dehumidifier / fan near water heater

ChrisJ

This may be a dumb question but I feel its worth the risk to ask.



I am running a dehumidifer in my basement near my water heater and I'm concerned it may cause a problem. 



My water heater is a Bradford White power vented 50 gallon model with their "Defender" system. My dehumidifer just happens to exhaust on the side that is towards the water heater.  It has not caused any problems or errors but I am concerned wind blowing towards the water heater may not be the best idea? 

The reason it is aimed in that direction is it gives me the best overall flow around the basement.  Due to my basements layout its not easy to simply move the dehumidifier, I would end up with other problems. Of course, if its a bad idea to have it aimed at the water heater I will deal with those problems, I'd just rather not if I don't have to.





What do you think?  Should this be a problem with a power vented (single  exhaust, no intake) water heater?   Please see picture for exact setup, its not directed at the water heater but does blow past it.

icesailor

Dehumidifier Exhaust:

In my opinion, it doesn't matter where you exhaust it. The exhaust is hot air and if the water heater is running, it will remove the warm, drier air from the "conditioned" space.

In my opinion, a bigger problem is that the "conditioned space will become too warm and someone will open the windows to let cooler fresh air in. Air that is much higher in humidity than what is in the conditioned space. I see Dehumidifiers put in spaces all the time and the room becomes so hot that the windows are opened. Then, you are trying to dry out the world.

But that's my opinion. So, I'm probably wrong. I see a lot of dead Dehumidifiers in cellars.

ChrisJ

Yep

My main concern was interfering with the water heaters burner in some way.



It certainly gets warm down there.  Typically 75-79F depending on how warm it is outside and how dry I try to keep it.  I can pull off 45% but I'm sure it costs a lot more than maintaining 55-60%.  Without the dehumidifier I was seeing 85% and who knows how accurate that is, regardless of accuracy it was bad.



My basement is just under 400sqft while the rest is crawl space which I am also keeping dry with this dehumidifier.  I am the only one that goes down there and don't open the windows unless its cool and dry outside in which case I would also turn off the dehumidifier.  Haven t seen a time like that since before the spring.

I plan on cleaning the crawl spaces out more, sealing up things, replacing the crawl space doors with tighter, sealed ones and laying down plastic but its going to all take time.



At this time the amount the dehumidifier runs just to maintain 55-60% I'm sure I'm going to need a new one in a few years or less.  Of course, my basement is pretty dry and comfortable even though its warm, while my neighbor has mold on his screw drivers and rusty tools.  I think I'll deal with the heat and electric bill and keep my tools clean

ChrisJ

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