This is the most common question that we are getting at the moment. Phone call after phone call telling us that their dehumidifier never seems to turn off and it is collecting lots and lots of water. Is this normal people ask us?
The answer is yes.
The Explanation – Why it’s normal.
The dehumidifiers have a built in humidistat that measures the temperature and relative humidity of the room and tells the dehumidifier whether to sleep or dehumidify. If you have a house that has never had a dehumidifier in it before then the dehumidifier will be running flat out for around two to four weeks while it dries out all of the air in the house and then the organic material in the house (wood, clothing, furniture, paper, books etc.) releases all of the moisture into the air that they have been holding on to, giving the dehumidifier more work to do.
As well as the above you are also putting moisture into the air each day (bathing, showering, cooking, breathing etc.) and this slows down the process of getting to a point whereby the humidity is low enough for the dehumidifier to turn off for a rest.
Then there is the weather, if it is raining a lot then the dehumidifier will run for longer. When it has caught up and brought things under control you will find that your dehumidifier turns off and then you will settle into a cycle of on/off/on/off as required.
After all you bought the dehumidifier to dry your house and that is exactly what it is doing for you. So don’t be too hard on your poor old dehumidifier!
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240 responses
Dear Chris,
Great blog and appreciate how you kindly write back to these comments.
I recently bought the DD8L as the flat we live in has a problem with damp and mould during the winter months. Couple of questions:
1) Our place is an one floor flat about 200 sqm and I wondered if our DD8L is strong enough for the whole space or should I concentrate on the bedrooms with the most problems by closing the door? If it is strong enough, once the problem rooms settle, should I then bring the machine into a central space of the flat, in our case the hallway, and leave the doors open for the rest of the flat?
2) Which fan speed will be best? I have noticed the medium fan setting does the job in bringing down the humidity but at the moment it stays on the whole day I’m worried about the running costs.
Thank you in advance!
Mona,
Thank you for your purchase and your comments. I would suggest putting it somewhere central on single fan speed and running it against the thumbs up setting. When you have any laundry to dry then use the laundry mode and if you feel that things are getting out of hand then either use the second fan speed for a while or reduce the target humidity to the three droplets setting.
Hope this helps.
Chris
Hi, just bought 2 of the abc 12 LT, do I just set it to 50 ? I dont understand how to know how much humidity is in the house, or am I better setting to a lower number (I presume the lower the number, is for a lot of damp ?), Also if I leave my 2nd unit on the landing with all 3 bedroom doors open will it work or does it need to be in each room then moved to the other room ? Thank you
Andrea,
Thank you for your purchase and your message.
Set both machines to 50%rh and leave them in the central positions with the internal doors open. No need to move them from room to room.
Chris
Good morning Chris
I have a 2 storey home with one occupant. The footprint is 60 square meters.
I found mould on the walls and some wooden furniture recently and the seat of my sofa felt cold and damp. As well as condensation on the windows.
I have purchased a MeacoDRY ABC 12litre which arrived on Tuesday. I have placed the unit at the bottom of the stairs and am leaving doors open
I set the target at 55% and the RH read at 78. In the first 24 hour period the RH reading went down to 61 and 6 litres of water have been extracted from the air. The unit has not read under 61 since.
Are you able to comment on the amount of water extracted please and whether I have bought the correct size unit? I understand the unit will not ‘turn off’ until the surrounding air reaches the target, is this likely to be days or weeks?
Sorry if I have just asked ‘how long is a piece of string’
Thank you
Karen
karen,
Thank you for your purchase and your message. It will take weeks to get the house under control because as you have described yourself you have a fairly serious damp problem and the machine will take time to dry it all out. Just keep the machine running 24/7 and be patient, it will get there for you.
Chris
Hi, I have the Meaco 20L unit. Please can you confirm/advise what the Low and High fan speeds settings are for.
I tend to use the fan speed to control the noise factor – high during the day, low at night, but I do wonder if I should just leave it running on low speed, so that it can run at its own pace.
When on High for instance, other than the fan spinning faster, is the unit is actually working harder and will it complete sooner, saving me running costs? I do feel, sometimes when on High, the air is circulating faster, but having less time to condense in the unit causing less water collection in the same time as it would if on Low. Other than that, it works well approx 6 Ltrs a day for us. Thank you.
Ian,
Thank you for your purchase and your comment. The low fan speed does help to reduce the noise level but it is in high fan speed that you will get maximum extraction and greater effeciency.
regards
Chris
Here’s a query on my Meaco 25l Low energy dehumidifier.
I run it so it’s in the mode which has it start up every 30 minutes to check the humidity. I think it’s called Humidistat mode.
I think this mode follows what is called “Meaco Control logic” which I found described in a manual.
From the manual I found.
—————– cut ————————————————————————————————————
When the room relative humidity is 3%rh below your target relative humidity the dehumidifier will stop drying the
air but the fan will continue to run for 10 minutes. If the relative humidity is stable then the dehumidifier goes to
sleep for 30 minutes.
During this sleep time, the humidity reading on the display will probably increase well above the set point. This
is because the fan is turned off and the sensor is now reading the relative humidity inside the dehumidifier where
it is cold and wet. This is normal and the machine will not turn back on because this is the reading inside the
dehumidifier and not the room reading.
After 30 minutes the dehumidifier will wake up and sample the air with just the fan running for 2 minutes so that
the relative humidity sensor can tell the control panel what the room relative humidity is, if the relative humidity is
3%rh above the set point then it will start to dehumidify again, if not then the fan will go to sleep again for another
30 minutes
——————————————-cut ———————————————————————————
Does the Meaco 25L Low Energy follow this?
I see what’s being done, it’s a way to avoid the initial high reading inside the machine.
This is what mine is doing and if it’s how it’s supposed to work then it’s not really low energy. I set it at 55% in a room that I know is roughly 55% humidity. It sits waiting for the 30 minutes to pass, then when it starts the humidity display immediately jumps to anywhere between 70-80% which I’m sure is just the air in the machine. It starts the compressor straight away and doesn’t do a fan only run for two minutes before checking.
It’ll run for roughly 2-3 minutes during which time it gets a sample of the room air, finds its around 55%, and shuts down. It just stops immediately, no fan only run after shutdown either.
So what I get instead of a 2-minute 20watt fan run every 30 minutes, I get a 2-minute compressor and fan run which adds up over a 24hr period when it’s not exactly needed.
How is the 25l low energy supposed to work?
Mike
Hi Chris
I purchased the Meaco 12l dehumidifier on the 8 of June 2020. I put it on the same night and 12 hours later the tank was full, I emptied the tank and it collected water again the next day. The dehumidifier only collected water for two days, and it has not collected any water since. I did not run the machine this past two days just to check whether it would collect water and it has not.. Is this normal or do I have a problem.
Addalene,
Thank you for your purchase and your message. It sound slike the target you have set is higher than the room humidity which is why it is not collecting water at the moment. Have a look at the reading on the screen, that is the room reading and then press the Up arrow once, the new reading is the target, if the target is lower then the machine will not collect anything. If you want it to run and collect water you can use the Down arrow to change the reading to a lower target.
Hope this helps.
Chris
I just replaced my frigidaire 95 pint with a new one. It was replaced free of charge after 4 years because it had a 5 year major component warranty. It was showing an FO error code. My new one is a little different but still works great. My question is, I have it locked on 45 % relative humidity. When it indicated that the relative humidity was at 43% should it not shut off or does it have to drop 5% below where I have it locked in to shut off. My manual gives me no information of this. Any help would be much appreciated. I called the company twice an neither rep could answer my question
Thomas,
Thank you for your message, obviously this is not our unit but I found the manual online and had a read for you. The machines default is to run continuously so press the – or + button once and see what reading you have on the display, the humidity set point might be different to what you think. If it is set to 45%rh then it is probably the case that the fan runs continuously on this model and only the compressor is switched off when the target is reached.
Hope this helps.
Chris
HAVING READ ABOVE COMMENTS .I RECENTLY BOUGHT A 12L DOES YOUR CUSTOMERS UNDER STAND THE CO AND AP SETTINGS AND KNOW HOW TO SET THEM. IT TOOK ME A FEW DAYS TO NOTICE THEM
Donald,
CO stands for continuous and AP turns the dehumidification cycle off and the machine just runs as an air purifier (best to have the HEPA filter fitted). These are described on page 6 of the manual. Please let us know if you need us to send you another copy.
Thank you for buying a Meaco dehumidifier.
Chris
hi chris
just bought the meaco 20 litre dehumidifier for a five bedroom house and its being running flat out for 3 days and collected around 12 litres,is it ok to constantly run it till it reaches humidity of 50
great product by the way
Shane,
Thank you for the purchase. What you describe is perfectly normal, you will find that it takes around a month or so to slow down as the house dries out.
Chris
Hi, I’ve purchased a ABC 10L dehumidifier a couple of weeks ago. At first it displayed the lights and the humidity levels, but now it only shows lights when you press a button. It may be going into sleep mode, but how do you take it out of sleep mode? I have tried pressing sleep mode and then another button straight away, but the lights still go out after 30 seconds.
Chris,
Thank you for your purchase. Hold your finger on the Sleep button for four or five seconds and everything will go back to normal.
Chris
I just wanted to clarify. Press the Sleep button for 2 seconds and then another button within 30 seconds to come out of sleep mode.