kitchen curtains / blinds and condensation

[Not_Fred_Honest]

I took down my kitchen curtains last summer and never replace them. I was going too

Since then the condensation stopped. Their a small dehumidifier running 24/7, but that was running last winter too. At some point it was set for an upgrade this year but now there no need to do it. Its only a small kitchen.




Aidodo Dehumidifier Mini Electric 1000ml £30

It turns out when I closed them at night they trapped a warm air ageist the glass and this was the cause of the condensation. And one of my friends thought I was joking. She then took down her kitchen blinds and the same thing happened, less condensation over night.

Now you mite say, cant you just leave a window open in the kitchen? That will stop it and it will !!!

But.....

I'm not keen on leaving ground floor windows open at night. Its an invitation for trouble.

 

[LadyOnArooftop]

I'm plagued with condensation at the bottom all my windows, but I just use kitchen roll to soak it up.

 

[Not_Fred_Honest]

A low watt dehumidifier would fix that. This ones on a deal right now for £56 and uses 47 watts.

https://www.argos.co.uk/product/3449527

Your washing will dry faster. Its good for one good size room. For the hole house you need a 12-25 L depending on the size.
I'm not a fan of the big ones, you need to leave all the doors open for them

 

[supercookie123]

You should NEVER dry clothes in the house, on radiators, etc. This invites damp. Washing lines and tumble dryers are for that. If you need a dehumidifier regularly, I'd say it's time to look at insulation and windows - might be time for new ones. It's expensive, but a permanent solution.

 

[Not_Fred_Honest]

Hmmm.... I'm not too sure about that one.

Its cheaper to use a dehumidifier to dry clothes than tumble dryer. And they wont shrink

 

[Kev45]

Hi good evening guys because I am an expert in every electrical gadget known to man, I thought I would educate you about cheap dehumidifiers bought on Amazon.

1. Don't buy cheap gimmicky electrical goods shite online at Amazon.
2. A small dehumidifier will not remove all the moisture in an average sized room, if at all, any, they are simply not powerful enough.
3. They 101% will not dry a full load of washing efficiently in "hours" or even "overnight" and I can't wait a month for dry underwear, can I?
4. If you ran one "day and night" you will also spend all day and night emptying it.
5. The high-pitched whining sound will send you over the edge in the first hour, call 111 asap if you suddenly start banging your head on your 'damp' wall.

If visible condensation is already an issue then it is already everywhere, in your walls, in your floor and in your ceiling.

Hire a REAL dehumidifier for a day or two which will remove ALL of it.

Here are my top tips to combat condensation.

Try and make sure your house is properly insulated and ventilated.
Extractor fans are far more efficient at removing excess moisture than a cheap dehumidifier, both in the kitchen and bathroom.
Wipe down surfaces in the kitchen after you have been cooking with a tea towel.
Fully open those floral curtains in the bedroom each morning that your partner said look great, make sure the window vent, if you have one, is open, if not open the window slightly.
Don't cram cupboards and wardrobes chock-a-block, this attracts condensation like an Amazon addict buying cheap shite online.

Finally, run the radiators, on a low setting, if you can afford it, throughout the house.

Happy dehumidifying guys.

 

[Not_Fred_Honest]

Wot a twat

There is too much evidence online to say dehumidifiers don't dry clothes in a few hours. It google it !!

Now without going too deep into sizing a dehumidifiers, common sense would tell you:

A small one for a small room
A big one for a whole house.

And like most things it comes down to running cost:

A small one would use 20-45 watts, 0.2p per hour
A big one 200-500 watts, 20p per hour

The only time you hire them in is after a water event: flood or burst pipe.

 

[Kev45]

I am always right guys, always, 100% always, and top tip guys, pay no attention to online cowboys who wouldn't know their dehumidifier's from their humidifier's.

If you have a major damp problem and if you do hire a "big" dehumidifier, guys, move it from room to room, (that's why they come with wheels). This is far more efficient than expecting a "big" one in your downstairs kitchen to extract all the moisture from your bedroom or bathroom upstairs etc. It would take weeks or months, if at all, and we don't want a damp house for weeks or months, right?

You would have to be a jaded, burnt out Amazon consumer (mug) to believe a "big" extractor fan kept downstairs is going to remove moisture from windows and walls upstairs efficiently.

Btw, if you rent and your landlord simply brushes it off as a "lifestyle" problem, and when clearly it isn't, always seek advice. Tenants have far more rights since legislation was introduced last year, than they did previously. Awaab's Law, part of the Social Housing Regulation Act 2023 and subsequently landlords have stricter timelines to resolve issues with damp.

Mould caused by damp/moisture will cause no end of health issues, and particularly for children.

Stay safe out there.

 

[Not_Fred_Honest]

Oh fck Kev dont know about the dew point

The dew point is the temperature at which air must be cooled to become saturated with water vapor and reach a relative humidity of 100%

Warm air can “hold” more moisture than cooler air. When warm air cools, and can “hold” less moisture it will become saturated even though the amount of water vapor in it has not changed. The dew point is the temperature to which the air must cool for it to become completely saturated with water.

The warmer the air, the more water it holds. This is why your shower steams up the room and cooking in the kitchen does the same. Opening the window will help but you need to keep doors closed. If you don't it gets into the rest of the house.

Cold air is dry and this is the reason we get chapped lips in winter.

The whole fan thing worries me more than Kev with 2 brain cells. If your moving the air around the chances are you will hit a cold spot like a wall or window and make things worst.

And remember each person breaths out about a mug full of water each day, don't even get me started on those with fish tanks or cats.

The main point to remember is new housing is "air tight" to meet the building regs. If your home is closed up like mine is right now due to storm Bert or you just feel cold and wont open the windows, that water vapors got no where to go. Its just going to build up over the winter and make the place feel damp.

Just don't take my word for it, sales of dehumidifiers have rocketed in the last few years in the UK. If they didn't work and make life better, no one would buy them

 

[Kev45]

Sausage boy (and I knew he would) is now rabbiting on about nothing in particular in regard to his various claims.

Google is his master.

A needy attention seeker.

 

[ShorehamChap51]

Wow
What a lotta stuff to plough through

 

[ShorehamChap51]

I'm plagued with condensation at the bottom all my windows, but I just use kitchen roll to soak it up.

Dehumidifier ide say
A good sized 1

 

[Not_Fred_Honest]

Sausage boy (and I knew he would) is now rabbiting on about nothing in particular in regard to his various claims.

Google is his master.

A needy attention seeker.

Unlike you, I'm open minded

Housing in the UK has change in the last 30 years. The days of chimneys and fire places venting our homes are long over.




We need to change with the times

 

[Kev45]

As someone who lives in a 150-year-old terraced house, with no modern DPC (it is slate) there is absolutely nothing some random online can teach me about damp or condensation.

It would help his case more if he actually lived in a house, but of course, he does not.

I have used an industrial dehumidifier, a real one, in the main bedroom (after removing the plaster) and that took a week or so to fully remove all the moisture from the walls before I had it tanked and replastered.

There are also tools to measure damp in the walls (moisture detector), and a consistent "red" reading would be extremely problematic.

Bought at any decent DIY shop.

That's just a fact.

A "small" bottom of the range "dehumidifier" costing £30 (cheap shite) from Argos will certainly not clear enough moisture to be effective, from even a small kitchen or bathroom.

It would struggle in a large airing cupboard.

It certainly will NOT dry a normal load of washing or even come close.

Those are the facts.

Googled pictures courtesy of random font on a screen are not facts.

 

[Not_Fred_Honest]

Oh Kev.......

You're so 1980's its not funny

You plaster a wall.... you hire in a industrial dehumidifier.....

Was it that one? Its given me a warm fuzzy feeling inside knowing you spend £80 running it over a week




Now Kev... once the plaster dried out you wont need it, but the house will still get damp over the winter
Just living there will make it damp.

And I know far more about living in old houses than you, I lived in one for 25 years.
And I know far more about building than you too, I have an NVQ 6 in construction






Would you like to see all the other certs I have for construction Kev? I have some really nice OLD ones for plumbing and heating

 

[Kev45]

Yeah, a few years ago you were also a multi-millionaire with the largest plumbing business in the SE, and now you're also a master builder to boot

Telling damp experts how to do their job, from the comfort of his local authority assisted housing, and where he has NO real responsibility at all, including doing his own washing or paying utility bills etc.

While he posts yet more fake "certificates", he has ... Googled.

Ha Ha Ha.

If water is pooling on the bottom of ALL your windows, imcluding rooms you are not using, then it suggests it might not be just a ventilation problem.

Reasonably simple (logical) to find out.

Buy a moisture meter to check all your walls for damp. Buy a hygrometer or use an android app to measure humidity. If both are in the recommended range, then it most likely is ventilation and or poor insulation. A relatively simple fix, which has already been explained and it could also be faulty window seals, or faulty guttering etc.

I am sure all the grown-ups on the site are already well aware of these particular issues, anyway, right?

The problem is, however, naive people just rush out and buy a dirt cheap dehumidifier and because they do collect some water, those naive people believe that they are actually doing their job.

The actual reality is, a small dehumidifier will collect literally spoonfuls of water over a few hours, but a decent mid-range dehumidifier can collect pints (litres) over the same period of time and in exactly the same space.

When a fake online master builder gives you advice online, take it all with a pinch of salt, this is the same sausage who thought he could single-handedly manhandle a 240 litre wheely bin full of dry cement bags, sand and topped up with water and simply tip it straight into a wheelbarrow.

 

[Kev45]

would you like to see all the other certs I have for construction Kev? I have some really nice OLD ones for plumbing and heating

How about you write on a piece of paper, "Kev you handsome bastard" then place it next to your fake googled "dehumidifier" and use your smartphone to take a pic and post that instead.

How about you do that, sausage boy (lol).

 

[Not_Fred_Honest]

I'm not a master builder Kev, never said that
But I do get £450 per day to run a site and you get £400 a month on the dole

I do love those fresh faced know it all's from the council... never done the work and get paid frk all, but full of advice

Now lets try and get this thread back on track.

Kev find a low cost way to stop the windows steaming up, say in a KITCHEN? ( See title of this thread)

 

[Kev45]

Sausage boy derails his own thread then types "let's get it back on track".

You are not in control here, sausage boy.

No pic then?

'I own this, I own that, I do this, I do that', I get paid this, I get paid that.

Brag brag brag (all total bullshit).

We all own googled pics.

 

[Not_Fred_Honest]

One day you will post I want reply.......
I'm closer to the end of my life now than the beginning.
When I do die, I'm coming back as a ghost and will haunt you. Every time you fart, I will set fire to them