Effective Bathroom Ventilation Options
Ventilation is crucial in bathrooms, especially in modern bathrooms which don’t have windows or an outside wall. Bathrooms without a window or skylight are common in flats and smaller properties and not having a window can quickly cause moisture to build up in the room. But it’s not just homes without windows in the bathroom which can develop problems caused by too much moisture in the air. If you’ve spotted mould or mildew developing in the bathroom then the main culprit is often excess moisture, coupled with inadequate ventilation. Getting ventilation levels right could sold your problems with mould and mildew forever. So what steps should you be taking?
Air Circulation
Every time someone takes a shower, as much as two pints of moisture can be produced by the hot water and linger in the air? Other household activities such as drying washing inside, cooking, boiling the kettle or even just breathing can cause moisture to develop in your home. You might not be able to see it, but the moisture will be present and causing problems, unless you can give it somewhere to escape to.
Air circulation is the key to combating moisture caused by showers, drying washing or cooking. Opening windows and allowing the hot, damp air to escape to the outside is usually the best option, but if that’s not practical, there are other ways of getting air circulating around your bathroom. These methods of ventilation will both make your bathroom a more pleasant place to be, and also prolong the life of your bathroom suite.
Open the Window
If you do have a window, then you don’t need to go any further than just making sure it’s open. Windows should be left open for at least 15 minutes after you’ve had a shower to let the air out of the room. The main reason people don’t like leaving the bathroom window open is that the bathroom gets cold, but if this is the case, keep the door closed and set a timer to remind you to go back into the bathroom and close the window after a set time. If your window has been painted shut or doesn’t open properly, then it’s often more cost-effective to get someone in to repair the window than to go through installing more high-tech methods of getting wet air out of the room.
If you can’t leave your bathroom window open because you have to leave your house just after you’ve stepped out of the shower, or live in a ground floor property and have concerns over security, then take other steps to minimise wet air in the bathroom. Leave the door open instead after you have finished having a shower or bath, and always take your damp towels out of the room to be dried elsewhere.
Extractor Fans
Perhaps the most common way of dealing with damp air in the bathroom is by installing an extractor fan. As the name suggests, the job of an extractor fan is to suck the moist air out of the room. There are lots of different fans on the market, in all shapes and sizes. You need the correct size of fan for the room you want to install it in – if your fan is not strong enough for the size of the room, then the air won’t be extracted properly. Although the price you pay for the fan doesn’t always correlate exactly with the performance of the fan, some of the fans at the cheaper end of the market are false economy. Look for a mid-range unit from a reputable retailer, and if you are unsure about which sort of fan you need, speak to a plumber for advice. Consider other factors such as the speed of the fan and the noise when it is running or whether it switches on with a cord or comes on automatically with the light.
Some of the more advanced fans have automatic moisture detection, which will trigger the fan to switch on when levels of humidity in the air reach a pre-set level. These can cost a bit more but take the guesswork out of when you need to switch the fan on, and are probably worth the investment if you are planning on being in the property for quite some time.
Fitting an Extractor Fan
If you currently have an extractor in the bathroom and are just looking to replace it with something bigger or more efficient, then fitting a new fan is a simple and straightforward task. However, if you haven’t a fan in place at the moment it’s probably best to get a professional onto the job. Installing a brand new extractor firstly means purchasing the right size and specification of fan for the room, knocking a hole in the wall to allow the air to be extracted outside, wiring it up safely, and getting a professional finish on the walls. If you have a bathroom which doesn’t have an outside wall then you can still have an extractor fan, but may have to have it in the ceiling, extracting air out into your loft space.
A basic bathroom extractor fan starts at around £50, with up to as much as £150 for the top of the range models. If you are getting a professional in to fit a new bathroom fan where there hasn’t been one in the past, you can expect to pay around £200 for the work to be done, plus the cost of the fan you choose to buy. Fans are very economical to run and can cost as little as £1.50 per year in electricity – less than the cost of one bottle of spray to deal with mould and mildew problems.
Dehumidifiers
Dehumidifiers are machines which work in the same way as extractor fans, but are less commonly found in bathrooms. A dehumidifier machine is a square, plug-in unit which can be moved around the house. Most aren’t designed for bathroom use, but are useful in other areas of the home where washing is being dried, for example. Dehumidifiers draw wet air in through the vents of the machine, and cool it down to extract water vapour which condenses into a tray as water. You will have to empty the reservoir in the dehumidifier, but the frequency of this will depend on just how damp the atmosphere is. Modern dehumidifiers aren’t particularly noisy to run, but are more expensive than an extractor fan - it costs about £1.50 a week in electricity to run a dehumidifier compared with £1.50 a year for an extractor fan.
There are many other products on the market which are marketed as “moisture reducing” and which are tubs filled with powder or gel to extract moisture to the air. These do have limited effect and can be useful in caravans and other places where fans or dehumidifiers aren’t an option. However, they are not particularly effective, and can be unsightly too. They are best considered as a short term, emergency measure only. Also, this style of moisture removal product is single use, once it has absorbed the moisture, you just have to throw it away.
Bathroom dehumidifiers are a lot more expensive than a standard extractor, and can be more expensive to run too. It’s therefore always best to look at getting an extractor fan fitted or upgraded before you start exploring buying a dehumidifier too. You can expect to pay around £100 for a plug-in dehumidifier unit but these aren’t always suitable to be plugged in and used in a bathroom setting. Take expert advice from a plumber about dealing with your moisture issues; often a dehumidifier is the last in a long line of options you should try first.
Protecting Bathroom Surfaces from Moisture
If you have a general issue with ventilation and moist air in your bathroom, then the furniture in your bathroom could be seriously affected too. Rooms which don’t have a problem with ventilation, areas such as your radiator and wooden surfaces in the bathroom can deteriorate over time when exposed to moisture in the air. There are some products which are designed to deal with these issues and prolong the life of your surfaces and furniture.
Furniture polish on radiators and wooden units can be a cheap and effective way of protecting them against dampness in the air. Polish forms a very thin protective coat on the furniture and acts as a barrier against moisture. The same trick can be used on shower screens to try to stop soap marks or hard water marks building up on the glass, making it difficult to clean.
One of the simplest ways of stopping moisture from getting into the air is ensuring the toilet lid is down before you flush. The action of flushing will release water particles into the air, and these could contain all manner of bacteria as well as releasing moisture into the air.
