I purchased this exact model a few months ago, and agree with all of the criticisms. One curious point, however, is that while I don't see any difference in the hygrometer readings even when I put the hygrometer right above the device, the water tank does empty quickly. It's not clear to me how much water the air in my apartment can hold, such that a few gallons doesn't change the humidity even by more than 1-2%.
What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier
51–60 of 302 posts
Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier
#52I know it's not an option for a lot of people but a simple bypass flow-through humidifier attached to forced-air central heating is pretty hard to beat:
* The only "active" element is a solenoid water valve.
* Since water flows through once and then out a drain there's no standing water to grow mold (at the cost of extra water usage; mine is 3 gallons per hour though the humidifier is rarely on 100% of the time).
* Maintenance is a new water panel yearly (about $20) and some cleaning, again yearly.
* You need smart controls or to regularly adjust a manual humidistat to not over-humidify your house based on outdoor temperature, though this is exactly the same as with "portable" humidifiers.
Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier
#53I have one of these; the complaint about the fan being inaccessible is legitimate, but it's otherwise clean, and easy to clean - the tank and the base can be scrubbed by hand or just thrown in the dishwasher, unlike any vaporizing humidifier I've used. I think the other complaints may be regional - and the fact that the proposed solutions all seem to be vaporizing humidifiers (or boiling water) seems telling. I got o…
How do you deal with cleaning the handle part of the tank? It looks like the end can pop off, but I haven't tried.
Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier
#54Earlier quoted context omitted.
Convincing water to just evaporate on its own was always going to be a bit tricky. The energy needs to come from somewhere so your best bet is to just get it into contact with enough dry air and hope for the best. Besides if you're trying to restore humidity lost by heating your room then pure energy wise there's not that much difference in evaporating the required amount of water using ambient heat or evaporating th…
Even without a system that has >100% efficiency (i.e. a heat pump), home heating systems often use a source of heat that is significantly less expensive per watt than electricity. (For example, natural gas.)
Well that depends on what you're optimizing for, but yes.
Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier
#55The author mentions living in a New York apartment - I wonder if the lack of central heating and air means that their air is unfiltered, thus the only thing to collect the dust would be the humidifier?
I also have one of these and the only thing I really dislike about it is the 'glug glug' sound randomly throughout the night. But it is worth pointing out that I live in Texas and so I don't have extreme low humidity very often or persistently.
I wonder how a tote full of water with an aquarium pump, washable furnace filter, and fan would do.
Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier
#56As someone living on the east coast and having a very sensitive nose, I have tried different humidifiers and sadly no humidifiers have been perfect. There are three main types of humidifiers: 1. Warm mist humidifiers boil water and generate steam which humidifies the air. But, they are a burn hazard and consume a lot of energy. 2. Cool mist (non ultrasonic) work like miniature swamp coolers. They are essentially fans…
We used Ultrasonic humidifiers in a server room (to cut down on static risk) and I can confirm they get covered in minerals
Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier
#57The best humidity solution I've found is to set my shower up as a humidifier. Puts out a lot of humidity that spreads throughout the house. Doesn't need any cleaning, refilling, etc. Total cost on Amazon, like $40 (probably cheaper from Home Depot). Picture of my setup: https://imgur.com/a/Oca4USg I did that with 4-5 products: A shower head splitter, a shower->hose adapter, a mister, and anti-leak tape. Splitter: htt…
The larger humidifiers come with a humidistat which will keep humidity within say a 5% range. A solution like this may over humidify and requires more frequent intervention.
Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier
#58Earlier quoted context omitted.
Convincing water to just evaporate on its own was always going to be a bit tricky. The energy needs to come from somewhere so your best bet is to just get it into contact with enough dry air and hope for the best. Besides if you're trying to restore humidity lost by heating your room then pure energy wise there's not that much difference in evaporating the required amount of water using ambient heat or evaporating th…
Even without a system that has >100% efficiency (i.e. a heat pump), home heating systems often use a source of heat that is significantly less expensive per watt than electricity. (For example, natural gas.)
Gas-fired humidifiers exist, though I'm not sure if you can get small ones easily.
Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier
#59I'm in Australia, and I've lived in a lot of areas both inland (hot dry) and coastal and humidifiers are that common here. What is it in the US that creates the need/demand for Humidifiers?
Winter.
Winter in a house with a forced-air heating system just makes everything far worse. If you have the opportunity and the means, you want to go with a boiler, radiant in-floor heat, etc. Anything but forced-air.
By the way, in the winter we almost never use the dryer when washing clothes - always hang them up and they dry quickly and add their moisture to the air. We also open the dishwasher door as soon as it finishes and let the moisture evaporate into the air. Etc.
Re: What’s Wrong With The Honeywell Humidifier
#60As someone living on the east coast and having a very sensitive nose, I have tried different humidifiers and sadly no humidifiers have been perfect. There are three main types of humidifiers: 1. Warm mist humidifiers boil water and generate steam which humidifies the air. But, they are a burn hazard and consume a lot of energy. 2. Cool mist (non ultrasonic) work like miniature swamp coolers. They are essentially fans…
We used Ultrasonic humidifiers in a server room (to cut down on static risk) and I can confirm they get covered in minerals
Amazon reviews on ultrasonic humidifiers complained that their expensive home electronics died because of the dust.