attic fans????

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Hi all, I had installed from the Homo Depot a large whole house fan put in my garage yesterday. It's by Master Cool made by GAF.com. OMG!!!! This thing moves 6000 cfms per minute!!!! My AC didnt come on for 2 hrs after the guy installed it!!! I normally keep my AC at 80 cuz it gets too cold for me. I checked or timed my AC. It usually comes on 3 times per hr. Now it turns on only once per hour. How cool is that??? Let me know your experiences with this item if you have one. Thanks,....Bill in Az....
 
Aunty Em!

We had a great old house in Michigan that had a huge fan in the attic. There were louvers in the upstairs hallway that opened when the fan turned on. It sounded a bit like a helicopter with a whop whop sound. If the windows were opened downtairs, it would make the curtians stand out. I loved it, the deep sound and the breeze that cooled us all down.
Kelly
 
That's pretty nice! However, don't count your savings before it hatches! How much electricity does the attic fan consume? If that thing's got a 1500 watt motor on it, you may be consuming almost as much power running that thing ALL the time, versus running the AC intermittantly. At least you don't live in a humidity prone area. Out here, you must have the AC running continually to keep the air dried out. It's common practice to under-size the air conditioners here in the south so that they run longer.

Attic fans are nice tho, especially when they can be set up to exhaust the entire house. I remember going to sleep in the summer time feeling the cool breese in my window, with the purring of the attic fan above, and the crickets and frogs chirping outside. Mom & Dad didn't put AC in the house till about 1985.

In my current house, I've got two solar powered attic fans. When the sun shines, they spin, and when it's overcast out, they don't. I also put disconnect switches on them, and I've got covers to go over the holes during the wintertime. They keep the attic pretty nice. Also, don't forget the value of vegitation. Although you probably can't really grow much of anything that tall out there in Phoenix, planting some decidious trees (that loose the leaves in the fall) on the south side of the house works great for keeping the heat off. During the winter, they loose the leaves, and you can get the advantage of the solar radiation.
 
Due to a new ridge vent installed when the roof was installed....

(see brown mesh-filled slit in photo [oh HUSH now Jason :-) ] near horizontal stud (oy vey) that forms peak of roof (upside- down "V" as seen from inside looking up...)
 
I simply stuck a twin fan set to blow in in the window that is in the attic. It is a walk-in attic accessible from the penhouse level guest suite.

This forces the heat out of the top of the roof, as seen in above pic.
 
and to control it, i went REALLY low-tech (read: inexpense)

Ye old appliance timer in the outlet (powerpoint) trick.

I may just do it right with an outlet near the window and a timer on the main level even though I am selling this house. We shall see.

(The black cable is the orignal cloth-sheathed 1946 vintage cable. The metal-covered new stuff is my doing).
 
and for more low-tech cooling this skylight in the penhouse guest suite was here when I got the place. When opened, the lighter warm air pushes itself out. This draws cooler air in from lower-level windows. YAY to natural convection.

Just like in the southern part of the east cost, the humidity here in the northeast makes this approach usable on a very limited basis.

I prefer to leave the central air-conditong set on 77*F when the house is occupied and let it run as it may.

Far less cleaning, and street noise, as well as more aesthetic curb appeal with the widows all closed. Oh, I do leave the bathroom window open an inch (2.5 cm) from the top mostly all summer for fresh air. That is EXCEPT when it is raining or the humidity tops 70% outdoors.
 
I use passive air circulation to keep my attic relatively cool.

This place is a one story bungalow that was extended with a master bed/bath addition some 30 or more years ago. When I bought it, the attic has zero insulation, and numerous air leaks between the living spaces and the attic. The roof is a low pitch (4 in 12) and you can't stand up in it (unless you're only about four feet tall). But there wasn't any soffit ventilation, just some rectangular roof vents on the higher portions of the roof (hipped roof).

Anyway, on the few very hot days we get each year, you could feel the attic heat radiating downward through the ceiling. After a couple of years of this, I did a major upgrade of the situation. I got out my trusty cicular saw (actually, three of them) and cut a 2" wide ventilation slot (shut up toggle) in the enclosed soffits all the way around the eaves. Then I affixed louvered continuous soffit vents over the slots. I also had to drill from inside the attic ventilation holes so that the soffits could breathe into the attic. After that, I affixed ventilation baffles, and then finally enough miraflex fiberlass batt insulation (nice stuff, not very itchy, looks and feels like polyester fiberfill) to R-50 level.

Now, during our hot spells, all I have to do is to button up the living space in the morning. It stays cool all day - maybe only gaining about five degrees - even though it might reach 100F outside, it's still about 75F inside. At night I open up the windows and use fans to circulate cool night air all night, to cool the place down to 70 (or whatever) again. It helps that this region has relatively cool nights, even during heat waves.

No AC needed. No attic fan needed. I think attic fans are preferable to AC, but good insulation and proper passive attic ventilation is even better - which should include continuous soffit venting. The idea is that warm air in the attic will naturally rise to exit through the ridge or high roof vents. It will be replaced by air drawn in through the soffits. This is preferable to sucking air out of the living quarters into the attic. Your mileage may vary!
 
Here is the rest of the guestroom/ penthouse suite.

Just in case I get to keep the house after getting rid of the ex, and someone in the club comes to visit.

(Please, any tips on hiding a body and removing bloodstains are not really necessary).

Trust me darlings the carpet does match the curtains. Why it looks grey here I don't know. LOL ROFL

O M G ~
 
Story from way back...

Shared this a while back...!

These used to give me nightmares. For years and years I did not know what these were. I was born in Southern California and live here now, but spent the ages 3-13 in Denver. I had a friend who had a semi-custom house. We were playing over there one time, I was about 8. He takes me to the bottom of the staircase and tells me to check out the ceiling at the top of the staircase, and to go up. I did, staring at these slats in the ceiling. When I got to the top, he hit a switch I did not expect. These slats slammed open with a smack, and this hellaciously noisy fan came on. It literally scared the hell out of me. For years I would just freak out about the thought of such a thing, and why would you want it in the house!

Anyways, fast forward to about 10 years ago when my wife and I were looking for a house. We went to one that was a newer custom home that the owner ran out of money and was selling. There was no furniture in it. We were encouraged to look all over the house versus a realtor tour of it. So, my wife went to the kitchen, and I went off to the garage!

Going down this one hallway, I happened to glance up and see a set of slats in the ceiling. (I still did not know what a whole house fan was at this point.) I stood staring at it, saying...oh oh.

I look over, and there is a silver plate on the wall with a rotary switch on it. For some insane reason, I rotated the switch.

There was a pause, then WHAM! those slats banged open and wooooooooooo the fan fired up, but this time not on a high stairwell ceiling but right near my face. AHHHHHHHHHHHGGGHHHH!

So, I turn back to the switch to turn the damned thing off, and unbelievably, the switch breaks in my hand! I couldn't believe it. I grabbed the thin little stem that the switch had busted off of and attempted to turn it off, but my fingers were sweating so bad I couldn't grip it. Finally, I took a key and placed it against the flat side of the stem and was able to get enough leverage to barely snap it into the off position.

My wife had just enough time to see me do it...and I yelled at her...."That's it, that's that sicko fan I told you about!!!!"

They do sound like they work well, but I could never ever get over the creepiness of them.
 
peterh770

peterh770

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Bill:
Did you get a direct drive fan or a belt drive? The belt drives are MUCH QUIETER and seem to move more air.

Kevin:
Creepy is a silver grilled classic Nutone bathroom ventilator fan. There are others that are creepy (Fasco, Miami-Carey), but Nutone is the worst.
 
Peter...

Now we had in two homes in Denver the lower wall mounted NuTone heater, which was just wonderful in cold climates. Or are you talking about those ones that are mounted usually on the wall near the ceiling?

My grandma had one of those, and yes, it was creepy. The Nutone bathroom heaters were quiet and the fans were small and they were very cozy and nice.

But many fans bothered me as a kid, glad I am not the only one. I wasn't too thrilled about the ceiling mounted glowing orange/yellow heat bulbs either!

I can't believe they still make it..


Was the following the type that bothered you?


This is the style that creeps me out more than anything:

 
As a boy-lived in a house in clearwater Fla that had a whole house attic fan-In the humid summers there-was better than nothing-the attic fans work best in dryer climates.
Later in life at a radio station transmitter site they had an attic fan that was used to exhaust tranmitter heat that got into the attic of the transmitter building-later the station owner gave me a larger motor to put on the attic fan-"gotta move more air" he said,I suggested he get a diffirent fan instead-he insisted I install the motor-was a two hp job-the original motor was half hp.So I put in his motor and started the fan up-was sort of scary--the thing shook and shivered like an airplane engine and propeller on an engine test stand-but it did move more air-dust in front of the fan blew out the vent in a large cloud of dust!This was over 20years ago-wonder if that souped up fan is still there.Typical attic fans have one third to one half hp motors-the power consumption would be around 400-600 Watts.for that 2 hp job at the radio station-would be about 1800W-that fan ran all the time-household attic fans can be connected to a thermostat like an AC-than it would cycle on or off and not run all the time-400-600W is easier on the electric bill than the 3000-8000W that a household size central AC would require.In attic fans that were manually controlled-remember them being run at night so it was cooler so you could sleep.Only on really hot days were they run all the time.
 
Attic Fans

Oh God I remember the attic fan. Used to scare me when I was a little kid. From one angle, it sounded like a large rattling fan, and from the other (looking straight up into it) sounded like a helicopter. After I got older I realized that it made fresh air in the house and I started to love it, and once I got used to the helicopter-like sound I always wanted to let it run on cool days. It was a great way to get fresh air in the house. Also, the more windows you open, the more the louvers open.

Ours had a simple toggleswitch (lol) and yes, UP was on. As soon as you flipped up, it would go OOOOOOOO and then the louvers would open. Beautiful fresh air filled the house.

Come to think of it, I miss those things. Only older houses have those.
 

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