormin for the effort! Really appreciate it!
>

Hi,
I have exactly same humidifier in my house(2600 sq ft 2 story with
finished basement) This humidifier is bypass type, so is the flap
controlling the air passing thru the water panel open? Or partially open
or closed? Also check if you can open the water cock more for
more water flow.
Hot air has to pass thru the panel to moisten the room air. Also
humidity has to be set in relation to outside temperature. During winter
I leave it at 30 to 35% and no higher to prevent condensation on window
panes. Panel can be reused after cleaning with CLR. Are you Chinese or
Korean? 저는 한국인입니다. Hope this helps.

[Tony Hwang]

Hi,
Forgot one thing. Make sure you have power att humidistat(24V AC).

[Stormin Mormon]

He said the bypass damper is open.

[Stormin Mormon]

On 11/21/2014 8:40 PM, Tony Hwang wrote:

> panes. Panel can be reused after cleaning with CLR.

Ideally, with the flow of water through, the
panel "never needs cleaning". But nothing is
perfect.

[Stormin Mormon]

On 11/21/2014 8:43 PM, Tony Hwang wrote:
> Hi,
> Forgot one thing. Make sure you have
power att humidistat(24V AC).

He said that there was water flowing.

[trader_4]

The panels in those last a year to maybe 3 years, depending on
how hard the water is. For the OP:

He said the water is running, so the unit is energized, but is that
all the time or does it shut off part of the time? I prseume he tried
putting the control to max to make sure it stays on more, but that had
no effect? If it's running all
the time, then it's not a control problem. That unit has an outside
temp sensor so it will lower the humidity as the outside temp drops,
which is what you want. But if it's running all the time, then that
isn't an issue.

How is it installed? Usually the unit is on the return side, with a
bypass duct going over to the hot side plenum. He says there is airflowing,
but how much? A lot? Usually they have a damper that you close for
the summer. Any chance it's mismarked, not fully open?

How large is the house? I've never been a fan of the bypass type
humidifier. I have the Aprilaire 700 which has it's own fan and
doesn't short circuit the blower air. I would think one possibility
is that the humidifier just doesn't have enough capacity. The fact
that the furnace is two stage, variable blower, might be a factor too.
I would think he might be getting less airflow, air not quite as hot
passing through it, etc.

If it's a capacity issue, changing the water feed to use hot water, which
probably isn't hard to do, instead of cold water will increase the output.

Finally, those little humidity meters are typically very inaccurate.
I've had 4 of them side by side, and they can read from 30 to 60.
If he googles he can find a calibrating procedure, where you use a
closed box with some moist salt in the bottom as reference. You can't
adjust the thing, but you can mark it +15 to know that you need to add
~15 to what it shows to get closer to the correct reading.

[philo]

I have a similar setup in my own house and when the unit is working
properly, there should be some drainage from the over-flow hose at the
bottom.

If there is nothing coming out, then not enough water is going in.

Check to be sure the water stop-cock is open far enough and also clean
out calcium deposits at the water orifice inside the humidifier if it
looks like only a small amount of water is flowing through the feeder holes.

[Tony Hwang]

trader_4 wrote:
> On Friday, November 21, 2014 8:52:22 PM UTC-5, Stormin Mormon wrote:
>> On 11/21/2014 8:40 PM, Tony Hwang wrote:
>>> panes. Panel can be reused after cleaning with CLR.
>>
>> Ideally, with the flow of water through, the
>> panel "never needs cleaning". But nothing is
>> perfect.
>>
>> --
>> .
>> Christopher A. Young
>> Learn about Jesus
>> www.lds.org
>> .
>
> The panels in those last a year to maybe 3 years, depending on
> how hard the water is. For the OP:
>

Hi,
If your water is not hard. Digital ATD type humidity sensor hardly ever
goes out of calibration.

[Hongyi Kang]

Thanks Tony for all the responses and thanks Stormin for helping again! Unfortunately I'm Chinese but I always wished I could understand Korean :D
If the flap you were referring to was the damper that controls the air flow from supply to the humidifier(the one that I could control with the horizontal/vertical switch), then yes I did double check and make sure it was fully on. I've also tried different water flow from the hot water supply, from minimum to maximum, humidity output did not change. The humidity monitor I was using was AcuRite 00613A1 Indoor Humidity Monitor. Bought from Amazon, not sure if it's okay to post links here so I'll just skip that for now. Anyways for the two years since I had it its performance had been satisfactory for me, it was able to sense humidity changes and never fluctuated when in a stable environment.

I just found out that the lowest reading this humidity monitor can have was 16%, therefore the hot air I was measuring probably was even lower than 16%, this is the main thing I was concerned about, and also why I think I might be experiencing something different from other people who has the same unit.

[trader_4]

You said you were measuring the 16% right at the heat register. Keep in mind
that the air there is much hotter than room temperature. When that air cools
down to room temp, the humidity will be much higher than 16%. You also said
that the humidity in the room was 33% and the outside temps were as low as
29F. If you set that unit to 45%, as the outside temp drops, the unit will
automatically lower the humidity below 45%, assuming it has the outside temp
sensor connected. When it's in the 20s you probably don't want it above 40%.

Also, a furnace hunidifier can't humidify when it's not on. If it's not
very cold out, then it may not run enough to be able to boost it as high as
you want. Depending on how it's wired up, if it runs when the blower is on,
you could run the blower constantly for a while to get more humidity out of it.
You'll get humidity out, just not quite as much as you would if the furnace
was firing. You apparently have hot water going into it, so that will help.

[Hongyi Kang]

Thanks Trader for the response! As far as I can see, the water is flowing when the heat is on and is not flowing when heat is off. The house is only 1600 sq ft so I thought the humidifier should be plenty. The unit is located on the return duct and the air supply comes from the hot air supply duct. The unit is running on hot water line and I tried various water flow on it, there was always water draining down the draining tube and the humidity output did not change. I'm getting another one of these humidistat in a couple of days, I'll test and see if they give the same readings. I guess my question right now is whether the humidifier ever fails to output what it should be outputting, or it's already working fine but I'm asking too much from it? I'm really curious if there are other people with the same kinda humidifier and similar outdoor temperature, what humidity they are getting from the hot air registers. The way this thing works is almost purely physics so I really can't imagine where could've gone wrong.

[Hongyi Kang]

Thanks Trader, your statement about hot air cooling down and then becoming much higher than 16% sounds reasonable, but I'm not sure if this hot/cold air difference will be able to account for the difference between the 45% and 16%. The humidifier should not sense the outside temperature because when I had it installed I specifically asked for them to not put in the automatic one, but the manual one instead. So the humidistat on the return duct is just a round knob pointing to different numbers, no digital display.

So I guess my question boils down to whether the 16% humidity right out of register is reasonable or not, if it is, I probably shouldn't even bother getting the service guy back in again. But if it's not, I'm thinking whether there are other hardware configuration problems involved that they could make improvements on.

Thanks again.

[trader_4]

IDK why you would not want the automatic adjustment. I wouldn't buy a unit
without it. Otherwise, you have two choices. Keep it set at a humidity
appropriate for the coldest temp, which will be less than what you'd likely
want most times, or else keep adjusting it as the temperature changes.

> So the humidistat on the return duct is just a round knob pointing to different numbers, no digital display.

The older models with outside temp compensation look just like that too.

>
> So I guess my question boils down to whether the 16% humidity right out of register is reasonable or not, if it is, I probably shouldn't even bother getting the service guy back in again. But if it's not, I'm thinking whether there are other hardware configuration problems involved that they could make improvements on.
>
> Thanks again.

Is the humidifier always on when the furnace is running, ie it's always
trying to raise the humidity?

What is the humidity in the house? Getting static shocks? Could be
the humidity gauge you're using isn't accurate.

If it's running, you stop it and quickly check the panel, is it wet all
over? I suppose if the unit is not level or similar, water could be
flowing only over part of the panel. There should be about a pencil
size stream of water flowing out the drain hose.

[Stormin Mormon]

On 11/22/2014 2:28 PM, Hongyi Kang wrote:
> Thanks Trader for the response! As far as I can
see, the water is flowing when the heat is on and
is not flowing when heat is off. The house is only
1600 sq ft so I thought the humidifier should be
plenty. The unit is located on the return duct and
the air supply comes from the hot air supply duct.
The unit is running on hot water line and I tried
various water flow on it, there was always water
draining down the draining tube and the humidity
output did not change. I'm getting another one of
these humidistat in a couple of days, I'll test and
see if they give the same readings. I guess my
question right now is whether the humidifier ever
fails to output what it should be outputting, or
it's already working fine but I'm asking too much
from it? I'm really curious if there are other
people with the same kinda humidifier and similar
outdoor temperature, what humidity they are getting
from the hot air registers. The way this thing
works is almost purely physics so I really can't
imagine where could've gone wrong.
>

I had an idea, which might sounds strange. In order
for the water to evaporate, it has to soak into the
white fibers of the media pad. if there is a lot of
mineral build up, the water might be sliding down the
outside of the pad, instead of soaking into the fibers.

Someone else suggested to soak the pad in vinegar, or
use some CLR to see if there is calcium carbonate build
up. I'd also wonder if a tiny bit of soap would help
water to soak in. Spray a little bit of some thing like
Simple Green detergent on the white fiber pad.

Just thinking, here.

[Frank]

On 11/21/2014 8:13 PM, Hongyi Kang wrote:

> Thanks Stormin for the effort! Really appreciate it!
>

I learned about the damper from the thread. Didn't know I had one and
don't shut it off. Have to do that next summer.

I don't measure humidity but Aprilaire seems to work OK but things do
dry out in the winter. I put in a new pad every year as old has a lot
of salts precipitated around it although I think it could work for a
couple of years without change.

[Stormin Mormon]

Leaving the damper open with central AC makes
it much more likely to freeze the evaporator
coil.

I'm wondering if the OP need to replace that pad,
might be the water is on the outside of the pad,
not soaking into the fibers.

[Don Wiss]

On Sat, 22 Nov 2014, trader_4 <tra...@optonline.net> wrote:

>How large is the house? I've never been a fan of the bypass type
>humidifier. I have the Aprilaire 700 which has it's own fan and
>doesn't short circuit the blower air. I would think one possibility
>is that the humidifier just doesn't have enough capacity. The fact
>that the furnace is two stage, variable blower, might be a factor too.
>I would think he might be getting less airflow, air not quite as hot
>passing through it, etc.

Yes, how large is the house? How well sealed is it? You may need two. When
I had Aprilaires I had two of them.

You can also improve it a little bit by having the fan run continuously.

Don. www.donwiss.com (e-mail link at home page bottom).

[Hongyi Kang]

Thanks Stormin for the thinking, I actually bought a new pad on Friday and put it in already, I had the side with the black mark facing up. Although it seemed to me that the side facing into the return duct also matters, I had the pad oriented so that the little holes in it go upwards, not sure if it's correct though.

[Don Wiss]

On Fri, 21 Nov 2014, Hongyi Kang <hongyi...@gmail.com> wrote:

>I'm extremely new here so please let me know if I'm posting things at the wrong place. I recently (3 months ago) installed a new Trane 2 stage ECM furnace and along with it an Aprilaire 600 whole house Humidifier. It's upstate New York here, I've been setting the the thermostat to 73 degree, so furnace officially started working since late September.

You are in the right place. But your posting with no carriage returns makes
it very hard to read your posts. One has to scroll back and forth.

[Don Wiss]

On Sat, 22 Nov 2014<tra...@optonline.net> wrote:

>What is the humidity in the house? Getting static shocks? Could be
>the humidity gauge you're using isn't accurate.

That is my test. Touch a metal light switch plate. If no static shocks
there, or any other place, the humidly is high enough.

[Hongyi Kang]

I didn't want the automatic one because I wanted to be able to adjust it to a higher humidity level when my family really needs it. But again I really don't think that is the issue here.

The humidifier is constantly on when the furnace is running, when I set it to 45%, but if I set it to ~30%, it stops.

The humidity guage I was using could possibly be inacurate, but I did have 2 years of experience with it and it had been functioning well, again I'm getting another one in to make sure, but if you think the whole model is just not accurate I probably won't be able to invest more money to get something better and more accurate.

I tried checking the water panel when it was running, but I could really tell the difference between wet all over and partly wet, am I supposed to see stream on every single wire or just a very tiny thin layer of water that's hardly observable? Or just drops of water here and there? The draining water seemed to all stick to the side of the tubing and not forming a stream.

[Hongyi Kang]

On Saturday, November 22, 2014 4:42:22 PM UTC-5, Don Wiss wrote:

I will have to learn how to post with carriage return then. Sorry about the inconvenience. :D

[Hongyi Kang]

I'll give that a shot, thanks!

[Stormin Mormon]

Don, the modern generation has no idea what is a
carriage, and less idea what is a carriage return.
That may take some explaining to computer users.

I some times have to reply, and then insert the
carriage returns as I've done with the quoted
text.

[Don Wiss]

On Sat, 22 Nov 2014, Stormin Mormon <cayo...@hotmail.com> wrote:

>Don, the modern generation has no idea what is a
>carriage, and less idea what is a carriage return.
>That may take some explaining to computer users.

In the OP's header I find: User-Agent: G2/1.0
Which I find here: http://www.g2reader.com/en/

I would think it has a setting someplace. But it appears to be a simple app
and not a regular application for a desktop computer. So maybe no settings.

[micky]

On Sat, 22 Nov 2014 16:44:21 -0500, Don Wiss <donwiss@no_spam.com>
wrote:

>On Sat, 22 Nov 2014<tra...@optonline.net> wrote:
>
>>What is the humidity in the house? Getting static shocks? Could be
>>the humidity gauge you're using isn't accurate.
>
>That is my test. Touch a metal light switch plate. If no static shocks
>there, or any other place, the humidly is high enough.

But doesn't that depend on what kind of carpet he has, if any, and what
kind of soles there are on the shoes they wear? They both have to be
right to get static.

In 30 years, I've never gotten a static shock in this house**, and for
at least 10 of these years, I've had no humidifier and I'm sure the
humidity was low. In fact an ivory came loose on my piano for the first
time in over 67 years. .

**Because the carpet is synthetic (I'm sure). I'm also not sure if the
rubber-like stuff on the bottom of my slippers and sneakers are the same
kind of rubber that would create a static charge if I had wool carpets.
or whatever pair works.

>Don. www.donwiss.com (e-mail link at home page bottom).

AIUI, there are no good humidity gauges that the average person can
afford. That would include the gauge the OP is checking the humidity
with, and the gauge inside the humidifier that attempts to humidify the
household air to a desired humidity.

OP, have you tried just turning that " round knob pointing to different
numbers" to a higher number? Even if those numbers are supposed to be
the percent humidity that the unit will deliver, that doesn't mean they
are. The furnace control in the 50-apartment building I used to live
in didn't attempt to give a temperature, only heat output, for which one
could set it to A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H. I think only by trial and
error did the first landlord** find what was the right setting. The
analogy is not perfect, but I think that's how you'll find it too.

Maybe you can borrow another better than average hygrometer from
someone.

Or just set the humidity to maximum, and when water starts dripping off
your windows, etc. keep setting it down a little at a time until nothing
bad is happening, no dripping anywhere that matters, and that will be
the highest humidity your home can have, anyhow. Regardless of your
hardware. Then mark that spot on your knob dial. And you can also
probably find out what the %age is, and interpolate what all the other
numbers on the dial mean.

It bothers me that he charged you for part of a service call because HE
could not find anything wrong. Were you very clear that something WAS
wrong. But in a way there's no point in crying over spilt milk, and
just calibrate the humidifier yourself.

[Hongyi Kang]

Thanks for the warm reply! I have no carpet in the house and am wearing bamboo slippers all the time, not sure how that's gonna affect static shock though. The 45% is actually the highest setting on this humidifier. I wish I could crank it up any higher lol. However I am seeing frost on the window, is that a sign of too much humidity then? So I should probably never rely on humidity measurement coming out of the register but instead just judge by the water on window. This whole measuring humidity thing actually started because my wife woke up on a morning about two weeks ago telling me her throat had been burning the whole night and she had to drink water every hour to feel a little better.

I put the humidistat on one of the return registers on the floor on first floor this afternoon and it read 36%. This number actually is consistent with the humidistat by the humidifier, because when I turned the humidistat to under 35%, it would stop the hot water feed to the humidifier. Maybe just like Stormin said, I might need two of these... Or maybe it's time to bleach clean my portable one again XD.

[micky]

On Sat, 22 Nov 2014 16:42:15 -0500, Don Wiss <donwiss@no_spam.com>
wrote:

Don, you're using Agent 1.93, the same as I am. I was about to tell
you to just turn on word wrap, with O.

But I looked at his op and found that it looked the same with wordwrap
on or not. And its lines are only about 70 characters, though they
all end with = except the last line in a paragraph.

So obviously one of Agent's other many parameters is set different for
you and me. I don't want to go over ever singlee one of them, but if
you have a couple suggestions, I'll check what my settings are.

You're right, when I reply to the OP and quote it, each paragraph is one
line with one > in front of it. But it still only spans the width of
my not new, not wide monitor. There is a scroll bar at the bottom,
though nothing to the right to scroll to. Of course I'm in full-screen
mode (for Agent and anything else that will go full screen.)

[Hongyi Kang]

I kind of get what carriage return means here now, I guess the paragraphs I
typed all just went into one single line? I'm pressing enter at the end of
every line I'm typing now, hope that will help! I'm just using google
chrome on a desktop computer to read and post right now. Not sure if there
is any app i'm using.

[micky]

At least for the sake of testing, you can raisse the humidity further by
putting a big pot of water on the stove and boiling it until it's almost
dry. (You can boil it dry for that matter without hurting most pots that
much.) And/or you can stopper the bathtub, turn on the shower all
hot, and just make sure you don't overflow the tub. (You could leave
the tub unstopped, but that's a waste of hot water, and not as
effective, because the water steams off of the surface as much as the
spray.)

It's certainly worth doing this once, to see if it helps your wife. If
it doesn't, then you can just stick with the humidifier as you have it.

The boiling water is better than the shower, I think. You can just keep
adding more hot water to the boiling water, but you can only let the
bathtub fill up so high, and I won't drain the tub until the water is
room temperature.

Both of these, btw, are good ways of making the house feel warm, by
raising the humidity, when the furnace is broken.

> However I am seeing frost on the window, is that a sign of too much humidity then?

It's only too much if it bothers you for some reason. It would bother
some of the people here, I think, or at least water on the windows
would, but they don't have a wife with a sore throat. The only
problem with the water is that it might damage the paint on the windows
sills, but you might not have paint or even sills, and you have to
repaiint painted ones once in a while anyhow.

They also worry about mold. I've had black mold for other reasons and
it doesn't bother me, but I'm sure it does bother some people. I killed
it either by removing the source of the wetness (a lot of water just
outside) or with bleach, or with paint with mold suppressor added.
(I thought killing it with bleach would make it turn white again, but
that was silly.)

>So I should probably never rely on humidity measurement coming out of the register but instead just judge by the water on window. This whole measuring humidity thing actually started because my wife woke up on a morning about two weeks ago telling me her throat had been burning the whole night and she had to drink water every hour to feel a little better.

This had not bothered her like this before?

Maybe she was also sick with something that she doesn't have anymore.
Or does have and should be treated for it.

So it made her feel worse than it normally will.

[micky]

On Sat, 22 Nov 2014 17:20:42 -0500, Don Wiss <donwiss@no_spam.com>
wrote:

>On Sat, 22 Nov 2014, Stormin Mormon <cayo...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>>Don, the modern generation has no idea what is a
>>carriage, and less idea what is a carriage return.
>>That may take some explaining to computer users.
>
>In the OP's header I find: User-Agent: G2/1.0
>Which I find here: http://www.g2reader.com/en/

I can't look here right now.

>
>I would think it has a setting someplace. But it appears to be a simple app
>and not a regular application for a desktop computer. So maybe no settings.

I've seen User-Agent: G2/1.0 many times, for years, and I thought it was
a regular application program.

[trader_4]

You can adjust the ones that have compensation for outside temperature,
just like you can adjust the one you have. If you want it high, just turn
it up. I guess it would prevent you from setting it to 50% when it's 15F
outside, but that would seem to be a good thing. What the the ones with outdoor temp compensation will do is reduce
the humidity when it gets cold outside. So, if you have it set to 45% when
it's 40 outside, which is reasonable, if the outside temp drops to 20, it will reduce it to maybe 35%, which is more appropriate for that temperature, so you don't get condensation at windows, inside walls, etc. If you
don't have it done automatically, then you're supposed to be doing that
manually. Or else keep it set low enough all the time so that condensation
problems never occur.

> The humidifier is constantly on when the furnace is running, when I set it to 45%, but if I set it to ~30%, it stops.

So it thinks the actual humidity is at ~35%. Another factor here could be
the furnace sizing for the house. You said the house is 1600 sq ft. If
the furnace is oversized, ie too large for the house, then it's not going
to run very long and the humdifier won't have enough time to put out moisture.
Say a house should have a 70K BTU furnace and instead a 120K BTU furnace is
installed. The 100K furnace is going to run a lot less number of minutes
under the same conditions than the 70K furnace.

>
> The humidity guage I was using could possibly be inacurate, but I did have 2 years of experience with it and it had been functioning well, again I'm getting another one in to make sure, but if you think the whole model is just not accurate I probably won't be able to invest more money to get something better and more accurate.
>

As I said before, if you google you can find a simple procedure to calibrate
them. I've seen 3 of the same or very similar model, side by side, with
read outs that are 20%+ different.

> I tried checking the water panel when it was running, but I could really tell the difference between wet all over and partly wet, am I supposed to see stream on every single wire or just a very tiny thin layer of water that's hardly observable? Or just drops of water here and there? The draining water seemed to all stick to the side of the tubing and not forming a stream.

If you take it out and feel it, I would think it should feel wet all over
and/or you should be able to see that it's wet all over. There should also
be water over the whole top of the distribution tray. Have you placed a
level on the unit?

[Hongyi Kang]

I will definitely try both the boiling water and the bathtub. And thanks
for explaining the window water situation, I think we should be fine with
water on the window then. My wife have had this coughing and sore throat
problem for about 3 years, and it's mainly during winter that it's the
worst. Before I moved into this house I used a portable humidifier to keep
the humidity in bedroom high so that she feels better during the winter.
That was a little problematic because I had to shut off the dry hot air register in that room and keep the door half shut to keep the humidity to be
around 50%. But the room got kinda cold which aggravated her throat as
well. After we moved into this new house when I heard about this whole house
humidifier you can imagine how happy I was. I thought I could keep the
house warm and humid at the same time now :D. That's why I felt a little upset when it started to not function as expected since the temperature drop.

[trader_4]

On Saturday, November 22, 2014 6:17:26 PM UTC-5, micky wrote:

>

> > However I am seeing frost on the window, is that a sign of too much humidity then?
>
> It's only too much if it bothers you for some reason.


It would bother
> some of the people here, I think, or at least water on the windows
> would, but they don't have a wife with a sore throat. The only
> problem with the water is that it might damage the paint on the windows
> sills, but you might not have paint or even sills, and you have to
> repaiint painted ones once in a while anyhow.

If you get significant condensation on the windows, what do you think is
happening everywhere else that there is a similar cold spot, eg inside
walls, near electric outlets, etc? Having humidity too high when it's
cold isn't just a bother. It promotes mold, mildew, rot, etc.

>
> They also worry about mold. I've had black mold for other reasons and
> it doesn't bother me, but I'm sure it does bother some people. I killed
> it either by removing the source of the wetness (a lot of water just
> outside) or with bleach, or with paint with mold suppressor added.
> (I thought killing it with bleach would make it turn white again, but
> that was silly.)
>
>

There you go.

[Frank]

Pad appears to be a paper coated aluminum honeycomb. They mention paper
on the box but you can see aluminum showing through. It is not like the
sponge like pad I had on an old Sears unit which every now and then I'd
take off and soak in dilute vinegar to remove salts. When I replace the
pad each year I note a lot of dried salts which I vacuum out but pad is
not full of them. Pads are maybe $5-7 which is not a big expense.

In the summer, we shut off water to the pad and not sure what difference
it will make but will close mine next summer.

[Tony Hwang]

Hi,
I monitor every thing on my Davis weather station console. Right now
Outdoor temp. is 2C, indoor 20.5C steady, Dew point -2C, Outdoor
humidity 75%, Indoor 42%. Davis is pro grade instrument. In winter
time I try to keep condensation off windows keeping humidity level
proper. My humidifier is tied to furnace blower, so whenever blower
runs it does too.

[Hongyi Kang]

Thanks Tony for the info! As I remember you only set your humidifier to
30% to 35%? If you are getting 42% humidity from that same exact humidifier, in your much bigger house. I really don't see why mine can only get to 37% when set to 45%. Maybe it's just like what trader said, my furnace is not blowing enough. But really I felt the driest when the furnace was blowing.

[Tony Hwang]

Hi,
Today weather is mild so humidity can be high like that but when cold
like -30C I have to keep humidity down around 30% or little bit less
to prevent condensation. Summer time, a/c is running so humidifier is
shut off. Usually humidistat is mounted side by side with thermostat.
If you can turn on the fan on your thermostat, it'll circulate air
in the house for more even temp. and humidifier can run too. Usually
furnace cycles like 3 times an hour or so, but if you let the fan run
all the time, humidifier will run all the time too.

[Hongyi Kang]

I can definitely adjust the humidity level when there is condensation, the
thing is, I'm wondering if my humidifier is functioning right. My furnace
I believe is a 49,500/76,000 BTU, which I really don't know if it's too
much. But if it is, I should probably expect the humidity in house to rise
when the weather gets colder? So far we felt the driest and the humidistat
gave the lowest reading when the weather was lowest. We can see when it gets
really cold how the humidity is, but I really feel that it will just go even
lower. And that's what I'm worried about right now.

I checked the water panel, it was wet everywhere, and the unit was level as well, the distribution tray had water evenly distributed in it, all the 4 little holes had water going through and downwards.

[Hongyi Kang]

Hi Tony,

My humidifier is probabaly configured differently than yours, because when I
turn the fan to on instead off auto, the water supply to the humidifier doesn't turn on. It only runs when the heat is on.

[micky]

Yes, Enter is a carriage return (CR) It does help a lot, but you
shouldn't have to do that. Still, Don knows more than I do about
electronics, so he probably knows more than I here too.

> I'm just using google
>chrome on a desktop computer to read and post right now.

I think it takes more than that. Are you at a particular website,
like groups.google.com?

[Tony Hwang]

Hi,
Usually furnace control board has terminals marked "HUM" meaning
humidifier hook up there. Simply humidifier solenoid needs 24V AC
in series with humidistat. When humidity is called for contacts in the
humidistat makes supplying the 24V AC power to the solenoid. Aprilaire
package comes with a small 24V AC transformer for this purpose. In case
there is no "HUM" terminals. Then power source has to be tied into
blower power utilising that transformer. Turning fan on does not start
humidifier? you better call the service tech and ask him to make it work
like it should. Being a retired EE I always tell HVAC service techs
leave electrical part to me, don't bother with it. Once I teased a guy
who installed my high efficiency furnace and a/c for an upgrade, I asked
him to install wireless thermostat I got, he did not want to saying he
never installed one. I wish I were your neighbor, I could straighten
things out for you like nothing. Is your name 姜? My BIL
who is HVAC commercial estimator, mechanical engineer's name is 姜大薰.
Come to think of it, maybe they made the humidifier to come on when heat
comes on which is not ideal.

[Stormin Mormon]

On 11/22/2014 6:17 PM, micky wrote:
>
> At least for the sake of testing, you can raisse the humidity further by
> putting a big pot of water on the stove and boiling it until it's almost
> dry. (You can boil it dry for that matter without hurting most pots that
> much.) And/or you can stopper the bathtub, turn on the shower all
> hot, and just make sure you don't overflow the tub. (You could leave
> the tub unstopped, but that's a waste of hot water, and not as
> effective, because the water steams off of the surface as much as the
> spray.)
>
> It's certainly worth doing this once, to see if it helps your wife. If
> it doesn't, then you can just stick with the humidifier as you have it.
>
> The boiling water is better than the shower, I think. You can just keep
> adding more hot water to the boiling water, but you can only let the
> bathtub fill up so high, and I won't drain the tub until the water is
> room temperature.
>
> Both of these, btw, are good ways of making the house feel warm, by
> raising the humidity, when the furnace is broken.
>

When I was a teen, I used to put hot water in a
spray bottle and spray hot water mist into the
air near the ceiling. It would evaporate on the
way down. Quick and easy. Parents did not have a
humidifier, so I pumped water into the air.

The pot on the stove is an old favorite of people
who burn wood.

I agree, it's good for testing. See if she and you
both feel better.

[Stormin Mormon]

On 11/22/2014 6:33 PM, Hongyi Kang wrote:
> My wife have had this coughing and sore throat
> problem for about 3 years, and it's mainly during winter that it's the
> worst. Before I moved into this house I used a portable humidifier to keep
> the humidity in bedroom high so that she feels better during the winter.
> That was a little problematic because I had to shut off the dry hot air register in that room and keep the door half shut to keep the humidity to be
> around 50%. But the room got kinda cold which aggravated her throat as
> well.

Sounds like more humidity does good. The portable
humidifier sounds like it worked for awhile.

But, it would be nice to get the real humidifier
working properly.

[Stormin Mormon]

On 11/22/2014 9:32 PM, Hongyi Kang wrote:
> I can definitely adjust the humidity level when there is condensation, the
> thing is, I'm wondering if my humidifier is functioning right. My furnace
> I believe is a 49,500/76,000 BTU, which I really don't know if it's too
> much. But if it is, I should probably expect the humidity in house to rise
> when the weather gets colder? So far we felt the driest and the humidistat
> gave the lowest reading when the weather was lowest. We can see when it gets
> really cold how the humidity is, but I really feel that it will just go even
> lower. And that's what I'm worried about right now.
>
> I checked the water panel, it was wet everywhere, and the unit was level as well, the distribution tray had water evenly distributed in it, all the 4 little holes had water going through and downwards.
>

You know, it would be a bad surprise if the tube
from the heat to the humidifier had a damper in
it, and that additional damper were shut.

From here, it sounds like every thing "should" be
fine. I am puzzled.

May I please write you by email, not on the home
repair list?

[micky]

On Sat, 22 Nov 2014 16:03:22 -0800 (PST), trader_4
<tra...@optonline.net> wrote:

>On Saturday, November 22, 2014 6:17:26 PM UTC-5, micky wrote:
>
>>
>> > However I am seeing frost on the window, is that a sign of too much humidity then?
>>
>> It's only too much if it bothers you for some reason.
>
>
> It would bother
>> some of the people here, I think, or at least water on the windows
>> would, but they don't have a wife with a sore throat. The only
>> problem with the water is that it might damage the paint on the windows
>> sills, but you might not have paint or even sills, and you have to
>> repaiint painted ones once in a while anyhow.
>
>If you get significant condensation on the windows, what do you think is
>happening everywhere else that there is a similar cold spot, eg inside
>walls,

Why would there be cold spots in the interior walls? Or the exterior
wall inside the insulation.

> near electric outlets, etc?

AFA wwater near electric outlets, what's that going to do. Trip a
breaker at most.

I have an extension cord I use with my electric lawn mower. I've left
it outside for 10 years, day and night, 365 days a year lying in the
rain and under the snow. It's never tripped the breaker, and it's a
ground fault breaker that knows how to trip.

[Hongyi Kang]

I am indeed on groups.google.com

[trader_4]

On Saturday, November 22, 2014 11:28:42 PM UTC-5, micky wrote:
> On Sat, 22 Nov 2014 16:03:22 -0800 (PST), trader_4
> <tra...@optonline.net> wrote:
>
> >On Saturday, November 22, 2014 6:17:26 PM UTC-5, micky wrote:
> >
> >>
> >> > However I am seeing frost on the window, is that a sign of too much humidity then?
> >>
> >> It's only too much if it bothers you for some reason.
> >
> >
> > It would bother
> >> some of the people here, I think, or at least water on the windows
> >> would, but they don't have a wife with a sore throat. The only
> >> problem with the water is that it might damage the paint on the windows
> >> sills, but you might not have paint or even sills, and you have to
> >> repaiint painted ones once in a while anyhow.
> >
> >If you get significant condensation on the windows, what do you think is
> >happening everywhere else that there is a similar cold spot, eg inside
> >walls,
>
> Why would there be cold spots in the interior walls? Or the exterior
> wall inside the insulation.
>

Because insulation isn't put in perfectly, even in new houses. And
then you have areas where there is no insulation, or minimal insulation,
eg where there is an electrical outlet box, recessed lights, a pipe going
through a wall, etc. In old homes, who knows what you have. There are bound to be cold spots, and if excess humidity is condensing on the windows, it's bound to be condensing elsewhere, where you can't see it. Like maybe in the
attic, because vapor barriers aren't perfect either and an old home may not
even have one. Every credible
building authority that I've seen talk about humidity, warns that
excess humidity can cause damage and that you should not go above about 45%,
lower as it gets colder outside. If you want water stains, peeling
paint, rotting wood, that's up to you, crank it up to 75%+

> > near electric outlets, etc?
>
> AFA wwater near electric outlets, what's that going to do. Trip a
> breaker at most.
>

Fine, have water dripping out of your outlets if you want.

> I have an extension cord I use with my electric lawn mower. I've left
> it outside for 10 years, day and night, 365 days a year lying in the
> rain and under the snow. It's never tripped the breaker, and it's a
> ground fault breaker that knows how to trip.
>
>

Another sound practice. Who could argue with that?

[trader_4]

On Saturday, November 22, 2014 8:22:50 PM UTC-5, Tony Hwang wrote:

What does your weather station say the humidity is in Hongyi's house?

[trader_4]

There are a lot of humidifiers wired so that they are only on when the
burner is on, including mine. Nothing wrong with it, no problems here.
I do agree that if he gets his changed, then he could run it as much as
he wants, but I haven't found the need. It will have less output without
the benefit of the hot air though.

[Stormin Mormon]

On 11/22/2014 11:36 PM, Hongyi Kang wrote:
> I am indeed on groups.google.com
>

Worth noting, google groups is a portal
to Usenet, which is a much older message
system.

You are actually not talking (writing)
with google people for the most part.

[mako...@yahoo.com]

To op
If you want more humidity, did you try just turning the control upfull for a few days?
I try to keep the house at 40% in the winter and it takes a lot of water to do that.
And yes i get condensation on the cold glass, but that is normal, if you have
humidity and cold glass, you will have condensation.

You might try a warm mist vaporizer in the bed rom.
Make sure it is a warm mist type that actually heats the water, not the
spinning disc type that slings the water and not an ultrasonic type.

Unfortunatly the warm mist type need a lot of maintenance but that is just
The nature of evaporating water that contains minerals.

Get a digital humidity meter off ebay for a few bucks.

Also re google, with all the smart people they claim to have, you
would think they would get the Cr thing roght.
Maybe they are not as smart as they think.
The zoom feature also does not work right
When viweing google groups on an ipad.

Mark

[Tony Hwang]

Hi,
If you study furnace control board, humidifier and electronic air clear
are to run when blower comes on. Where I am in winter time R.H. can be
below zero(that dry), if it runs only when heat comes on, humidity in
the house will never reach to proper level. For various reasons blower
is on all the time at low speed. Some humidifier packages come with sail
switch to be mounted in the duct to sense the air flow and trigger the
humidification.

[Tony Hwang]

Hi,
It is free standing on a pole outside in my front yard. It measures all
the weather related parameters and relay that to my console via Wireless.
It has WWV synch'd clock, runs on solar/rechargeable battery combo. thru
USB port it is connected to NOAA net. They collect lot of local weather
conditions to micro manage forecasting. Check out the Davis products.
It is expensive but worth the money.

[Stormin Mormon]

On 11/23/2014 10:16 AM, Tony Hwang wrote:
> trader_4 wrote:
>> On Saturday, November 22, 2014 9:57:48 PM UTC-5, Tony Hwang wrote:
>>> Hongyi Kang wrote:
>>>> On Saturday, November 22, 2014 9:27:38 PM UTC-5, Tony Hwang wrote:
>>>>> Hongyi Kang wrote:
>>>>>> On Saturday, November 22, 2014 8:22:50 PM UTC-5, Tony Hwang wrote:
>>>>>>> Hongyi Kang wrote:
>>>>>>>> On Saturday, November 22, 2014 2:56:49 PM UTC-5, trader_4 wrote:
>>>>>>>>> On Saturday, November 22, 2014 2:37:55 PM UTC-5, Hongyi Kang
>>>>>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>>>>>> On Saturday, November 22, 2014 1:38:39 PM UTC-5, trader_4 wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>> On Saturday, November 22, 2014 12:54:35 PM UTC-5, Hongyi Kang
>>>>>>>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>> On Saturday, November 22, 2014 11:56:53 AM UTC-5, Tony Hwang
>>>>>>>>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>>> trader_4 wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>>>> On Friday, November 21, 2014 8:52:22 PM UTC-5, Stormin
>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Mormon wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> On 11/21/2014 8:40 PM, Tony Hwang wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> panes. Panel can be reused after cleaning with CLR.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
I

I
I [christmas presents]

[Hongyi Kang]

Oh that's really good to know! Thanks!

[Hongyi Kang]

Thanks Mark! I think my thing right now is, I don't think the humidifier is
putting more humidity into the rooms when the furnace is on. I actually
think it's drier when the hot air is coming out of the registers. This
really bothers the hell out of me because I don't know whether I should
trust my feelings, but the humidistat kinda agrees with me.

[Hongyi Kang]

Hi Tony, sorry I didn't reply earlier, passed out with my crying son last night XD. I will definitely ask the service tech about hooking the unit up with blower power. Haha if you were my neighbor it would be a lot of fun, cuz I've always been interested in EE, but I'm a bio major. My last name is actually 康, not sure if the character displays fine on your screen though...

[Stormin Mormon]

If the three of us were there in person,
we'd had it fixed by now.

[Stormin Mormon]

On 11/23/2014 3:20 PM, Hongyi Kang wrote:
>
> Thanks Mark! I think my thing right now is, I don't think the humidifier is
> putting more humidity into the rooms when the furnace is on. I actually
> think it's drier when the hot air is coming out of the registers. This
> really bothers the hell out of me because I don't know whether I should
> trust my feelings, but the humidistat kinda agrees with me.
>

I'd rely more on the wife being comfortable. I don't
care as much what a gauge says, it's people comfort
that is important.

[Hongyi Kang]

Agree, last night and today had been warm, and the humidity in the house
increased to ~47%. My wife said she felt better. I tried both the boiling and filling up bath tub methods last night :D, was a lot of fun lol.

[Tony Hwang]

Hi,
Please do it. My brother's name is 黃康秀, Koreans up to my generation
can read and write Chinese, they quit teaching in high school for a
while then they found out that was a mistake. They started teaching it
again, LOL! My daughter did microbiology in university and went on to
med. school, now she is a teaching doctor at local med. school.
(university of Calgary) Your furnace looks like a 2 stage one. Mine is
also 2 stage, 110.000 BTU at 96% efficiency. Kids grow up too fast, I
still remember carrying daughter on my back every where. Most memorable
is carrying her on my back I went down to the bottom of Grand Canyon and
back up.....

[trader_4]

I just looked at a Rheem furnace install manual. They provide a line voltage
humidifier output. It clearly says that it's active when:

the burner is on and
the blower is running.

Different furnaces may operate differently. You can wire a humnidifier to
run either only when the burner is firing, or whenever the fan is on. All
the ones around here that I've seen, have been wired to run only when the
burner is on and they provide sufficient humidity. I wouldn't want the
furnace blower running in winter when it's not putting out warm air.
My main point is that HK should know that it's not unusual to see them
wired the way his is before he accuses the installer of doing it wrong.

[micky]

On second thought, the bathtub is pretty risky. If you do it often
enough, eventually you'll forget and water will overflow who knows how
long, hours?

BTW, the overflow drain in tubs (and sinks too I think) doesn't drain
nearly fast enough to make up for a running faucet.

[micky]

If you want to fully appreciate Usenet, and its 10,000 newsgroups, you
can get a newsreader and news server.. You probably already have a news
reader, and others are free. And news servers run from $4/month, or
more, down to free.

[Hongyi Kang]

I got it, I will ask nicely then and see if they could do it :). Thanks!

[Hongyi Kang]

lol yeah, I figured I probably shouldn't do it every night :D

[Hongyi Kang]

I can totally see the happiness! I wish I could carry my son to the Grand
Canyon one day, that would be fun, I haven't even been there myself yet, sigh.

[Stormin Mormon]

On 11/24/2014 12:04 AM, Hongyi Kang wrote:
> On Sunday, November 23, 2014 6:07:51 PM UTC-5, trader_4 wrote:

>> On Sunday, Nove Hwang wrote:
>>> trader_4 wrote:

>>>> On Saturday, Novwang wrote:
>>>>> Hongyi Kang wrote:

>>>>>> On Saturday, Novembe Hwang wrote:
>>>>>>> Hongyi Kang wrote:

>>>>>>>> On Saturday, Novem5, Tony Hwang wrote:
>>>>>>>>> Hongyi Kang wrote:

>>>>>>>>>> On Saturday, Nov trader_4 wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>> On Saturday, No5, Hongyi Kang wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>> On Saturday, NTC-5, trader_4 wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>>> On Saturday, M UTC-5, Hongyi Kang wrote:

>>>>>>>>>>>>>> On Saturday,UTC-5, Tony Hwang wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> trader_4 wrote:

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> On Friday,PM UTC-5, Stormin Mormon wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> On 11/21/ Tony Hwang wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> panes. P after cleaning with CLR.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
I I
I I
I I [christmas presents]

[Stormin Mormon]

In the old days of usenet, it was bad manners to
leave excess old text, and keep sending it back
through the system. I think it still is bad
manners.

We can look at the last few people who wrote on
this message, to see who are the offenders.

[Stormin Mormon]

It is nice to have comfort. Sadly, sounds like
your humidifier is not doing the job. I wonder
if the furnace is over sized, and not allowing
for enough run time?

--

[N8N]

On Saturday, November 22, 2014 8:31:33 AM UTC-5, trader_4 wrote:
> On Friday, November 21, 2014 8:52:22 PM UTC-5, Stormin Mormon wrote:
> > On 11/21/2014 8:40 PM, Tony Hwang wrote:
> > > panes. Panel can be reused after cleaning with CLR.
> >
> > Ideally, with the flow of water through, the
> > panel "never needs cleaning". But nothing is
> > perfect.
> >

> > --
> > .
> > Christopher A. Young
> > Learn about Jesus
> > www.lds.org
> > .
>

> The panels in those last a year to maybe 3 years, depending on
> how hard the water is. For the OP:
>

> He said the water is running, so the unit is energized, but is that
> all the time or does it shut off part of the time? I prseume he tried
> putting the control to max to make sure it stays on more, but that had
> no effect? If it's running all
> the time, then it's not a control problem. That unit has an outside
> temp sensor so it will lower the humidity as the outside temp drops,
> which is what you want. But if it's running all the time, then that
> isn't an issue.
>
> How is it installed? Usually the unit is on the return side, with a
> bypass duct going over to the hot side plenum. He says there is airflowing,
> but how much? A lot? Usually they have a damper that you close for
> the summer. Any chance it's mismarked, not fully open?
>
> How large is the house? I've never been a fan of the bypass type
> humidifier. I have the Aprilaire 700 which has it's own fan and
> doesn't short circuit the blower air. I would think one possibility
> is that the humidifier just doesn't have enough capacity. The fact
> that the furnace is two stage, variable blower, might be a factor too.
> I would think he might be getting less airflow, air not quite as hot
> passing through it, etc.
>
> If it's a capacity issue, changing the water feed to use hot water, which
> probably isn't hard to do, instead of cold water will increase the output.
>
> Finally, those little humidity meters are typically very inaccurate.
> I've had 4 of them side by side, and they can read from 30 to 60.
> If he googles he can find a calibrating procedure, where you use a
> closed box with some moist salt in the bottom as reference. You can't
> adjust the thing, but you can mark it +15 to know that you need to add
> ~15 to what it shows to get closer to the correct reading.

yes on several things. Get some cheap humidor hygrometers and calibrate them using the salt method (google it) to verify RH in the house.

Then if everything checks out OK but the humidifier just can't keep up (a sign would be that it is constantly running every single time that the furnace is calling for heat) consider changing the water feed from cold to hot to increase the efficiency of the humidifier.

nate

[N8N]

On Saturday, November 22, 2014 2:37:55 PM UTC-5, Hongyi Kang wrote:
> On Saturday, November 22, 2014 1:38:39 PM UTC-5, trader_4 wrote:
> > On Saturday, November 22, 2014 12:54:35 PM UTC-5, Hongyi Kang wrote:

> > > On Saturday, November 22, 2014 11:56:53 AM UTC-5, Tony Hwang wrote:
> > > > trader_4 wrote:
> > > > > On Friday, November 21, 2014 8:52:22 PM UTC-5, Stormin Mormon wrote:
> > > > >> On 11/21/2014 8:40 PM, Tony Hwang wrote:
> > > > >>> panes. Panel can be reused after cleaning with CLR.
> > > > >>
> > > > >> Ideally, with the flow of water through, the
> > > > >> panel "never needs cleaning". But nothing is
> > > > >> perfect.
> > > > >>
> > > > >> --
> > > > >> .
> > > > >> Christopher A. Young
> > > > >> Learn about Jesus
> > > > >> www.lds.org
> > > > >> .
> > > > >
> > > > > The panels in those last a year to maybe 3 years, depending on
> > > > > how hard the water is. For the OP:
> > > > >

> > > > Hi,
> > > > If your water is not hard. Digital ATD type humidity sensor hardly ever
> > > > goes out of calibration.
> > >
> > > Thanks Tony for all the responses and thanks Stormin for helping again! Unfortunately I'm Chinese but I always wished I could understand Korean :D
> > > If the flap you were referring to was the damper that controls the air flow from supply to the humidifier(the one that I could control with the horizontal/vertical switch), then yes I did double check and make sure it was fully on. I've also tried different water flow from the hot water supply, from minimum to maximum, humidity output did not change. The humidity monitor I was using was AcuRite 00613A1 Indoor Humidity Monitor. Bought from Amazon, not sure if it's okay to post links here so I'll just skip that for now. Anyways for the two years since I had it its performance had been satisfactory for me, it was able to sense humidity changes and never fluctuated when in a stable environment.
> > >
> > > I just found out that the lowest reading this humidity monitor can have was 16%, therefore the hot air I was measuring probably was even lower than 16%, this is the main thing I was concerned about, and also why I think I might be >experiencing something different from other people who has the same unit.
> >
> >
> > You said you were measuring the 16% right at the heat register. Keep in mind
> > that the air there is much hotter than room temperature. When that air cools
> > down to room temp, the humidity will be much higher than 16%. You also said
> > that the humidity in the room was 33% and the outside temps were as low as
> > 29F. If you set that unit to 45%, as the outside temp drops, the unit will
> > automatically lower the humidity below 45%, assuming it has the outside temp
> > sensor connected. When it's in the 20s you probably don't want it above 40%.
> >
> > Also, a furnace hunidifier can't humidify when it's not on. If it's not
> > very cold out, then it may not run enough to be able to boost it as high as
> > you want. Depending on how it's wired up, if it runs when the blower is on,
> > you could run the blower constantly for a while to get more humidity out of it.
> > You'll get humidity out, just not quite as much as you would if the furnace
> > was firing. You apparently have hot water going into it, so that will help.
>

> Thanks Trader, your statement about hot air cooling down and then becoming much higher than 16% sounds reasonable, but I'm not sure if this hot/cold air difference will be able to account for the difference between the 45% and 16%. The humidifier should not sense the outside temperature because when I had it installed I specifically asked for them to not put in the automatic one, but the manual one instead. So the humidistat on the return duct is just a round knob pointing to different numbers, no digital display.

>
> So I guess my question boils down to whether the 16% humidity right out of register is reasonable or not, if it is, I probably shouldn't even bother getting the service guy back in again. But if it's not, I'm thinking whether there are other hardware configuration problems involved that they could make improvements on.
>
> Thanks again.

yes it definitely would. Hot air can absorb much more water than cool air. That is why in the winter the inside of your house is so dry to begin with - it may be 80% RH outside at 20 degrees but (let me google for a real number) that same mass of air heated to 65 degrees will be around 15% RH without having any change in water content.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relative_humidity
http://home.fuse.net/clymer/water/rh.html

So, the most accurate RH measurements should not be made at the register but in fact as far away from them as possible, as the air coming out of the supply duct will be warmer than the ambient temperature of the house.

Now that said, 16% does seem a little low, but it will definitely be lower than your target of 40-45% due to the temperature difference.

This is also why your humidistat is mounted on the return duct.

nate

[trader_4]

I believe he said it's already using hot water.

[Hongyi Kang]

This is definitely very useful information! I never knew this hot/cold RH difference before. I'll keep my humidistat by the return register then. Thanks Nate!

[Edward Reid]

On Fri, 21 Nov 2014 15:53:27 -0800 (PST), Hongyi Kang
<hongyi...@gmail.com> wrote:

> I set the manual humidistat to 45% since the very beginning.
> And I have another small humidistat clipped right on one of the
> second floor registers where the hot air comes out.

Just FYI ... the control device is a humidistat. The sensor (or gauge)
is a hygrometer.

You'd be surprised how much difference temperature makes in how much
water air can hold. I found a calculator at

http://andrew.rsmas.miami.edu/bmcnoldy/Humidity.html

and plugged in some of the numbers you'd quoted. It doesn't convert
directly from RH at one temperature to RH at another temperature, so
you have to take it in two steps.

If the temperature is 72F and the relative humidity is 45%, then the
dewpoint is about 50F.

If the dewpoint is 50F and the relative humidity is 16%, then the
temperature is 105F.

And 105F coming out of a register from a gas furnace is reasonable.

So yes, it's quite reasonable that the RH could be 16% at the register
and 45% in the middle of the room. Or IOW, 16% RH at 105F and 45% RH
at 72F are the same *absolute* humidity.

Edward

[Tony Hwang]

Hi,
Every house I had custom built and lived in always had humidistat
mounted side by side with thermostat. In present house I upgraded to
wireless thermostat which I can move around in the house and humidity
is monitored by humidistat still at location next to thermostat used to
be on a wall.

[Hongyi Kang]

Thanks Edward, one of the websites Nate posted earlier:
http://home.fuse.net/clymer/water/rh.html

actually had the conversion between different temperature's RH. And I just finished the salt calibration of my hygrometer, it's actually measuring 70% instead of 75%, so I guess it is 5% off. The temperature of the air coming out of the hot register was between 95 and 102. Based on these, I think my humidifier is probably working fine, just not enough yet for my wife's problem. I'll ask the service tech and see if they could rewire the unit so that it can run while the blower is on. Thanks!

[hrho...@sbcglobal.net]

If you are getting condensation on your windows, you have enough humidity. Whether or not it is comfortable is a separate matter. If the humidistat is set for maximum, that is all you can do if everything else has been checked out.

You might call the manufacturer and see if they would send out someone for free to look at your problem as a goodwill gesture. If you tell about an unsatsfactory service call and your wife and new baby, they might be more wiling to send someone out without a charge to preserve their reputation. It might not hurt to mention this series of posts on this forum and how it is hurting their reputation to not have solved the problem. A little pressure on them<g>.

[micky]

On Mon, 24 Nov 2014 19:28:33 -0800 (PST), Hongyi Kang
<hongyi...@gmail.com> wrote:

>
>Thanks Edward, one of the websites Nate posted earlier:

>http://home.fuse.net/clymer/water/rh.html=20
>
>actually had the conversion between different temperature's RH. And I just=
> finished the salt calibration of my hygrometer, it's actually measuring 70=
>% instead of 75%, so I guess it is 5% off. The temperature of the air comi=
>ng out of the hot register was between 95 and 102. Based on these, I think=
> my humidifier is probably working fine, just not enough yet for my wife's =
>problem. I'll ask the service tech and see if they could rewire the unit s=

>o that it can run while the blower is on. Thanks!

That' a very good idea. I had a room AC when I lived in a very small
room and the AC was right next to my bed, and the fan ran all night even
if the air had cooled off and the compressor wasn't running. I hated
the noise.

I took off the cover, and just had to rearrange three slip-on
connectors. I didnt' have to cut or solder anything, and when the
compressor went off, the fan did too. Furnaces and humidifiers are
more spread out so it probably won't be that easy, but it can certainly
be done.

Actually you only need one wire with two ends.

There is probably a neutral wire from the humidifier to a common neutral
somewhere . You can leave that alone. All you need is a hot
wire that runs from the hot wire where the blower gets its power and
goes straight to the humidifier, where the hot wire from the furnace
control unit already connects to the humidifier. So the power
doesn't have to go through the furnace control unit.

You ought to put a switch on the wire, for when your wife is fully
recovered, or for when you trade houses with someone from New Zealand.

[micky]

On Mon, 24 Nov 2014 23:46:36 -0500, micky <NONONO...@bigfoot.com>
wrote:

You also might (eventually?) want a humidistat to control this wire
too**. I didn't read all of the thead, but I'm guessing you want
higher than you have now, but lower than 100% RH. If you put the
blower on ON, so it runs 24 hours a day, you might well get more
humidity than even you want.

**You could probably wire it to inlude the current humidistat, but I
never read whether that was part of the problem or not. AFAIK yoiu
might need a second one set higher.

[trader_4]

If the humidity is already at 70 to 75% and you're intending to drive it
higher, you're almost certainly headed for trouble in NY. No building
science folks I've ever seen recommend humidity anywhere near that high.
About 50% is tops for a house in winter. And if it gets down to 10F or 20F
then more like 30% is tops. At 70%+ expect lots of condensation and likely
damage. The most I would do is keep maybe a bedroom higher, with a separate
humidifier.

[trader_4]

Are you aware that he said he had a variable speed blower, which
today is likely ECM?

[mako...@yahoo.com]

right.

and even with an old fashion multi speed blower there are complications. If you connect the humdifier directly to the blower motor, the humidifer will be fed with different voltages when the blower operates at different speeds.

The best way to deal with this is to add another relay to power the humidifer. A not so bad way to deal with it is to connect the humidifier to the HIGH speed tap. Then the humidifier will see full line voltage when the blower is on high and it will see LOWER line voltage when the blower is on low. This is not too bad usually. The worst thing you can do is connect the humidifer to a low speed tap. Then the voltage to the humdifier may get above 120 when the blower is on high speed, which can be very bad for the humidifer.

Bottom line, use a relay or be sure to connect to a the high speed tap and use a meter to check the voltage at the humidifer over all modes of operation.
Nothing is ever easy. :-)

Mark

[trader_4]

They have current sensing relays that can be added. But he may not even
need one. It's a modern furnace and they typically have outputs on the
control board for a humidifier, air cleaner, etc. First thing is to find
out what the furnace has and under what conditions it's activated.

Plus it looks like a moot point to me. After measuring the humidity in
the house, instead of at the hot air register, I believe the OP reported he
was getting 70 - 75% with the way it's wired now. He said something about
making it higher, but that's another story, and IMO, a bad idea.

>
> Bottom line, use a relay or be sure to connect to a the high speed tap and use a meter to check the voltage at the humidifer over all modes of operation.
> Nothing is ever easy. :-)
>
> Mark

Leaving what's working alone is..... :)

[Hongyi Kang]

On Monday, November 24, 2014 10:54:22 PM UTC-5, hrho...@sbcglobal.net wrote:
> If you are getting condensation on your windows, you have enough humidity. Whether or not it is comfortable is a separate matter. If the humidistat is set for maximum, that is all you can do if everything else has been checked out.
>
> You might call the manufacturer and see if they would send out someone for free to look at your problem as a goodwill gesture. If you tell about an unsatsfactory service call and your wife and new baby, they might be more wiling to send someone out without a charge to preserve their reputation. It might not hurt to mention this series of posts on this forum and how it is hurting their reputation to not have solved the problem. A little pressure on them<g>.

Thanks for the advice! Will certainly do.

[Hongyi Kang]

Oh the 70% came from the salt and water calibration you mentioned before. I put the hygrometer with water saturated salt in a zip bag and it read 70% instead of 75%, my room never was that high lol.

[Hongyi Kang]

I think Tony mentioned earlier that the humidifiers should come with a transformer which allows the blower power be hooked up with it, maybe I could ask the contractor and see if they have that?

[Hongyi Kang]

On Tuesday, November 25, 2014 9:25:35 AM UTC-5, mako...@yahoo.com wrote:

Tony mentioned that those humidifiers should usually come with a little transformer which transforms 120V to 24V I suppose, and can be used to connect the blower power to the humidifier. I might be able to ask the contractor that?

[Hongyi Kang]

Hi Trader, the 70% was actually measured in a zip bag with water saturated
salt to calibrate the hygrometer. My room was never that high. These a few days it had been warmer, the humidity had been aroun 45%-50%.

[Tony Hwang]

mako...@yahoo.com wrote:>>
>> Are you aware that he said he had a variable speed blower, which
>> today is likely ECM?
>>
> right.
>
> and even with an old fashion multi speed blower there are complications. If you connect the humdifier directly to the blower motor, the humidifer will be fed with different voltages when the blower operates at different speeds.
>
> The best way to deal with this is to add another relay to power the humidifer. A not so bad way to deal with it is to connect the humidifier to the HIGH speed tap. Then the humidifier will see full line voltage when the blower is on high and it will see LOWER line voltage when the blower is on low. This is not too bad usually. The worst thing you can do is connect the humidifer to a low speed tap. Then the voltage to the humdifier may get above 120 when the blower is on high speed, which can be very bad for the humidifer.
>
> Bottom line, use a relay or be sure to connect to a the high speed tap and use a meter to check the voltage at the humidifer over all modes of operation.
> Nothing is ever easy. :-)
>
> Mark
>

Hi,
ECM or X13 type motor draws power from main AC, Humidifier connection
should be there. ECM is servorized DC motor ans X13 is also DC motor
with speed taps. Rectifiers produce DC for them for main 120V AC input.
Look at the control board schematics and trace the AC input to blower
circuit. No relay or hard thinking needed.

[trader_4]

See the post from mako about blower motors. It's not as simple as
just connecting the humidifier directly to the blower motor, certainly not with
a modern variable speed blower. An older style multi-speed blower has
multiple windings that selectively get powered to get the various speeds.
New ones are typical ECM, with a complex controller on the furnace board
that drives the motor, not a wire with 120V on it.

[Hongyi Kang]

Hi Tony, my furnace was a Trane XV95, I can probably look through the manual
for the control board schematics? is that right?

[Hongyi Kang]

Hi Trader, the furnace I had installed was a Trane xv95. I will look
through the manual to see if it's possible. I'm also waiting for the
contractor company to call me back and let me know if it is doable.