Ventless dryer
joenorm
| Posted in General Questions on
I am interested in a ventless dryer. I am still in framing stage and am scratching my head about adding the duct or not in the laundry area.
I see very mixed reviews on these units it’s hard to make a good decision.
In your-all’s opinion, are ventless/heatpump dryers the future?
Will this technology only be getting better and more widely used as time marches on?
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Replies
To me this is falls into the same category as an electric plug behind a gas range.
If it is a simple run, I would put in the duct and cap it. It is easy enough now, very hard down the road.
Hi Joe.
I cannot predict (I don't think anyone can) the future of ventless dryers. There are so many things that have been and continue to be predicted as "the future" in home building, yet little changes. I applaud you for wanting to install an emerging and efficient appliance, but I think Akos gave you good advice, particularly if your laundry area is in a tricky spot for ducting. Even if you go with the condensing dryer, maybe prepare for a future vent for you or the next homeowner.
That is good advice, I think part of it is just me being lazy and liking the idea of not having to run the vent/one less penetration to side around. Less about actually wanting the unit.
My laundry is in the middle of the house, not ideal, but cannot change now. What is the best venting product to be able to go straight down to crawlspace from back of dryer(don't worry I'm not going to vent into the crawlspace, just need to get there to finish the ducting out the rim joist)?
Joe, one issue with vented dryers is that they typically exhaust about 125 cfm, and can significantly depressurize a tight home. (Lessons learned the hard way...) If you are building a tight home and use an exhausting dryer, I would plan for makeup air.
We are very happy with ours. Ventless dryers have been in common use in Europe for a long time, so they are not going anywhere. Eventually we'll start to see more selection in North America, and prices coming down. We gave no thought to running a dryer vent on our house, but we also have no intention of moving.
I have built two "forever" houses. I'm now planning my third. ;-)
Yes, I'm sure there's a lot of those out there. I'd actually like to use my current one as a practice house, and move on to house #2. The location of it makes that a near impossibility, unless I win the lottery and can afford to rebuild on the same site. I don't buy lottery tickets, so my chances are not too good.
Your odds of winning the lottery are roughly the same....whether you buy a ticket, or don’t
We got a Miele heat pump dryer last year and have been very happy with it. It dries very well and doesn't heat up or humidify the room it's running in. Electricity consumption is low--we can't see a spike on our house-level consumption meter when we turn it on.
My only long term concern is how well their filtering works to keep the heat pump coils clean. There are 3 different filters in the air stream and it appears pretty well thought out.
Our Whirlpool heat pump dryer has worked flawlessly for almost five years.