I recently moved into a new house, and inherited a four year old Haier
AHD40, 40 pint dehumidifier which runs in an unfinished basement. Now
that the summer is here, the thing is running around the clock,
keeping the humidity in the basement at around 65%. I live in
Connecticut, where electricity prices are around 20 cents per k/wh.

I have tested the unit to see how much electricity it is using, and it
turned out to be around 16 kw/h over 24 hours, which, when I do the
Math, is going to set me back around $90 a month. Ouch!

The thing is, that for my 16 kw/h of electricity, the unit managed to
suck up just over 7 liters of water, which works out to be less that a
half a liter of water for every kw/h it uses. I was reading on the
energy star website, that modern dehumidifiers should be able to suck
up about 1.5 liters of water per kw/h used.

I am wondering that if I were to replace the unit for a new one, would
I get better efficiency. It would add insult to injury if I were to
shell out a couple of hundred dollars for a new unit, and still be
paying $90 to run thru the summer months.

Any thoughts from anyone would be greatly appreciated...

on 8/13/2007 6:41 PM said the following:
I recently moved into a new house, and inherited a four year old Haier
AHD40, 40 pint dehumidifier which runs in an unfinished basement. Now
that the summer is here, the thing is running around the clock,
keeping the humidity in the basement at around 65%. I live in
Connecticut, where electricity prices are around 20 cents per k/wh.

I have tested the unit to see how much electricity it is using, and it
turned out to be around 16 kw/h over 24 hours, which, when I do the
Math, is going to set me back around $90 a month. Ouch!

The thing is, that for my 16 kw/h of electricity, the unit managed to
suck up just over 7 liters of water, which works out to be less that a
half a liter of water for every kw/h it uses. I was reading on the
energy star website, that modern dehumidifiers should be able to suck
up about 1.5 liters of water per kw/h used.

I am wondering that if I were to replace the unit for a new one, would
I get better efficiency. It would add insult to injury if I were to
shell out a couple of hundred dollars for a new unit, and still be
paying $90 to run thru the summer months.

Any thoughts from anyone would be greatly appreciated...

It's an unfinished basement. Paint the walls with a moisture barrier
paint and the dehumidifier will run less. The cost of the paint would be
less than a month's worth of electricity.

--

Bill
In Hamptonburgh, NY
To email, remove the double zeroes after @

willshak wrote:
on 8/13/2007 6:41 PM said the following:
I recently moved into a new house, and inherited a four year old
Haier AHD40, 40 pint dehumidifier which runs in an unfinished
basement. Now that the summer is here, the thing is running around
the clock, keeping the humidity in the basement at around 65%. I
live in Connecticut, where electricity prices are around 20 cents
per k/wh. I have tested the unit to see how much electricity it is using,
and
it turned out to be around 16 kw/h over 24 hours, which, when I do
the Math, is going to set me back around $90 a month. Ouch!

The thing is, that for my 16 kw/h of electricity, the unit managed to
suck up just over 7 liters of water, which works out to be less that
a half a liter of water for every kw/h it uses. I was reading on the
energy star website, that modern dehumidifiers should be able to suck
up about 1.5 liters of water per kw/h used.

I am wondering that if I were to replace the unit for a new one,
would I get better efficiency. It would add insult to injury if I
were to shell out a couple of hundred dollars for a new unit, and
still be paying $90 to run thru the summer months.

Any thoughts from anyone would be greatly appreciated...

It's an unfinished basement. Paint the walls with a moisture barrier
paint and the dehumidifier will run less. The cost of the paint would
be less than a month's worth of electricity.


I'm using two dehumidifiers willshark, that paint thing sounds like a good
idea!

Clark

On Aug 13, 6:50 pm, willshak wrote:
on 8/13/2007 6:41 PM said the following:



I recently moved into a new house, and inherited a four year old Haier
AHD40, 40 pint dehumidifier which runs in an unfinished basement. Now
that the summer is here, the thing is running around the clock,
keeping the humidity in the basement at around 65%. I live in
Connecticut, where electricity prices are around 20 cents per k/wh.

I have tested the unit to see how much electricity it is using, and it
turned out to be around 16 kw/h over 24 hours, which, when I do the
Math, is going to set me back around $90 a month. Ouch!

The thing is, that for my 16 kw/h of electricity, the unit managed to
suck up just over 7 liters of water, which works out to be less that a
half a liter of water for every kw/h it uses. I was reading on the
energy star website, that modern dehumidifiers should be able to suck
up about 1.5 liters of water per kw/h used.

I am wondering that if I were to replace the unit for a new one, would
I get better efficiency. It would add insult to injury if I were to
shell out a couple of hundred dollars for a new unit, and still be
paying $90 to run thru the summer months.

Any thoughts from anyone would be greatly appreciated...

It's an unfinished basement. Paint the walls with a moisture barrier
paint and the dehumidifier will run less. The cost of the paint would be
less than a month's worth of electricity.

--

Bill
In Hamptonburgh, NY
To email, remove the double zeroes after @

Thanks Bill. I will probably do the painting as well, but I was
wondering if the dehumidifier wasn't working correctly due to the the
fact that it is removing less that half a liter of water per kw/h. If
it is under performing, it would make sense to replace the unit, but I
would be loathe to do that if a newer unit performed no better.

on 8/13/2007 6:52 PM Clark said the following:
willshak wrote:

on 8/13/2007 6:41 PM said the following:

I recently moved into a new house, and inherited a four year old
Haier AHD40, 40 pint dehumidifier which runs in an unfinished
basement. Now that the summer is here, the thing is running around
the clock, keeping the humidity in the basement at around 65%. I
live in Connecticut, where electricity prices are around 20 cents
per k/wh. I have tested the unit to see how much electricity it is using,
and
it turned out to be around 16 kw/h over 24 hours, which, when I do
the Math, is going to set me back around $90 a month. Ouch!

The thing is, that for my 16 kw/h of electricity, the unit managed to
suck up just over 7 liters of water, which works out to be less that
a half a liter of water for every kw/h it uses. I was reading on the
energy star website, that modern dehumidifiers should be able to suck
up about 1.5 liters of water per kw/h used.

I am wondering that if I were to replace the unit for a new one,
would I get better efficiency. It would add insult to injury if I
were to shell out a couple of hundred dollars for a new unit, and
still be paying $90 to run thru the summer months.

Any thoughts from anyone would be greatly appreciated...

It's an unfinished basement. Paint the walls with a moisture barrier
paint and the dehumidifier will run less. The cost of the paint would
be less than a month's worth of electricity.



I'm using two dehumidifiers willshark, that paint thing sounds like a good
idea!

Clark

I don't know where you are, but here in NY, I finished off the basement
with studded, insulated, vapor barriered, sheetrocked walls and my
single dehumidifier hardly runs at all.

--

Bill
In Hamptonburgh, NY
To email, remove the double zeroes after @

wrote:
I recently moved into a new house, and inherited a four year old Haier
AHD40, 40 pint dehumidifier which runs in an unfinished basement. Now
that the summer is here, the thing is running around the clock,
keeping the humidity in the basement at around 65%. I live in
Connecticut, where electricity prices are around 20 cents per k/wh.
....
I am wondering that if I were to replace the unit for a new one, would
I get better efficiency. It would add insult to injury if I were to
shell out a couple of hundred dollars for a new unit, and still be
paying $90 to run thru the summer months.

Any thoughts from anyone would be greatly appreciated...

http://www.energystar.gov/index.cfm?..._dehumidifiers

--

I never did a water/kwh calculation but when I needed a dehumidifier I
had a 40 pint one also and it filled roughly every ten hours (in
Westchester County, near CT).

If the previous owners left it in the house, it's likely, don't you
think, that it didn't work all that well?

Shaun Eli
www.BrainChampagne.com
Brain Champagne: Clever Comedy for Smart Minds (sm)

wrote:

I recently moved into a new house, and inherited a four year old Haier
AHD40, 40 pint dehumidifier which runs in an unfinished basement. Now
that the summer is here, the thing is running around the clock,

And adding heat to the house.

I have tested the unit to see how much electricity it is using, and it
turned out to be around 16 kw/h over 24 hours...

.... 16 kWh (note units) is 54.6K Btu.

The thing is, that for my 16 kw/h of electricity, the unit managed to
suck up just over 7 liters of water...

Condensing 7 liters of water adds an additional 15.4K Btu.

Any thoughts from anyone would be greatly appreciated...

You might circulate basement air up through the house whenever
the basement RH is greater than 60%, using a humidistat (maybe
the one in the Haier unit) and use an $80 window AC upstairs
to remove moisture and cool vs warm the house in summertime.

Where is the moisture coming from?

Nick

On Aug 13, 8:41 pm, Shaun Eli wrote:
I never did a water/kwh calculation but when I needed a dehumidifier I
had a 40 pint one also and it filled roughly every ten hours (in
Westchester County, near CT).

If the previous owners left it in the house, it's likely, don't you
think, that it didn't work all that well?

Shaun Eliwww.BrainChampagne.com
Brain Champagne: Clever Comedy for Smart Minds (sm)

The previous owner was upping sticks and moving to Pennsylvania, and
left a bunch of stuff that he didn't want to ship. The dehumidifier
was one of these items. As we had little in the way of furniture, for
the most part it was appreciated. He was a good guy, a State Trooper
with a conscience no less, so I would be doubtful that he knowingly
left an ailing dehumidifier, but of course, you never know.

It's interesting that yours unit filled its bucket in around ten
hours, and ours is taking over twice as long whilst running constantly
to do the same. That might well be further evidence that all is not
well with our unit.

On Aug 14, 6:47 am, wrote:
wrote:
I recently moved into a new house, and inherited a four year old Haier
AHD40, 40 pint dehumidifier which runs in an unfinished basement. Now
that the summer is here, the thing is running around the clock,

And adding heat to the house.

I have tested the unit to see how much electricity it is using, and it
turned out to be around 16 kw/h over 24 hours...

... 16 kWh (note units) is 54.6K Btu.

The thing is, that for my 16 kw/h of electricity, the unit managed to
suck up just over 7 liters of water...

Condensing 7 liters of water adds an additional 15.4K Btu.

Any thoughts from anyone would be greatly appreciated...

You might circulate basement air up through the house whenever
the basement RH is greater than 60%, using a humidistat (maybe
the one in the Haier unit) and use an $80 window AC upstairs
to remove moisture and cool vs warm the house in summertime.

Where is the moisture coming from?

Nick

As far as I can tell the moisture is coming from the the normal
humidity in the air, that you would get in the hot summer months.
There is an additional crawl space with a dirt floor, which I am also
sure adds to the amount of moisture in the basement. However, we moved
into the house at the end of April. I know that in May the
dehumidifier was only running part of the time, so the summer is the
main reason for the increased humidity.

Your idea about circulating the air up through the house might be
worth thinking about, but what I am really wondering is if the
dehumidifier, at just four years old, should be removing more that 7
liters of water for 16 kwh of electricity, as the energy star website
suggests that a modern dehumidifier should be able to remove 1.5
liters per kwh. If I were to buy a new unit which started to remove
the moisture at 1.5 liters kwh, then this would surely have the effect
of reducing the humidity in the basement to less than 60% far quicker
than my unit, which would mean that it wasn't running all the time,
and would instantly slash my power bill.

I am wondering if anyone knows why a dehumidifier, that is rated to
remove 1.5 liters of water per kwh, would fail to do just that? Is the
only reason because the unit was faulty, or are there environmental
factors?

What's the temperature in your basement? If it's cold then the
dehumidifier won't work as well, since it works by cooling air and
catching the water that drips off the cooling coils.

On Aug 14, 7:52 am, Shaun Eli wrote:
What's the temperature in your basement? If it's cold then the
dehumidifier won't work as well, since it works by cooling air and
catching the water that drips off the cooling coils.

The temperature is up there. The mercury is showing temperatures in
the upper seventies. The heat from the dehumidifier probably has a lot
to do with keeping it so balmy.

In article . com,
wrote:

On Aug 14, 6:47 am, wrote:
wrote:
I recently moved into a new house, and inherited a four year old Haier
AHD40, 40 pint dehumidifier which runs in an unfinished basement. Now
that the summer is here, the thing is running around the clock,

And adding heat to the house.

I have tested the unit to see how much electricity it is using, and it
turned out to be around 16 kw/h over 24 hours...

... 16 kWh (note units) is 54.6K Btu.

The thing is, that for my 16 kw/h of electricity, the unit managed to
suck up just over 7 liters of water...

Condensing 7 liters of water adds an additional 15.4K Btu.

Any thoughts from anyone would be greatly appreciated...

You might circulate basement air up through the house whenever
the basement RH is greater than 60%, using a humidistat (maybe
the one in the Haier unit) and use an $80 window AC upstairs
to remove moisture and cool vs warm the house in summertime.

Where is the moisture coming from?

Nick

As far as I can tell the moisture is coming from the the normal
humidity in the air, that you would get in the hot summer months.
There is an additional crawl space with a dirt floor, which I am also
sure adds to the amount of moisture in the basement. However, we moved
into the house at the end of April. I know that in May the
dehumidifier was only running part of the time, so the summer is the
main reason for the increased humidity.

Your idea about circulating the air up through the house might be
worth thinking about, but what I am really wondering is if the
dehumidifier, at just four years old, should be removing more that 7
liters of water for 16 kwh of electricity, as the energy star website
suggests that a modern dehumidifier should be able to remove 1.5
liters per kwh. If I were to buy a new unit which started to remove
the moisture at 1.5 liters kwh, then this would surely have the effect
of reducing the humidity in the basement to less than 60% far quicker
than my unit, which would mean that it wasn't running all the time,
and would instantly slash my power bill.

I am wondering if anyone knows why a dehumidifier, that is rated to
remove 1.5 liters of water per kwh, would fail to do just that? Is the
only reason because the unit was faulty, or are there environmental
factors?

You can chase vague concepts and suppositions around all day, but I'd
suggest borrowing a good quality unit of equal capacity from a friend,
neighbor, co-worker, family, etc. and try it out for two days. Then
you'll know.

On Aug 14, 10:06 am, Smitty Two wrote:
In article . com,



wrote:
On Aug 14, 6:47 am, wrote:
wrote:
I recently moved into a new house, and inherited a four year old Haier
AHD40, 40 pint dehumidifier which runs in an unfinished basement. Now
that the summer is here, the thing is running around the clock,

And adding heat to the house.

I have tested the unit to see how much electricity it is using, and it
turned out to be around 16 kw/h over 24 hours...

... 16 kWh (note units) is 54.6K Btu.

The thing is, that for my 16 kw/h of electricity, the unit managed to
suck up just over 7 liters of water...

Condensing 7 liters of water adds an additional 15.4K Btu.

Any thoughts from anyone would be greatly appreciated...

You might circulate basement air up through the house whenever
the basement RH is greater than 60%, using a humidistat (maybe
the one in the Haier unit) and use an $80 window AC upstairs
to remove moisture and cool vs warm the house in summertime.

Where is the moisture coming from?

Nick

As far as I can tell the moisture is coming from the the normal
humidity in the air, that you would get in the hot summer months.
There is an additional crawl space with a dirt floor, which I am also
sure adds to the amount of moisture in the basement. However, we moved
into the house at the end of April. I know that in May the
dehumidifier was only running part of the time, so the summer is the
main reason for the increased humidity.

Your idea about circulating the air up through the house might be
worth thinking about, but what I am really wondering is if the
dehumidifier, at just four years old, should be removing more that 7
liters of water for 16 kwh of electricity, as the energy star website
suggests that a modern dehumidifier should be able to remove 1.5
liters per kwh. If I were to buy a new unit which started to remove
the moisture at 1.5 liters kwh, then this would surely have the effect
of reducing the humidity in the basement to less than 60% far quicker
than my unit, which would mean that it wasn't running all the time,
and would instantly slash my power bill.

I am wondering if anyone knows why a dehumidifier, that is rated to
remove 1.5 liters of water per kwh, would fail to do just that? Is the
only reason because the unit was faulty, or are there environmental
factors?

You can chase vague concepts and suppositions around all day, but I'd
suggest borrowing a good quality unit of equal capacity from a friend,
neighbor, co-worker, family, etc. and try it out for two days. Then
you'll know.

I think you're right. I'm not sure who won't be using there's at this
time of year, but I think that that is probably the way. I will post
the answer to my test as and when I have the results...

Thanks to everyone for their input.

wrote:

... As far as I can tell the moisture is coming from the the normal
humidity in the air, that you would get in the hot summer months.

Sounds like airsealing would help.

There is an additional crawl space with a dirt floor, which I am also
sure adds to the amount of moisture in the basement.

And plastic over the dirt floor.

... what I am really wondering is if the dehumidifier, at just four years
old, should be removing more that 7 liters of water for 16 kwh

Sounds like it should be.

... the energy star website suggests that a modern dehumidifier should be
able to remove 1.5 liters per kwh.

And what's this Munters DC120 that removes 3.3 liters/kWh?
Googling produces nothing but the energy star list...

Nick

According to :

The thing is, that for my 16 kw/h of electricity, the unit managed to
suck up just over 7 liters of water, which works out to be less that a
half a liter of water for every kw/h it uses. I was reading on the
energy star website, that modern dehumidifiers should be able to suck
up about 1.5 liters of water per kw/h used.

It doesn't sound that old, so, it should be doing better than that.

It may be that it just needs a thorough cleaning of the coils and fins.
If there's lots of dust on it, it will act as an insulator, and greatly
reduce efficiency. May need to resort to an air compressor and/or
fine & soft brushes.

In a basement, it may have picked up rather a lot of dust in a few
years if they did any renovation (eg: drywall sanding ;-).

Note also that if you're not getting the water right out of the
basement (eg: run the outflow directly into a drain), you'll be
losing some effectiveness through re-evaporation. Sorta like
having both the cold and hot side of an A/C in the same room - the
net result is the room doesn't get cooler...
--
Chris Lewis,

Age and Treachery will Triumph over Youth and Skill
It's not just anyone who gets a Starship Cruiser class named after them.

On Aug 14, 10:46 am, wrote:
On Mon, 13 Aug 2007 15:41:09 -0700, wrote:
I recently moved into a new house, and inherited a four year old Haier
AHD40, 40 pint dehumidifier which runs in an unfinished basement. Now
that the summer is here, the thing is running around the clock,
keeping the humidity in the basement at around 65%. I live in
Connecticut, where electricity prices are around 20 cents per k/wh.

I have tested the unit to see how much electricity it is using, and it
turned out to be around 16 kw/h over 24 hours, which, when I do the
Math, is going to set me back around $90 a month. Ouch!

The thing is, that for my 16 kw/h of electricity, the unit managed to
suck up just over 7 liters of water, which works out to be less that a
half a liter of water for every kw/h it uses. I was reading on the
energy star website, that modern dehumidifiers should be able to suck
up about 1.5 liters of water per kw/h used.

I am wondering that if I were to replace the unit for a new one, would
I get better efficiency. It would add insult to injury if I were to
shell out a couple of hundred dollars for a new unit, and still be
paying $90 to run thru the summer months.

Any thoughts from anyone would be greatly appreciated...

I had a dehumidifier do EXACTLY what you are describing. Ran
constantly and didn't seem to be doing much. I discovered that the
fins were blanketed by a layer of dust. I cleaned the fins and all is
fine. It now removes a ton of water and runs far less. It made a huge
impact on my electric bill as well. Dropped roughly $80 a month!

You may be onto something... I have just taken a closer look at the
unit and there is a plastic mesh filter which covers the space at the
rear of the unit, and therefore encloses the fins. Until the closer
inspection, I did not even realize that it was even a filter, due to
the build up of filth and dirt on the mesh. I just thought it was a
dirty cover. I have removed the mesh cover, temporarily, and will see
what happens over the next twenty four hours... I will be delighted if
this solves the mystery, as I just could not believe how much the
thing was costing to run. Thanks a million.

On Aug 14, 5:17 pm, wrote:
On Tue, 14 Aug 2007 13:25:19 -0700, wrote:
On Aug 14, 10:46 am, wrote:
On Mon, 13 Aug 2007 15:41:09 -0700, wrote:
I recently moved into a new house, and inherited a four year old Haier
AHD40, 40 pint dehumidifier which runs in an unfinished basement. Now
that the summer is here, the thing is running around the clock,
keeping the humidity in the basement at around 65%. I live in
Connecticut, where electricity prices are around 20 cents per k/wh.

I have tested the unit to see how much electricity it is using, and it
turned out to be around 16 kw/h over 24 hours, which, when I do the
Math, is going to set me back around $90 a month. Ouch!

The thing is, that for my 16 kw/h of electricity, the unit managed to
suck up just over 7 liters of water, which works out to be less that a
half a liter of water for every kw/h it uses. I was reading on the
energy star website, that modern dehumidifiers should be able to suck
up about 1.5 liters of water per kw/h used.

I am wondering that if I were to replace the unit for a new one, would
I get better efficiency. It would add insult to injury if I were to
shell out a couple of hundred dollars for a new unit, and still be
paying $90 to run thru the summer months.

Any thoughts from anyone would be greatly appreciated...

I had a dehumidifier do EXACTLY what you are describing. Ran
constantly and didn't seem to be doing much. I discovered that the
fins were blanketed by a layer of dust. I cleaned the fins and all is
fine. It now removes a ton of water and runs far less. It made a huge
impact on my electric bill as well. Dropped roughly $80 a month!

You may be onto something... I have just taken a closer look at the
unit and there is a plastic mesh filter which covers the space at the
rear of the unit, and therefore encloses the fins. Until the closer
inspection, I did not even realize that it was even a filter, due to
the build up of filth and dirt on the mesh. I just thought it was a
dirty cover. I have removed the mesh cover, temporarily, and will see
what happens over the next twenty four hours... I will be delighted if
this solves the mystery, as I just could not believe how much the
thing was costing to run. Thanks a million.

You will probably need to remove the front cover as well, and clean there. If
air can't circulate past the fins, the unit will run endlessly without doing any
dehumidifying. Mine had more dirt and dust clogging the front than the rear. I
had to partially disassemble the unit to gain access to all that needed
cleaning. I ended up taking it outside and using a garden hose.

Since I took the back cover off, the unit has actually clicked off!!!
A wonderful feat in itself, and it also brought down the humidity to
less that 60% for about the first time ever. By my calculations, it is
using 30-40% less electricity already, but I intend to clean as much
of the other components that I can, and hopefully, that may improve
things even further. Thanks again for going to the trouble of replying
to this mail.

According to :

Since I took the back cover off, the unit has actually clicked off!!!
A wonderful feat in itself, and it also brought down the humidity to
less that 60% for about the first time ever. By my calculations, it is
using 30-40% less electricity already, but I intend to clean as much
of the other components that I can, and hopefully, that may improve
things even further. Thanks again for going to the trouble of replying
to this mail.

Pay special attention to cleaning the cooling fins. Even with a
filter, if it hasn't been cleaned out in years, there's bound to be
a lot of dust on the fins. That alone will decrease efficiency by quite
a bit.
--
Chris Lewis,

Age and Treachery will Triumph over Youth and Skill
It's not just anyone who gets a Starship Cruiser class named after them.