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I recently started getting very interested in air quality in my house. I decided to take a similar approach to air quality that I do with the stock market: lots

by verelo 10y ago

I recently started getting very interested in air quality in my house. I decided to take a similar approach to air quality that I do with the stock market: lots of small, well distribute bets whenever possible. For context, our house is 3 levels with a furnace in the basement (cold climate; Canada) I ended up with 3 different brand of CO detectors, 2 different brands of smoke detectors and 1 radon detector. By far the Radon detector is the most expensive at around $250 CAD, and least critical for the short term (but for the long term concerns, anyone with a below grade section of their home should have one!). A decent Co + smoke detector (You can often get them in one unit) should cost you no more than $30-40 CAD. Testing a CO detector isn't super easy (not like smoke detectors - just make some well done toast), but I'm trusting that if i have several different kinds well distributed throughout the house at least one of them should save us. I focused on keeping detectors both near and & inside bedrooms, as well as having a minimum of 1 smoke + CO detector on the other floors in open spaces. Unrelated to these gasses, I also purchased VOC sensors. These are SUPER interesting. It's amazing how the VOC level rises after a few days, and all it takes is opening a window for a few hours to bring it back to lower levels. We were renovating recently and found that after virtually every contractor the house needed hours of windows open to bring the VOC level back down to something that the sensor considered "good quality" (lower than 450 ppm). Hope that random rant was interesting to someone :)

B1FF_PSUVM 10y ago
> VOC Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) are organic chemicals that have a high vapor pressure at ordinary room temperature. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volatile_organic_compound https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volatile_organic_compound
fma 10y ago
Which VOC detector do you have? After I purchased my new house (USA, Georgia) I put in the detectors. My wife is from China where people are rightfully paranoid about formaldehyde - due to low quality building material. It's basically the same in the USA, except people are a lot less knowledgeable and informed about it. My cabinets, drywall, paint all had high level of formaldehyde. Had to always had the windows open...otherwise it would rise above OSHA approved levels. In the USA, there's no regulated levels for residence..but there is for office. Funny, isn't it.
- verelo 10y ago
  Eve Elgato: https://www.elgato.com/en/eve/eve-room https://www.elgato.com/en/eve/eve-room Sadly they do not break it down by substance type (which the website almost suggests it does), but i find it very interesting to monitor and that the measurements are highly correlated with painting or opening a window.
  - fma 10y ago
    Dang! Eve looks good, especially for the price. I have Foobot (https://foobot.io/ https://foobot.io/) and looks like it cost twiec as much as eve but probably does the same thing. Though, it doesn't say if eve uses wifi..I just see it say bluetooth. I like how Eve is battery powered, you can bring it wherver you want - whereas Foobot is plugged in. I have UNI-T UT-338C for on the fly readings. I like how the UNI-T can be portable, or plugged in and has a display. I get similar readings between the UNI-T and Footbot so I can somewhat trust it...
    - verelo 10y ago
      It's really rather decent, but I grow to hate the HomeKit protocol more every day (slow, buggy and not something I can mess around with) probably a wise move not going with something apple powered.
- exhilaration 10y ago
  Which one do you have that breaks it down by substance?
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
pmarreck 10y ago
Oh jesus. I'm currently renovating 2 bathrooms at once and ceramic dust is coating pretty much everything else not secured. I didn't even know about VOC's until now. I may have to invest in a detector EDIT: I ended up ordering a Foobot after doing some homework
- verelo 10y ago
  Oh I feel your pain. We renovated our basement and did a polished concrete floor. Brutal dust, it's just everywhere and I've tried to clean so many times but a few days later I look under something and BOOM missed a spot, it got everywhere! Masonary dust is a special kind of horrible.
i336_ 10y ago
Was very interesting to me! I'm curious what options are out there that will connect via something like RS232 or USB and let you tie into a centralized logging system (which would be incredibly easy to build). "Windows app with one-click data export" would be nice but isn't quite the same as a realtime feed. The main question would be whether polite pokings would produce protocol documentation, if this isn't already shoved in a forgotten corner on the website (or something).

by verelo 10y ago

B1FF_PSUVM 10y ago

> VOC Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) are organic chemicals that have a high vapor pressure at ordinary room temperature. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volatile_organic_compound https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volatile_organic_compound

fma 10y ago

Which VOC detector do you have? After I purchased my new house (USA, Georgia) I put in the detectors. My wife is from China where people are rightfully paranoid about formaldehyde - due to low quality building material. It's basically the same in the USA, except people are a lot less knowledgeable and informed about it. My cabinets, drywall, paint all had high level of formaldehyde. Had to always had the windows open...otherwise it would rise above OSHA approved levels. In the USA, there's no regulated levels for residence..but there is for office. Funny, isn't it.

verelo 10y ago
Eve Elgato: https://www.elgato.com/en/eve/eve-room https://www.elgato.com/en/eve/eve-room Sadly they do not break it down by substance type (which the website almost suggests it does), but i find it very interesting to monitor and that the measurements are highly correlated with painting or opening a window.
- fma 10y ago
  Dang! Eve looks good, especially for the price. I have Foobot (https://foobot.io/ https://foobot.io/) and looks like it cost twiec as much as eve but probably does the same thing. Though, it doesn't say if eve uses wifi..I just see it say bluetooth. I like how Eve is battery powered, you can bring it wherver you want - whereas Foobot is plugged in. I have UNI-T UT-338C for on the fly readings. I like how the UNI-T can be portable, or plugged in and has a display. I get similar readings between the UNI-T and Footbot so I can somewhat trust it...
  - verelo 10y ago
    It's really rather decent, but I grow to hate the HomeKit protocol more every day (slow, buggy and not something I can mess around with) probably a wise move not going with something apple powered.
exhilaration 10y ago
Which one do you have that breaks it down by substance?
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]

pmarreck 10y ago

Oh jesus. I'm currently renovating 2 bathrooms at once and ceramic dust is coating pretty much everything else not secured. I didn't even know about VOC's until now. I may have to invest in a detector EDIT: I ended up ordering a Foobot after doing some homework

verelo 10y ago
Oh I feel your pain. We renovated our basement and did a polished concrete floor. Brutal dust, it's just everywhere and I've tried to clean so many times but a few days later I look under something and BOOM missed a spot, it got everywhere! Masonary dust is a special kind of horrible.

i336_ 10y ago

Was very interesting to me! I'm curious what options are out there that will connect via something like RS232 or USB and let you tie into a centralized logging system (which would be incredibly easy to build). "Windows app with one-click data export" would be nice but isn't quite the same as a realtime feed. The main question would be whether polite pokings would produce protocol documentation, if this isn't already shoved in a forgotten corner on the website (or something).