Is our humidity level something to be concerned about?

TELLIT01

My sensor currently shows 40% humidity and 20C.  Humidity varies little from that, no more than a couple of %.  Cavity wall and loft insulation.  When we had the cavity walls done they discovered the cavity was 3" rather than the usual 2" in a 1930's house.

Ben1989

_Sam_ said:

ashe said:

 

I'm seriously considering a PIV system as don't want to end up getting damp , but hit sure if that wiki make the house even colder? 

It appears a PIV will require additional heating in winter as it introduces the cold air. 

Technically it does but it's only a tiny bit. Ours is on a low setting and you hardly feel the air coming out of it. It has a carbon filter so I take the fresh filtered air trickling into the house than the little bit of coldness it brings in with it.

Slinky

ashe said:

Slinky said:

Why does you girlfriend have the bathroom door open when in the bath. Surely you should keep it closed then leave it closed with the window wide open when she's finished so the damp air goes out the window.

Just airflow. Unless you swing the window open wide even with the powerful fan the room still gets a lot of condensation, and with window wide open it's freezing. And obviously no privacy 

Wasn't suggesting she sits in the bath with the window open, merely that she keeps the damp air in the bathroom using the closed door whilst in the bath, then opens the window after she's finished in there.

ashe

Slinky said:

ashe said:

Slinky said:

Why does you girlfriend have the bathroom door open when in the bath. Surely you should keep it closed then leave it closed with the window wide open when she's finished so the damp air goes out the window.

Just airflow. Unless you swing the window open wide even with the powerful fan the room still gets a lot of condensation, and with window wide open it's freezing. And obviously no privacy 

Wasn't suggesting she sits in the bath with the window open, merely that she keeps the damp air in the bathroom using the closed door whilst in the bath, then opens the window after she's finished in there.

My understanding is you need sufficient source of fresh air for the extractor fan to do its thing, so it's either having the windows open or the door open. We have the window in the lock so some can come in from there, but the bathroom door open to provide airflow for the fan to do the extracting part properly 

if you have the door closed the fan runs but doesn't really extract and you get pea soup in the air 

_Sam_

ashe said:

My understanding is you need sufficient source of fresh air for the extractor fan to do its thing, so it's either having the windows open or the door open. We have the window in the lock so some can come in from there, but the bathroom door open to provide airflow for the fan to do the extracting part properly 

if you have the door closed the fan runs but doesn't really extract and you get pea soup in the air 

The fan should be able to extract humid air with the door closed, I don't think it needs air "flow" (as such) to operate just the air itself which the room obv has, and having a window slightly open would provide a trickle of fresh air. I wouldn't expect a completely dry/clear air while having a bath, but perhaps a more powerful fan would make a more discernible difference to the "soup"?

If you have a bath with the door open I would expect a small percentage of humid air escaping via the fan, and the rest of the pea soup dispersing in the house via the open door, which would of course contribute to humidity.

Slinky

^^^

This.  You don't want the pea soup getting into the house

You will also be getting a small amount of air entering the bathroom under the closed door to provide some flow. We have a brand new hi-spec fan in our new shower room, which runs on for 10 minutes after being turned off. However, It's the open window which does most of the work drying the room out after we've finished in there.

ashe

 Slinky said:

^^^

This.  You don't want the pea soup getting into the house

You will also be getting a small amount of air entering the bathroom under the closed door to provide some flow. We have a brand new hi-spec fan in our new shower room, which runs on for 10 minutes after being turned off. However, It's the open window which does most of the work drying the room out after we've finished in there.

_Sam_ said:

ashe said:

My understanding is you need sufficient source of fresh air for the extractor fan to do its thing, so it's either having the windows open or the door open. We have the window in the lock so some can come in from there, but the bathroom door open to provide airflow for the fan to do the extracting part properly 

if you have the door closed the fan runs but doesn't really extract and you get pea soup in the air 

The fan should be able to extract humid air with the door closed, I don't think it needs air "flow" (as such) to operate just the air itself which the room obv has, and having a window slightly open would provide a trickle of fresh air. I wouldn't expect a completely dry/clear air while having a bath, but perhaps a more powerful fan would make a more discernible difference to the "soup"?

If you have a bath with the door open I would expect a small percentage of humid air escaping via the fan, and the rest of the pea soup dispersing in the house via the open door, which would of course contribute to humidity.

There is no pea soup if the door is open, because the fan is very powerful and gives it the airflow it needs. Door isn't wide open it's just open. In summer/spring/autumn we have the window open slightly but when it's -6 outside this means it's freezing in no time at all as the air rushing in is literally freezing cold. 

If we close the door some does come under the door but not enough, it works well again with windows open but no one wants to get out of the bath with a window wide open 😂

Don't think we need a more powerful fan either - the fan is a manrose MF100t which has an airflow of 245 m3/hour. Powerful fans definitely need airflow whether it's from the door or the window. Using an extractor fan in a room with windows and door closed will be really inefficient. We are having zigbee controllers wired onto the fans on Monday after which I'll put some humidity sensors in so that I can automate them coming on and set timers etc. the fan has a built in timer but we don't want it coming on for 10-15 minute overrun in the middle of the night when we go to the bathroom, so by doing it this way I'll have complete control. 

FreeBear

ashe said: We are having zigbee controllers wired onto the fans on Monday after which I'll put some humidity sensors in so that I can automate them coming on and set timers etc. the fan has a built in timer but we don't want it coming on for 10-15 minute overrun in the middle of the night when we go to the bathroom, so by doing it this way I'll have complete control. 

Ooooo... Are you going to use Home Assistant to do the automation ?

A small mains powered ESP32 board with a relay plus temperature/humidity sensor running ESPHome firmware would be the path I'd go. But once you start using home automation with sensors, you'll want to log the data, then add more sensors. Then it will need a dedicated storage device (SD cards only last a matter of months). It is a slippery slope down that rabbit hole, and I'm not even at the bottom yet (adding wiring here for a modbus network for yet more sensors).

ashe

FreeBear said:

ashe said: We are having zigbee controllers wired onto the fans on Monday after which I'll put some humidity sensors in so that I can automate them coming on and set timers etc. the fan has a built in timer but we don't want it coming on for 10-15 minute overrun in the middle of the night when we go to the bathroom, so by doing it this way I'll have complete control. 

Ooooo... Are you going to use Home Assistant to do the automation ?

A small mains powered ESP32 board with a relay plus temperature/humidity sensor running ESPHome firmware would be the path I'd go. But once you start using home automation with sensors, you'll want to log the data, then add more sensors. Then it will need a dedicated storage device (SD cards only last a matter of months). It is a slippery slope down that rabbit hole, and I'm not even at the bottom yet (adding wiring here for a modbus network for yet more sensors).

Yeah I've got a qnap server I run for Emby in the house to our various TV's, so have installed Home Assistant in a docker. The route I've gone down for now is a ZigBee USB device for the server, as already have hue lighting and hue compatible smart switches, and picked up a couple of Aquara temp/humidity sensors. We've got some Sonoff ZigBee switches for the fans so once everything is set up should be able to link everything up. 

Luckily the QNAP has an 18TB hard drive in it and 3 spare bays for more so I hope to not get that much data  

FreeBear

ashe said:

FreeBear said:

ashe said: We are having zigbee controllers wired onto the fans on Monday after which I'll put some humidity sensors in so that I can automate them coming on and set timers etc. the fan has a built in timer but we don't want it coming on for 10-15 minute overrun in the middle of the night when we go to the bathroom, so by doing it this way I'll have complete control. 

Ooooo... Are you going to use Home Assistant to do the automation ?

A small mains powered ESP32 board with a relay plus temperature/humidity sensor running ESPHome firmware would be the path I'd go. But once you start using home automation with sensors, you'll want to log the data, then add more sensors. Then it will need a dedicated storage device (SD cards only last a matter of months). It is a slippery slope down that rabbit hole, and I'm not even at the bottom yet (adding wiring here for a modbus network for yet more sensors).

Yeah I've got a qnap server I run for Emby in the house to our various TV's, so have installed Home Assistant in a docker. The route I've gone down for now is a ZigBee USB device for the server, as already have hue lighting and hue compatible smart switches, and picked up a couple of Aquara temp/humidity sensors. We've got some Sonoff ZigBee switches for the fans so once everything is set up should be able to link everything up. 

Luckily the QNAP has an 18TB hard drive in it and 3 spare bays for more so I hope to not get that much data  

Do you use Grafana for visualisation of the data ?