How Does a Dehumidifier Work?

With humid air crawling up your walls, few things can make a home so unpleasant. Whether your house is damp, or your humidity comes from indoor cooking or drying laundry, the result can be a dreaded musty smell, mold growth on walls, and an increased risk of respiratory illness. Fixing a major moisture problem can take time, so what do you do in the meantime? One solution is to buy a portable dehumidifier, an electronic device that removes moisture from the air. In this article, we will introduce the working principle of commercial dehumidifier.

We are like "walking water bags". Just because an adult's body is usually 60% water, doesn't mean our home should be like a fish tank. High humidity can cause all kinds of problems. It can mold the clothes in your closet. At the same time mold is not good for computers and optical equipment, which leads to our health problems. High levels of indoor humidity promote the growth of bacteria, viruses, mites and fungi, as well as more respiratory infections and diseases, according to a scientific review of health effects. Most of the adverse health effects caused by relative humidity can be minimized by maintaining indoor relative humidity between 40% and 60%.

An air dehumidifier is a bit like a vacuum cleaner. It draws in air from one end of your room, pulls the moisture out, and blows the moisture back into the room. Moisture drips into a collection tank, which you must empty over time. So how do you remove moisture? Let's take a look inside a dehumidifier and see what all the parts do.

1. Warm, moist air is sucked in through a grille on one side of the machine.
2. An electric fan draws the air inward.
3. The warm air passes over freezing cold pipes through which a coolant circulates. (Note: we've simplified this part of the machine quite a lot. It's like a mini air-conditioner or refrigerator endlessly circulating coolant with a pump and compressor.) As the air cools, the moisture it contains turns back into liquid water and drips downward off the pipes.
4. Now free of moisture, the air passes over the hot condensor / compressor unit and warms back up to its original temperature.
5. Warm, dry air blows back into the room through another grille.
6. The moisture that was in the air originally drips down into a collecting tray (or bucket) at the bottom of the machine.
7. A plastic float in the machine rises upward as the collecting tray fills up.
8. When the tray is full, the float trips an electric switch that turns off the fan and switches on an indicator light telling you the machine needs emptying.