Dehumidifier

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SunshineChins

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This morning I found a dehumidifier at a garage sale. My thought is to help bring the humidity down here in lovely sunny FL :SarcasmA: in the chin room. My hope is that we can get that room a few degrees cooler without turning the central A/C down. Does anyone use one and does it really help? I only paid $5 for it (runs like a champ!) so not a huge deal if they don't really do much.
:D
 
It makes a huge, huge difference here. I have a summer one (goes down to 60 degrees) and a winter one (goes down to 35 degrees) that I alternate by season. I've seen it drop the temperature in the room by 10 degrees when it's turned on.

One thing to remember, oddly enough, is that the dehumidifier produces heat as it runs, so make sure it's in an open area and not right up next to the chins.
 
I always have my dehumidifier running here in summer, and sometimes in winter, depending on the weather, although the humidity thankfully is pretty low here in winter.
We had some terrible heat a couple of weeks ago and I thought maybe I'd leave the dehumidifier off because of the heat it throws, but the humidity was just getting too high, so I turned it back on. Within a short amount of time, the temp and humidity started to come back down in the barn.
 
Wow.. I didn't realize it could make that much difference. I am so glad that bought it this morning. We have it set at the door of the room with the heat going out into the loft area away from the room. I am not sure how low ours will get.. I guess I need to get out the instruction book and look that up.

My thought is to close the blinds during the hottest part of the day and let it run all day/night.
 
I'm fairly happy that the portable a/c that I found on Craigslist for $100 has a dehumidifier. That way, in the winter, I can just run the dehumidifier instead of the a/c because it stays fairly warm throughout the winter here anyways.
 
I thought about getting a portable A/C unit for the room to help cool it more and bring down the humidity. But.. I think this will work out well as I can keep using the central A/C and run the dehumidifier and get the same effect.
 
We always have a dehumidifier running, but we live in the basement so it is really a must. Not happy about the heat that it puts out (not great air circulation, cuz we only have two windows in the chin room, and not in the other part of the basement), but it would just be unbearable and damp without it.
 
I have a dehumidfier in my basement, as well. I run it in the summer and I have to empty it every morning. (The water is good for watering some of my flowers.) Not sure if it actually makes the basement cooler b/c it is cooler than the rest of the house by nature. But it sure does make it feel much better and keeps the mold away. Idgie doesn't live down there, but I do store her hay there.
 
We have an old farmhouse and run one in the basement all summer as well to help keep it semi-dry down there as we use it for storage - not the chins. lol
I like the last dehumidifier taht I had better than this one you could actually set the humidity level you wanted it to be at. This one just has a dial you turn, so sometimes it's trickier getting it to work right. If it runs continuously, it ices up the fins and I have to turn it off for awhile and let it thaw out. I also put a filter over the front where it sucks in air to help extend it's life - helps to keep the dust out of the fins which will clog up and ruin the machine over time. I use the same filters on the air conditioner.
 
I have the Frigidaire FFAD7033R1 70-Pint Dehumidifier with Effortless Humidity Control, White which I bought on Amazon. While it is a very good dehumidifier, it has raised the room temperature by two degrees each time I've used it. It rarely gets that hot in our area so I don't worry about heat too much; but, if heat is a concern, then an additional portable AC unit could be good.
 
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