Dehumidifier - help with room temperature?

[pixi88]

Just purchased a Meaco arete two dehumidifier in the hope it will help with damp. We are in an old end terrace and noticing patches of damp on some outer walls so hoping this will help. Does anyone have any experience with dehumidifiers and can tell me if it will help the house feel warmer in winter? House is poorly insulated and always feels really cold during winter months. Any tips on how to get the best out of it? Currently have it set up on the landing, it was at 70% when I switched it on about 2 hours ago and now sat at 55% so I’m impressed so far! Thanks in advance.

The room my dehumidifier is in is always hotter than any other room in the house. I only put it on when there is loads of washing to dry in winter though these days as we had the damp proof course re done so the room is no longer damp.

To get the best out of it make sure windows are shut, you don’t want it working hard sucking the moisture out of air outside, the toilet, a glass of water, vase of flowers or whatever.

However, it is best to open the windows wide first thing for 10 mins to let some damp air out and then turn it on after closing the windows (there is a scientific explanation but can’t remember it) and it would be best to deal with the source of the damp to try to rectify it. Do you know what’s causing it? Does the pointing need doing or guttering/chimney stack or something?

I’ve found the video explanation about damp and opening windows, even when it’s cold and damp outside -relative humidity. This guy explains it well

https://vm.tiktok.com/ZNdV6KUck/

thanks this is really helpful. We are renting at the moment and we’ve had the landlords contractors out twice who advised ‘open the windows‘. We will be buying a house after Xmas so this is just a short term fix until we move out and into our own place.

My house is a terraced house with a large, unheated cellar below the combined kitchen and livingroom, and hallway. I have two large dehumidifiers and both are in use a lot during the winter.

One lives in the downstairs living area and is set to 50 so it cycles on and off. If I don't have this running, warm air from the living area travels down into the cellar, hits the colder walls and comes back up again as cold, moist air which makes the place feel freezing!

I also use a dehumidifier upstairs to dry washing and remove excess moisture in the bathroom and bedrooms (usually 40 minutes a day for each.)

This may sound expensive but dehumidifiers do add heat to the room they're operating in which means less CH is required. Also, the CH system needs less energy to heat drier air than it does to heat moist air. So all in all, it works well.

Your dehumidifier will remove your damp problem easily. In the winter I would run it for an hour a day in that area even when the damp has gone as moisture is getting in from somewhere and this will keep on top of it. Also, don't forget to close windows when it's operating!

We live in a Grade 2 listed end terraced cottage with a cellar running under the living room area. We have two dehumidifiers that we run in the winter, one for downstairs, and one for upstairs. We run them both for a couple of hours a day and it has made a MASSIVE difference to our house. We used to get damp patches here and there, mainly over winter, and the walls would feel so cold to the touch. Now we get NO damp at all, NO musty smells, and NO cold walls. It definitely makes the rooms feel warmer too. We have Meaco ones and they have been amazing!!

For older houses, ventilation is your friend so open the windows for a while each day when the dehumidifier isn't running.

Also for your cold house, do you have central heating? We set our central heating in the winter so that it keeps the house at an even temperature all day with the thermostat set to increase the temperature for 2 hours in the morning when we are getting up, and then 2 hours early evening to take the chill off. This keeps the house snug and the temperature even. We also have a wood burner for very cold days that we run and keep the doors open so the heat travels.

We find our house to be suitably warm in the winter. Not warm like a new house would be, we still need to wear a sweatshirt indoors and can't walk around in T-shirts in Winter like you could in a newer home but its definitely not freezing. Now we have the dehumidifier its not damp in the slightest either.

It depends on the dehumidifier on where it warms the room or not. Is it a refrigerant or dessicant one? The latter gives out warmth.

yes we have central heating, the temperature drops really low in winter and then it takes ages to bring it back up to a decent temperature. Will try setting it as you suggest and hopefully with the dehumidifier it will feel warmer and less damp.

Just checked and it’s a desiccant one so hopefully will make the house feel abit warmer.

We set ours to keep the house at an even temperature. Whenever the house dips below that temperature the heating kicks in, temporarily, to bring it back to that temperature. The house stays at the same temp all day (until the morning and evening when it has a boost!) It works for us. Keeps the house warm and the damp away.

@ErlingHaalandsManBun what temperature do you leave it on and does it cost alot more to do it that way?Have thought about doing it but worried about the cost ,our house takes ages to heat up from switching on.

We set ours to 21 degrees. Once its there, its easy to keep it there. Its more cost affective than letting the temperature drop a lot and then the boiler is working hard and burning more energy to go from cold back up to the temperature you want it to get to. It doesn't cost any more, in our opinion. It was our heating engineer who came to service our boiler than recommend we do what we do and he said its more cost affective to keep the temperature at a constant rather than let it drop and then the boiler is having to work hard and burn energy to recover.