Pros and Cons - Passive vents in bedroom

[^woody^]

Passive vents work because they have baffles to reduce noise and draughts. So they don't tend to get covered up by the resident.

But on their own they may not solve the condensation issue. You will need to deal with that with other ventilation and heating patterns. However, some properties are more susceptible to condensation so it may never be completely eliminated.

BTW, placing a hygrometer on the window cill, with all that condensation around is not going to give you an accurate reading of the property RH. In any case, humidity readings are irrelevant on their own. High humidity and cold walls will produce different effects to high humidity and warm walls, for instance.

Current thinking is that constant low extraction from a trickle fan (with boost) is more effective than fans going on and off at various times.

 

[thunt]

Passive vents work because they have baffles to reduce noise and draughts. So they don't tend to get covered up by the resident.

But on their own they may not solve the condensation issue. You will need to deal with that with other ventilation and heating patterns. However, some properties are more susceptible to condensation so it may never be completely eliminated.

BTW, placing a hygrometer on the window cill, with all that condensation around is not going to give you an accurate reading of the property RH. In any case, humidity readings are irrelevant on their own. High humidity and cold walls will produce different effects to high humidity and warm walls, for instance.

Current thinking is that constant low extraction from a trickle fan (with boost) is more effective than fans going on and off at various times.

My initial research showed that increasing ventilation with a piv unit with heater would give the best resolve.

Before i started researching it was obvious the condensation was forming much more on the middle pane, without a trickle vent, than the outer 2 panes with a trickle vent. So to me the first thought was to add a trickle vent to each middle pane and see how that goes. But housing didn't want to know.

I purchased those gyrometers myself as housing asked me to do those readings, and it's from that they acknowledge a problem exists, so got Airtech in to survey and recommend the solutions.

Strangely enough when i went in the loft to take a photo of the fan pump, i noticed no insulation where the old water tank used to be, but housing are not interested in looking at the insulation. There was also a big hole in the party wall, that the housing have acknowledged and arranged to be filled.

Here are my readings to date, I have continued with them as want to see what the difference is when the solutions are installed.

 

[^woody^]

I think you are wasting your time with that chart. What are your trying to acheive?

 

[thunt]

I think you are wasting your time with that chart. What are your trying to acheive?

It was what the housing asked me to do...... would like to see a reduction in humidity once the accepted solutions have been put in place.

 

[^woody^]

I suspect that the landlord is trying to shift responsibility to you not only for the cause of the humidity (the classic "lifestyle" excuse) but for you either not agreeing to solutions or choosing/refusing solutions which dont work/would work.

I can't think what the landlord is going to do with that, and I would question whether they have anyone qualified to interpret things either. I suspect they are spinning you a yarn based on their own lack of understanding.

There is absolutely no need, and no merit in you providing that data. You are using uncalibrated instruments, selecting random locations and times, you are not recording material temperatures or working out dew points, you are not recording weather conditions, or many other influencing factors .... and its not an unbiased exercise in any case.

I've never heard of such a thing. If they want useable data, then they should be installing secure data loggers themselves. But even then what are they to do with the data? It's bizarre.

 

[John D v2.0]

For me I'd say if there's more water in the air inside than outside then the improved ventilation would help, however if it's warm and wet outside then even the outside of your Windows will be steamed up, as is common on your car in the morning.
Ventilation is more likely to help in freezing winter as the outside air won't have much water in regardless of its humidity.
So it may well be that at this time of year you just have to be careful about producing moisture, although half hour every morning with the windows open would go a long way.

 

[thunt]

I'm beginning to think leave things as they are, perhaps open up the fan in the loft to see if the timer can be extended from the 7min it overruns now.
We have started to see an improvement since leaving the windows ajar, so best to give that more time and see what happens.
The thing that puts me off these humidistat fans as well is the walls are so thin, that we would no doubt hear it in bed, and the kitchen one when we are in the lounge.
My anxiety could have got the better of my on this one and i jumped in before doing the simple things like leaving windows ajar, and giving it time to adjust.

The other thing that puts me off the passive vent in the bedroom wall is that there is not a lot of space on the exterior wall, have a tv hung there (only place it can go), and a wall mounted fan for wife when she's in bed.

One to think on and not to rush in to.