Subject: Re: Advice Needed!!! Replacement Central Air/Ventilation

From: [email-masked] (Nick Pine)
Date: 1 Jun 1995 04:54:10 -0400

John W. Grooms Jr. <[email-masked]> wrote:

>3. We have allergies in our family. Any opinions concerning whole house
>air cleaners or humidifiers?

One nice new electronic air filter is made by Aqua-Air Technologies,
at (410) 489-5288. The ESSA electronic filter comes in 14 standard sizes,
and slips in place of a normal air filter in a hot air heating system.
It has a retail price of about $200. It's an inch thick, and it uses
three metal screens with two filter pads between the screens. The center
screen has a potential of 7,000 VDC, and the outer two are grounded. 
The filter pads cost about a dollar, and need replacing about every two
months. The device comes with a small 110-24V transformer which plugs into
a wall socket, and the power consumption is listed as 24VAC at 1.6 VA. 

Here is the basic filter performance:

Typical Ambient Particle                
Size distribution (in microns) per m^3       Particle Removal Rates 
                                         
                       % by    % by          Electrostatic   ESSA
Size (um.)   Count     count   weight        ($800-1200)     ($200)

10+          1,000     .005%   28%  xxx x    99%             99+%
5-10        35,000     .175%   52%    x x    95%             99+%
1-5        264,000    1.32%    17%    x x    85%             99+%
.5-1     1,352,000    6.78%     2%    xxx    60%             90+%
.01-.5  18,280,000   91.72%     1%    xxx    40%             65%

                                    |||||_ bacteria/viruses/spores
                                    ||||_ cooking/tobacco smoke
                                    |||_ household dust
                                    ||_ pollen/mold/spores
                                    |_ dander/hair

Average synthetic dust weight arrestance: 79%

Single pass efficiency: 33% @0.3 um, 75% @0.5 um, 95% @1 um, 99% @3 um

Pressure drop: 0.05" @150 lfm, 0.1" @225 lfm, 0.15" @300 lfm, 0.22" @375 lfm

ASHRAE dust holding capacity: 20 gm/ft^2

Does not produce ozone

More than one person with severe asthma has told me that these really work,
that they have had their first night of good sleep in years, after spending
one night in a bedroom with one of these devices.

The air filter product is available now, and Aqua Air will soon have a
stand-alone console model with built-in fan, prefilter and charcoal filter.
One low-cost way of using the air filter now is to buy a $15 20" box fan and
mount a 20" ESSA filter on the suction side, with duct tape...

Nick

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From: [email-masked] (Nick Pine)
Date: 2 Jun 1995 21:29:58 -0400

Spiros Triantafyllopoulos <[email-masked]> wrote:

>We have a Honeywell whole house electrostatic system; it works extremely
>well and we pretty much never dust anymore. The effects were obvious when
>we neglected to clean the plates once and turned it off, only to see 
>dust everywhere...

Including inside the downstream ducts, as I understand this...
In fact, this downstream duct dust collection can harbor further beasties.

>The only negative is that it requires the usual cleaning once a month in a
>dishwasher but still every 3-4 months in a hi pressure car wash to
>get all the dust out...

And it's hard to fit one of these in the dishwasher without damaging it.
This is one of the few drawbacks to such a system, other than cost. I like
the Aqua-Air (410-489-5288) system because you just throw away the medium
every few months. I don't like "disposable" products in general, but this
seems to be one of the few good ones...

Nick

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From: [email-masked] (Spiros Triantafyllopoulos)
Date: 2 Jun 1995 15:02:59 GMT

Spiros

-- 
Spiros Triantafyllopoulos                  Kokomo, IN 46904   (317) 451-0815
Software Development Tools                 [email-masked]
Delco Electronics Corporation             "Reading, 'Rithmetic, and Readnews"