powerful bathroom exhaust fan

[eqalidan]

my parents want to get the most powerful one possible due to issues with mildew along with every surface of the bathroom being wet after a shower. they do not care about noise but the most powerful one we can find in a store is only 200cfm and relatively quiet, what they are looking for is zero ♥♥♥♥♥ given as long as it fits. I have no idea what search terms I need to use to find what the upper limit is.

[↑↑↓↓←→←→BASelect]

Tip: The shower curtain goes inside the tub. That way water don't get everywhere. Except for the steam and i love hot showers. My hot water has a temp of 136.5 which is nice and enjoyable.

[Apollo702]

The OP actually had a legitimate concern.

At first glance all kinds of things are "there." You have it. What are you talking about? There is often times is little consideration for actual quality.

Another example: Many rooms have either zero lights or a crappy one on the ceiling fan. Even with it on the room can be gloomy has hell.

I hadn't thought about fan quality before. I actually had spraypainted ceiling vents before. I had never considered this angle before.

[eqalidan]

Publicado originalmente por cSg|mc-Hotsauce:

Any fan + open window will help suck out all the moist air. Door closed though. Dehumidifiers would also help.

:qr:

room is dead center of the house, though I did see a dehumidifier made for putting under the bathroom sink, it would potentially work, but they want it sucked out not have all the humidity everywhere and then dealt with by a dehumidifier.

largely the problem is only a problem for about 10-15 minutes, but its enough time and often enough that they refuse to paint the ceiling with an anti mildew paint because 'it wont fix the problem'

its mind numming crap but its what they want to do, so I dont care, im just trying to get this done faster than them saying they will do it and cut to 10 years later still not done.

Publicado originalmente por Fajita Jim:

I can see why you come to Steam with this problem. We have many experts in every field ready to assist you.

I use off topic as a shot in the dark fourm, because where the hell are you going to ask, reddits not as useful for help as you would think to the point a website with 4 in the name gives better help faster, but I use there as a last resort

Publicado originalmente por Kamiyama:

A normal fan should work fine as long as it's not obstructed and is actually venting outside.

I would talk to someone at a hardware store.

Another thing to try is repainting the bathroom. Ask them about a water-resistant paint and ask them if they can mix some mold killer into it for you. Usually they can. The guy at my local Ace hardware did that for me when I had to repaint a bathroom.

The new paint with the mold killer mixed in did not have mold growing on it, even though there was no vent in that bathroom. It probably will eventually but I don't live at that place anymore.

New paint plus a vent will probably fix your problem. But talk to an expert. I'm just a random lunatic.

ok, the tldr for my situation is I don't have the money to just buy stuff for things that aren't broken, my mom wont do it herself, and my dad get conned into buying overpriced crap or just wont do it unless something is 100% broken. my mom has finally gotten pissed enough at the issue to buy it herself, and from what I know about fans and cfm, what my dad got for the bathroom is a low noise low cfm fan, I would honestly be shocked if the thing is higher than 60 given how weak it is.

I aver considered getting in in line duct fan that's something like 750cfm but that is currently shot down as too much work. its possible that that comes back on the table if I find out that my dad DID get a really powerful fan, but just how little is sucks I doubt it.

as for paint, that is the first thing me and my brother wanted, but that's shot down till my mom is satisfied that the air is sucked out fast enough.

Publicado originalmente por Judgmental Amaterasu:

Cut hole in wall. Install industrial fan. Profit

a non option but it is a first though, at least with in line duct fans being far more powerful than standard bathroom fans for some reason.

Publicado originalmente por Liu Roll:

Hard to be sure if people are reacting to the boomer joke ironically or choosing to ignore it & respond seriously.

every bit helps to keep it higher up so someone who may know sees it.

Publicado originalmente por Apollo702:

Publicado originalmente por kilésengati:

How big is you bathroom to call it 90%+ done. Or are you just using a hand brush?

My house is one of those with one of those cathedral like living rooms with sky-high ceilings. The tradeoff is that means the second story is L shaped because of the cutout. It is a definite design trade-off.

My bathroom definitely is undersized as a result. The problem is it was finished. It almost would have been easier to do a total redo. Painting was a ROYAL PITA and yes, I had to do all of it by hand and huge portions with small brushes.

Also, I tried one of those edging systems they are advertising lately. The results weren't great- but I was working in cramped spaces. In the rare times(the ceiling edges) I tried using a pole I was constantly banging into things. Ultimately the results of the edging system were inconclusive.

I made a mistake by not taking before photos. Give me a day or two and I will maybe post some afters.

To me, the room was kind of bleh before. It was there and functional. I didn't love it.

The paint was a dull brown. I switched to an almost grassy green and the ceiling more of a tan- kinda almond-ish. I am switching out the old school( and underpowered) lights for something more modern and a new mirror.

It should be done in a day or two and tonight I am going to work on the office some more.

It is kinda fun in a way!

if you ever need to do an edge and you don't have a stead enough hand, the tool you want is "paint edging tool" they are long metal pieces with a plastic handle, if what you want is smaller, you can get by with a scraper. if you need to get closer than 1/64-1/32 of an inch, its probably better to remove what you want to pain and then not care, like with light switches, if its far enough away that you cant get close, 1/32 of an inch thats unpainted is not going to be noticed.

Publicado originalmente por Bird:

How many cubic feet is the room? You want it to evacuate the moist air in 2-3 minutes, 5 at the most.

This allows the surfaces to be exposed to dry air within 15 minutes, allowing them to dry before the 30 minute mildew growth mark.

8x6x8 measuring from widest longest and tallest points, its a bit smaller than this, so 384 at most.

the bathroom stays humid for about 10-15 minutes before its done, however the ceiling stays wet for quite a while primarily right above the shower/tub

the fan that my mom wants is not one that's good enough for that size of a room, what she wants is one that's overkill, doesn't care cost or noise. well cost is not unlimited, she is just willing to spend upwards 3-400 to solve the problem, and noise should be under need hearing protection but I don't think anything like that gets made.

Publicado originalmente por SnakeFist:

Tip: The shower curtain goes inside the tub. That way water don't get everywhere. Except for the steam and i love hot showers. My hot water has a temp of 136.5 which is nice and enjoyable.

problem is a cold room between 60-70 degrees, has the walls act as dehumidifiers, as in all the moisture condenses on them, the fan is mid bathroom about 1 foot shy of touching where the shower begins, ideally the glass doors top crap from just going out that way and it primarily leaves over the top, but the fan is so crappy id just doesn't suck out like it needs to, then again it possibly does and htis problem is self inflicted, however any mitigation for the problem will not happen untill the fan is replaced.

Publicado originalmente por Apollo702:

The OP actually had a legitimate concern.

At first glance all kinds of things are "there." You have it. What are you talking about? There is often times is little consideration for actual quality.

Another example: Many rooms have either zero lights or a crappy one on the ceiling fan. Even with it on the room can be gloomy has hell.

I hadn't thought about fan quality before. I actually had spraypainted ceiling vents before. I had never considered this angle before.

If you just want a room to be lit up, powerful lights being a defuser does the job, you want good lights you typically want 1 main source 1 bounce source and 1 separate source. I personally if I want the room lit, dont care about quality and just want light everywhere so I just put 120-150 'watt' lightbulbs everywhere, every fixture in the house was made for incandescent so even when they say 45 watts max they arent talking about led 'watts' which means how much light they make/their incandescent equivalence, they are talking about heat or or powerdraw, both of which anything in a lightbulb form factor is not going to touch the limits of with leds.

now when it comes to the kitchen, you want high cri lightbulbs that are warm light/2000k~
warm light makes food look better and high cri means the food also looks better, if you want to see this at home, get a cold light in the 5000k range and a warm light in the 2000k~ range, even if they have the same cri, food looks better with the warm light, now a higher cri makes food look even better, its why I still use some incandescent for over the stove, they are high cri and leds don't really touch this for cheap while incandescent, they aren't cheap for this use, are a fraction of 1 led bulbs price.

now for my purposes of thsi thread, performance is all that matter, if the box says 100-200 cfm, the fan either does that or its a failure, quality comes into play with how it does it, either in power draw, noise levels, how long it lasts, kind of like how I view light, this is an 'I want the room bright' scenario where im tossing every other nice feature out the window and just want problem solved.

[EASY PETE]

You need it to drive out all of your fart stink

[Dusk ✨]

Mildew is inveitable. Just clean the tiles every 2 weeks. I will mention if you are getting a powerful ceiling exhaust, that there needs to be a source of air for it to draw from, ie an open window. Otherwise the pressure will reverse and pull air down from the roof/insulation and you don't want that.

[Li77lehorn]

Have cold showers. You won't need any fans and will save power/gas and water because you won't want to be in there for very long. No need for repainting either. It's a win win.

I don't live in snowy areas though so my winters aren't as cold. But it is a solution none the less.

[eqalidan]

Publicado originalmente por Dusk ✨:

Mildew is inveitable. Just clean the tiles every 2 weeks. I will mention if you are getting a powerful ceiling exhaust, that there needs to be a source of air for it to draw from, ie an open window. Otherwise the pressure will reverse and pull air down from the roof/insulation and you don't want that.

the bathroom door, while its not too bad, has a horribly gap at the bottom, so that can act as intake along with the vent, its rare either in summer or winter for heat/ac/fan not to be running so thats also another source for air to come in on top of the current 'leave the door open after a shower' policy we have because it seems to vent the room better.

given how little suck there is though I dont think its a great fan, my dad probably got a quite one because the old one, the bearings or something decided to scrape and cause ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ of noise at all times, everyone complained for 2~ years, and when he finally was forced to do something he likely got one that was silent to shut everyone up, it was never the noise the fan made it was the noise the malfunction made that was the issue.

[Sir Dookface McFerretballs]

Had to deal with a mold problem in a badly designed 2-room bathroom, where the toilet and shower area is separate from the sink and vanity area, and the sink and vanity area was where a crappy useless extractor fan was located in a 1970s house that had cheap basic "textured" house paint everywhere.

Mold and mildew LOVES "textured" walls/paint.

It was not easy. Had to replace the ceiling sheetrock/drywall as it had mold all the way through and bleach would only kill it for a month or two at a time. While the ceiling was exposed I had to run an ozone generator to kill all the mold for about a week.

Put in a heater/light/extractor fan combo in the new ceiling I found new in the box from the 1980s since the new stuff is garbage... It has an extractor fan in it that sounds like a damn jet turbine that is strong enough that I can feel it pulling air from under the bathroom door from 10 feet away. Then I painted the walls and ceiling with a gloss white interior paint meant for basements.

Both the heater and the fan are great at drying out the bathroom quickly enough that mold and mildew are no longer a problem. The gloss smooth paint will also make sure it is never a problem again. But it involved cutting a hole in the ceiling and running an extractor pipe out of the roof.

If the bathroom has an opening window you can use pretty much any electronically reversible window fan like https://www.amazon.com/Comfort-3-Function-Expandable-Reversible-Removable/dp/B004TAYQXE/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=window%2Bexhaust%2Bfan&qid=1670503042&sr=8-1&th=1

If you are up for wiring and cutting holes in walls then there are even more options. If CFM is the most important then you can search for them by that if need be.

You can also use bathroom heaters to dry out the bathroom as well, but they MUST be rated for wet/damp environments.

[UmmUmBurst]

We just did the same thing in our house.

You are overthinking it way too much. Just get a new exhaust fan. Put a ceiling fan in the hallway outside the bathroom door.

Sauna it up, turn the exhaust fan on, and open the door to the hallway fan after your done.

Clean your walls every week or every other week.

And be real.... the noise is gonna be like 2-3 mins of your life. It's not an issue like you think.

[Enterprofilenamehere]

I'm sure Boeing has a few spare jet engines kicking around.