How do I change the humidity on my thermostat? What should I do with my furnace humidifier in the winter?
We always ask the same question: "What is the correct setting for our home's humidistat?"There are questions when you consider that there are many different brands and styles and that they have changed in design in the last few years.
Midwestern winters are very dry.Without humidifiers, our home's humidity level can drop to levels that aren't healthy for us, and can be damaging to our house and furniture.Many of us add water back into the air with a central humidifier attached to our heating and cooling system.
The goal of the humidistat is to keep the humidity in a comfortable range by turning the central humidifier on and off as the home's humidity increases.The home can be protected from over-humidification during the cold weather.There is a risk of condensation on the cold surface of windows and walls when the temperature falls below 20 degrees.If there is an automatic control or manual control, we need to back our humidifiers down when it gets cold.
There will likely be a series of numbers around the dial.The numbers will be read from 0 to 60.It will be between 45% and 35% for most people.Running on the higher end comes with some caution.When the outdoor temperature drops, and the level of humidity in the air is still high, water can condense on the windows, leaving the possibility of water building up and running down to the sill, thus doing damage.Most of the conventional humidistats have a temperature scale that makes us turn the dial lower as the temperature drops.When the outdoor temperature is 0 degrees, the humidistat is set to 25 degrees.It's necessary to set it even lower when it gets cold.It is safe to add humidity when the outdoor temperature is above 20.The scale is a guessing one.It assumes that a normal insulated house has single pane windows.You can keep a more comfortable level of humidity with better windows and insulation.
There is a series of numbers from 1 to 10 surrounding the dial.This type of humidistat uses an outdoor temperature sensor to do the job of guessing.The humidistat will reduce it's setting when the temperature drops.The humidity target is set at 35%.We can set our home's insulation level with the 1 to 10 settings.Better insulated homes are less likely to be damaged.We can raise the dial for these homes.The dial should be set lower for homes that are loose.It can take some time to find the right setting.You should have a reasonable level of comfort if you leave it at the setting where water doesn't condense on the windows.
Digital humidistats will have another level of control.The two previous features are combined into one digital control.The level of humidity and insulation factor can be adjusted.Most of the time, this type of humidity control is built into the home thermostat.