Average tasks like showering, bathing and shaving can put home-harming humidity into the air in your Pacheco home. There’s good news still—a simple bathroom ventilation fan can protect you from warped wood, mold growth, broken drywall and other problems connected with a humid bathroom.
Even if you have ventilation fans in your bathrooms, do you know if they’re the right size? Are they as noiseless and energy efficient as they could be? Clean Air HVAC is here to answer your questions.
Today’s bathroom ventilation fans are small and sleek and they run more quietly and effectively than ever before. You’ll find a great range of options, from simple fans that will get the job done to fans with fitted heat lamps, motion sensors and heat-exchanger ventilation that helps prevent warmed air from leaking through your ventilation. While you have a lot of bells and whistles to select from, the most critical characteristic of your fan is whether or not it’s big enough to do its job.
Rated by the cubic feet per minute (CFM) of air they move, a bathroom ventilation fan should be able to swap out the air in a bathroom at least eight times an hour. With a typical 8-foot ceiling, your ventilation fan should have a CFM rating at least as high as the number of square feet in your bathroom. Therefore, if your bathroom is 5 feet by 8 feet, a CFM rating of 40 would be sufficient.
If you have a higher ceiling, the equation gets a little more complex. You’ll want to multiply the width of the room by its height and length, divide it by 60 and multiply by 8. Or, to keep it easy, you can heed HGTV’s guidance for bathrooms larger than 100 square feet – verify your CFM requirements by increasing 50 CFM for every toilet; 50 CFM for each shower, bath and combo; and 100 CFM for each whirlpool.
If you’re not sure if your bathroom ventilation fan is the right size, or you know it’s the occasion for a new one, give the professionals at Clean Air HVAC at call at 925-233-6238. We’re here to help you guarantee you have a ventilation fan that will work hard to care for your home and keep it cozy.