High Humidity In Your Home? Check Your Duct System!
Let’s start today off by saying I am going to come to your house with three 5-gallon buckets of water and I’m going to dump one in the kitchen, one in the living room and one in the master. Then I am going to refill the buckets and dump them in the other bedrooms and the bath rooms. I don’t think you are going to be very happy with me am I correct? I mean seriously nobody in their right mind would do that right? You may very well be doing that exact thing to your house and you don’t even realize it. Let me explain.
We are beginning with a basic air conditioning lesson. For every ton of air conditioning you have in your home that machine produces around 400 CFM’s (cubic feet per minute) of air. So if you live in a 2,000 sq. ft. home you likely have a four ton air conditioner that is producing 1,600 CFM’s and sending it into your duct system. As a point of reference to understand a CFM think of it as enough air to fill up a basketball. Stay with me I’m going to tie this all together, I promise.
So, we are sending 1,600 basketballs of air into the duct system. The next question is how many of those basketballs are making into the interior of the home? Where would they go you ask? Very simple answer… it is highly likely the duct connection points in your attic are leaking. This is of course based on the age of the duct system, how well it was put together to begin with and has any maintenance been done to the ductwork? I find the typical duct system to be leaking around 200 CFM’s of air when we test them. Next thing to think about is where is most of our ductwork systems located?
The majority of our duct systems are located in our attics. The typical Florida attic on July 17th at 3:42 pm is going to be around 150 degrees with a humidity level somewhere around 85%. Not a very pleasant space to say the least. So back to our leaky ducts for a second, when the air is on and running it is moving thru the duct system at about 10 miles an hour. Any openings in the ducts allow air from the attic to be pulled into them so we are pulling hot humid air into the duct work from the attic. Ready?
FOR EVERY 100 CFM OF AIR LEAKAGE IN YOUR DUCTWORK YOU ARE ADDING 12 GALLONS OF WATER TO THE ATMOSPHERE OF YOUR HOME EVERY 24 HOURS
So if you have a leaky duct system (I’ll bet $100 bucks you do) you are doing exactly what I described in my opening statement. The duct system leaks are making your home more humid, making your air conditioner work harder and run longer, along with causing higher utility bills. One of my mentors many years ago said to me if you don’t test you guess, so yes, I am guessing your ducts are leaking based on the hundreds of duct systems I have seen over the last decade.
The only way to know for sure is to give us a call and let’s test your duct system and see how it’s performing. A duct system & home evaluation is $189 dollars and if you don’t see the value in the information we provide about what is happening in your home we will refund your money. Doesn’t get any better than that if you ask me.
Anyway, I’m off to see a mold filled attic (oh joy!!). Until we meet again friends, I ran into a pig the other day that was practicing karate, when I asked his name he replied I go by Pork Chop. (groan!!) House Whisperer out!!
