Whole house humidifier

[cubby]

I had some hardwood flooring delivered yesterday, and I noticed on the box it calls for 72 hours for the wood to adjust to the environment, and humidity in the 40-55 range. It suddenly occurred to me that I hadn't checked the humidity setting on the stat (had meant to do it when I changed the pad, but something shiny...). It's an Aprilaire humidifier attached to the return air duct at the furnace, no air exchanger or such like, and the house is finally pretty well sealed. Of course, I had forgotten it and it was essentially off, with a humidity reading on the stat of 22. (no wonder the kids are suffering with dry skin issues). So I whacked it up to 50. Roughly 24 hours later, it has crept up to 29. Does it make sense that it is taking so long? The house is about 5000 sf, so I guess could take a while, but I expected quicker than this. I checked the pad, and the water is filtering through fine. I'm in MN by the way, so very cold and dry.

TIA Cub

[Tony Hwang]

Hi, Aprilaire has several different capacity size. I wonder if yours is undersized? I live in Alberta, 2 story house is approx. 2600 sq. ft. not counting basement living space. I can push the humidity upto ~60% RH but leave it at 35% or so in the winter months. We have a grand piano made in 1912 which needs sound board protction. We watch humidity pretty close year round.

[ransley]

The floor only has to equalise the indoor humidity, 22% may be fine depending on outdoor temp and you dont say what that is. Humidity should not be raised to where you get any condensation anywhere, and windows are usualy the place to look, get a cheap moisture meter to test the wood, you never know it could be over wet if its natural wood.

[trader4]

I'd say the humidifier is probably working fine. If water is running over the media and out the drain, there isn't much that can be wrong. IF it's a bypass model, make sure the damper in the duct connecting it is fully open. But it does take a while to raise the humidity. And it obviously depends on the capacity of the humidifier. IF you want to increase the capacity, you can use hot water, instead of cold. Also, in MN, I would not be taking the humidity up to 50. Somewhere around 35 sounds more reasonable. 50 would be max if it were say 35 or 50 outside.

[cubby]

Thanks. In prior winters, with the humidity set to the point where it is comfortable (no sore throat in the morning or skin complaints) we have had a little (and I mean little) condensation on the windows when really cold overnight. It's -4F this morning, and nothing. I think I will try to raise until the condensation starts, which may be around the 35 you suggest. Thanks all.