3 ms·

I have been very tempted to buy a whole house fan for a couple years now. My compromise has been to put a box fan in our attic access and leave that running, w

I have been very tempted to buy a whole house fan for a couple years now. My compromise has been to put a box fan in our attic access and leave that running, which does more than nothing, but I have to imagine a proper house fan would be much better. I've never actually been somewhere with one to know what to expect. I've heard good things though.

fatnoah 6y ago
It's amazing when it works. In the summer, once the air outside was cooler than the air in the house, I'd turn it on. In about 10 minutes, the entire house would be the same temperature as outside.
EricE 6y ago
Get the right one and they are quite, effective and cost efficient too! I like designs like these: https://quietcoolsystems.com https://quietcoolsystems.com It took a couple hours to install, mainly because I went back and forth where to install the intake vent. I had power readily available from a hallway outlet - added a switch above the outlet, carried it up into the attic and to the fan. If you aren't comfortable doing your own wiring that will be the hardest part of installing the fan. The rest is simple - cut a hole in the drywall of your ceiling where you want the intake, mount the insulated box with the insulated dampers that close when the fan is not in use, hang the fan with the proper 90 degree bend in the duct, wire it in and finally snap the grate on and you are done. The only "glitch" I had with my install is I had the fan pointed down a bit too much and my attic has blown in insulation (ugh). The fan ended up blowing a big "hole" in it. So I adjusted the fan, raked the insulation back into place and haven't had an issue since. My air conditioners each use about 2400 watts each (I have two!), the motor on my whole house fan is around 640 watts. We had an exceptional fall the year I put it in, and it more than paid for itself. And I got the benefits of fresh air. I live in the Mid Atlantic so spring and fall are the biggest time of year I can use it, but this year our summer wasn't too bad with humidity so I used it most of the summer too. It's amazing how much heat you can tolerate if you have a steady breeze. I highly recommend them! My only complaint is I wish mine had variable speed. There are many times at night it gets way too cold to run at normal speed, but if off the heat of everything in the house will heat the interior back up again without at least some airflow. With the size of my house I need to add a second one anyway to get enough airflow/turn over so I'm thinking about one of their units that has two fans - can run just one for a lower amount of air volume. One of my best home upgrades, that's for sure!
- war1025 6y ago
  This is super helpful. Thanks! How often do you leave it running? Is it a continuous thing or just periodically?
  - fatnoah 6y ago
    The one I had ran on a timer, so it could be run up to 60 minutes at a time. I usually ran it from 10-20 minutes, depending how cool it was going to get.

fatnoah 6y ago

It's amazing when it works. In the summer, once the air outside was cooler than the air in the house, I'd turn it on. In about 10 minutes, the entire house would be the same temperature as outside.

EricE 6y ago

Get the right one and they are quite, effective and cost efficient too! I like designs like these: https://quietcoolsystems.com https://quietcoolsystems.com It took a couple hours to install, mainly because I went back and forth where to install the intake vent. I had power readily available from a hallway outlet - added a switch above the outlet, carried it up into the attic and to the fan. If you aren't comfortable doing your own wiring that will be the hardest part of installing the fan. The rest is simple - cut a hole in the drywall of your ceiling where you want the intake, mount the insulated box with the insulated dampers that close when the fan is not in use, hang the fan with the proper 90 degree bend in the duct, wire it in and finally snap the grate on and you are done. The only "glitch" I had with my install is I had the fan pointed down a bit too much and my attic has blown in insulation (ugh). The fan ended up blowing a big "hole" in it. So I adjusted the fan, raked the insulation back into place and haven't had an issue since. My air conditioners each use about 2400 watts each (I have two!), the motor on my whole house fan is around 640 watts. We had an exceptional fall the year I put it in, and it more than paid for itself. And I got the benefits of fresh air. I live in the Mid Atlantic so spring and fall are the biggest time of year I can use it, but this year our summer wasn't too bad with humidity so I used it most of the summer too. It's amazing how much heat you can tolerate if you have a steady breeze. I highly recommend them! My only complaint is I wish mine had variable speed. There are many times at night it gets way too cold to run at normal speed, but if off the heat of everything in the house will heat the interior back up again without at least some airflow. With the size of my house I need to add a second one anyway to get enough airflow/turn over so I'm thinking about one of their units that has two fans - can run just one for a lower amount of air volume. One of my best home upgrades, that's for sure!

war1025 6y ago
This is super helpful. Thanks! How often do you leave it running? Is it a continuous thing or just periodically?
- fatnoah 6y ago
  The one I had ran on a timer, so it could be run up to 60 minutes at a time. I usually ran it from 10-20 minutes, depending how cool it was going to get.