rbaake Posted February 28, 2011 Report Share Posted February 28, 2011 Dryer (Electric) venting to the interior, I have a serious problem with this for several reasons and told my client today to vent it to the exterior. Problem is, after a Goole search it seems this may be legal in some areas. Any thoughts on this? Older condo, however I remember seeing in the 2006 IRC that a exterior vent is required. Download Attachment: D_Vent.jpg 34.36 KB Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Neal Lewis Posted February 28, 2011 Report Share Posted February 28, 2011 I would just tell them to install a condensing dryer, the type that doesn't use any venting at all. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jerry Simon Posted February 28, 2011 Report Share Posted February 28, 2011 Dryer (Electric) venting to the interior, I have a serious problem with this for several reasons and told my client today to vent it to the exterior. Problem is, after a Goole search it seems this may be legal in some areas. Any thoughts on this? Older condo, however I remember seeing in the 2006 IRC that a exterior vent is required. Download Attachment: D_Vent.jpg 34.36 KB Legal here. What is your serious problem with such? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
resqman Posted March 1, 2011 Report Share Posted March 1, 2011 Aside from dumping huge amounts of moisture back into the house? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rbaake Posted March 1, 2011 Author Report Share Posted March 1, 2011 Yes, what Bruce said. An mold issues. Also, it's a summer home with three small children and lots of laundry, the AC will be running constantly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Kogel Posted March 1, 2011 Report Share Posted March 1, 2011 Older condo, no duct work for an in suite laundry. This can be a problem, installing a vent so it isn't too close to someone's window. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Douglas Hansen Posted March 1, 2011 Report Share Posted March 1, 2011 Legal schmegal. ASHRAE 62.2 Ventilation and Acceptable Indoor Air Quality in Low-Rise Residential Buildings states that clothes dryers shall be exhausted directly to the outdoors, with the exception being condensing dryers. ASHRAE defines the standard of acceptable air quality as that toward which a substantial majority of occupants express no dissatisfaction with respect to odor and sensory irritation and in which there are not likely to be contaminants at concentrations known to pose a health risk. ASHRAE is the basis for the mechanical code chapters on ventilation, and this particular standard is adopted (without amendment) into some of the state energy codes. It doesn't matter if your state is one of them. I would say to the client that the main organization that has researched this topic finds most folks are uncomfortable with the dryer venting into the house. That little bucket arrangement only makes things worse. It is supposed to be filled with water to act as a lint trap. Let's see - take some humid air, pass it over some water to warm that up and cook the lint, and breathe deep. Yuck! A friend of ours recently showed off her condensing dryer to us. She is very happy with it. It doesn't bake clothes quite so brutally as a dryer that requires an exhaust - fewer wrinkles and not so scratchy. Douglas Hansen Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
inspector57 Posted March 1, 2011 Report Share Posted March 1, 2011 Somebody educate me. What exactly happens to the moisture in a condensing dryer? does it have a drain, condensate pump up to the washer drain, or simply re-evaporate it back into the room air? I've never seen one of these gizmos. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Terence McCann Posted March 1, 2011 Report Share Posted March 1, 2011 Somebody educate me. What exactly happens to the moisture in a condensing dryer? does it have a drain, condensate pump up to the washer drain, or simply re-evaporate it back into the room air? I've never seen one of these gizmos. I didn't know either - found this at the LG web site. How does the condensing dryer work? Individual condensing dryers use air-to-air condensers to remove the moisture from the air before sending it back though the drum. Hot, moist air exiting the drum is passed over a set of metal fins. Cooler, room temperature air is pulled from the room to pass over the other side of each fin, and the difference in temperature causes the moisture in the warm air to condense into drops of water, which are pumped to the same drain as the wash water. The warm dry air is circulated back into the machine; the room temperature air returns to the room virtually unaffected. (The estimated temperature increase in the laundry room is approximately one degree Fahrenheit for a ten by ten room.) I can imagine an air-to-air heat-x that looks like a giant hairball in 6 months. I'm sure there is filtration in front of it but..... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mthomas1 Posted March 1, 2011 Report Share Posted March 1, 2011 Dryer (Electric) venting to the interior, I have a serious problem with this for several reasons and told my client today to vent it to the exterior. Problem is, after a Goole search it seems this may be legal in some areas. Any thoughts on this? Older condo, however I remember seeing in the 2006 IRC that a exterior vent is required. Every manufacturer of electric non-condensing dryers I'm aware of requires venting to the exterior. Rather than argue about it, I have one of these for each major manufacturer to insert into reports: Click to Enlarge 26.02 KB Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mthomas1 Posted March 1, 2011 Report Share Posted March 1, 2011 Somebody educate me. What exactly happens to the moisture in a condensing dryer? does it have a drain, condensate pump up to the washer drain, or simply re-evaporate it back into the room air? I've never seen one of these gizmos. Most (for example the LGs I've seen) drain to a reservoir that is emptied after every cycle, or optionally to a drain (the LG drain connection is on the left rear, seen from the front). The LG manual I looked at was pretty sketchy about this - just says to connect to a "household drain" and there was no spec for maximum lift or line length. Presumably a dedicated interior drain connection would have to be via an indirect receptor as for other similar sources, and I expect that as these become common we will be seeing the same kinds of improvised drains we now see for AC condensate. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hausdok Posted March 1, 2011 Report Share Posted March 1, 2011 I've seen a few dozen condensing washer/dryers in a converted apartment building turned condo in downtown Seattle. They are pretty amazing. They didn't look to me like they produced clothes with less wrinkles as Doug saw though. Every pile of just dried clothes I saw sitting around in this homes was seriously wrinkled. I imagined homeowners sitting there with an iron and ironing board for hours every night cursing their decision to purchase. Perhaps those folks just weren't using them correctly. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dale McNutt Posted March 1, 2011 Report Share Posted March 1, 2011 An A/C system vs higher humidity translates into lots of wasted money. The A/C system is constantly trying to displace humidity in order to cool the living area. Some folks here in the southwest don't understand this when they run swamp coolers along with A/C devices. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ben H Posted March 1, 2011 Report Share Posted March 1, 2011 Dryer (Electric) venting to the interior, I have a serious problem with this for several reasons and told my client today to vent it to the exterior. Problem is, after a Goole search it seems this may be legal in some areas. Any thoughts on this? Older condo, however I remember seeing in the 2006 IRC that a exterior vent is required. Every manufacturer of electric non-condensing dryers I'm aware of requires venting to the exterior. Rather than argue about it, I have one of these for each major manufacturer to insert into reports: Click to Enlarge 26.02 KB Thats a good idea, care to share your image library? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mthomas1 Posted March 2, 2011 Report Share Posted March 2, 2011 Thats a good idea, care to share your image library? Well... I've got around 3,000 images that I have extracted from various sources for insertions into reports, and it takes around 5 mins to extract and format each one. That's around 250 hours - more than a month of full-time work - and that was the easy part, I had to find all this stuff in the first place. So not to seen un-gracious: but no, I can't just give that away. What I *am* always happy to do is point anyone who asks in the direction of hard-to-find documentation, and I appreciate it when other do the same. But the case of things like appliance manufacturer's instructions, it's pretty much just a matter of GOGGLING then up, and extracting and formatting the material as needed for a given report - do that for a while, and pretty soon you find you have a few thousand images! And for me, anyway, the payoff has been a lot fewer arguments with sellers, contractors and developers, and a lot fewer post-report questions from clients. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Erby Posted March 2, 2011 Report Share Posted March 2, 2011 Selfish prig! I'll bet you actually charge people for your inspecting time too, don't you. [:-monkeyd [:-monkeyd [:-monkeyd Ever consider commercializing your image library? By the way: GOGGLING - 1. To stare with wide and bulging eyes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hausdok Posted March 2, 2011 Report Share Posted March 2, 2011 Well, He's obviously a better businessman than I am. ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!! Mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.