Free heat

[JL_LI]

I posted a thread yesterday about “steam” heat. Well nothing’s free but there is a way to reclaim heat that would otherwise be lost to the environment. Most homes have an electric dryer. That 220V appliance generates 2000 watt hours of heat and plenty of humidity, all shunted outside the house through the dryer vent. Disconnect the dryer hose from the vent and allow it to vent inside the house. Don’t forget to plus the vent outside. You don’t want to allow cold air from outside into your house. You can get sophisticated and have your dryer vent into your heating ducts. I just let mine warm the basement a little. Either way it’s 2000 watt hours of recovered rather than wasted heat. And it’s free.

Free heat.

 

[Ted Keane]

It's also filled with dust and lint.It's really not a good idea to do this.

 

[boxocrap]

I posted a thread yesterday about “steam” heat. Well nothing’s free but there is a way to reclaim heat that would otherwise be lost to the environment. Most homes have an electric dryer. That 220V appliance generates 2000 watt hours of heat and plenty of humidity, all shunted outside the house through the dryer vent. Disconnect the dryer hose from the vent and allow it to vent inside the house. Don’t forget to plus the vent outside. You don’t want to allow cold air from outside into your house. You can get sophisticated and have your dryer vent into your heating ducts. I just let mine warm the basement a little. Either way it’s 2000 watt hours of recovered rather than wasted heat. And it’s free.

Free heat.

put a really good filter on it for dust and such..and it may work..change the filter often

 

[telestratosonic]

I posted a thread yesterday about “steam” heat. Well nothing’s free but there is a way to reclaim heat that would otherwise be lost to the environment. Most homes have an electric dryer. That 220V appliance generates 2000 watt hours of heat and plenty of humidity, all shunted outside the house through the dryer vent. Disconnect the dryer hose from the vent and allow it to vent inside the house. Don’t forget to plus the vent outside. You don’t want to allow cold air from outside into your house. You can get sophisticated and have your dryer vent into your heating ducts. I just let mine warm the basement a little. Either way it’s 2000 watt hours of recovered rather than wasted heat. And it’s free.

Free heat.

Great idea. Just needs a lint filtration device. We have an electric dryer in our basement and we've had -35C/-35F temps this winter. Our forced-air furnace runs on natural gas.

 

[telemnemonics]

I installed an inside two way valve thing for that purpose, had a small filter to reduce the lint vented inside.
My Mother vented her dryer inside for the heat too, made the basement a little too damp and linty.
Good points though.

 

[Tele-friend]

I posted a thread yesterday about “steam” heat. Well nothing’s free but there is a way to reclaim heat that would otherwise be lost to the environment. Most homes have an electric dryer. That 220V appliance generates 2000 watt hours of heat and plenty of humidity, all shunted outside the house through the dryer vent. Disconnect the dryer hose from the vent and allow it to vent inside the house. Don’t forget to plus the vent outside. You don’t want to allow cold air from outside into your house. You can get sophisticated and have your dryer vent into your heating ducts. I just let mine warm the basement a little. Either way it’s 2000 watt hours of recovered rather than wasted heat. And it’s free.

Free heat.

Read your post yesterday. Yeah, dry air in these winter days is quite a problem. We use 2 portable humidifiers to bring the humidity to at least 50% in our appartment. We also dry our clothes inside to help with dry air.
Regarding electric dryer, we have it and heat doesnt go outside but stays inside the appartment, so we definitely use that for aditional heating. We also dont let the water out but collect it inside of dryers container. We use that water for humidifiers, because our tap water contains lot of minerals (limescale).

Bottom line, nothing goes to waste

 

[Bortyeast]

Home supply stores sell 'Indoor Hook-Up Dryer Vent Kit's' for under 20 bucks. They're designed to trap lint and humidity (water). Easy install, and they work pretty well.

 

[JL_LI]

put a really good filter on it for dust and such..and it may work..change the filter often

The dryer has a good filter and it vents into what was once the coal room in the basement from mid November thru mid April. I never thought of a secondary filter but that wouldn’t be hard to do.

 

[boxocrap]

The dryer has a good filter and it vents into what was once the coal room in the basement from mid November thru mid April. I never thought of a secondary filter but that wouldn’t be hard to do.

yep piece of cake..and a good idea too ( not blowin my horn here)..get one that filters bacteria and well as very small particles

 

[57joonya]

I thought of this years ago, and tried it for a week . It got moldy in my basement unfortunately. But I’ve been thinking about trying it again. It’s super dry in my house this time of year . I think I tried in fall last time . Wasnt dry enough yet

 

[Duck Herder]

I posted a thread yesterday about “steam” heat. Well nothing’s free but there is a way to reclaim heat that would otherwise be lost to the environment. Most homes have an electric dryer. That 220V appliance generates 2000 watt hours of heat and plenty of humidity, all shunted outside the house through the dryer vent. Disconnect the dryer hose from the vent and allow it to vent inside the house. Don’t forget to plus the vent outside. You don’t want to allow cold air from outside into your house. You can get sophisticated and have your dryer vent into your heating ducts. I just let mine warm the basement a little. Either way it’s 2000 watt hours of recovered rather than wasted heat. And it’s free.

Free heat.

Well, it's humid enough around here that you would cause other problems like molds and such, however, you could get a dehumidifier to capture the moisture and just like the drier, you would be capturing the energy that it needs to run as heat also.

 

[Flaneur]

I have one of these, hanging in my boiler/utility room.

-and one of these, in the garden.

 

[JL_LI]

Thank you to everyone who suggested a supplementary filter. I went down to the basement and saw some dust and a little bit of fine sand in the coal room. Sand? From the clothes dryer? It’s brought in by the dogs. No denying it. I never noticed it before even though I’ve been venting the dryer indoors all winter for years because I just cleaned and painted the entire basement this past fall. We no longer use window air conditioners but I have polyethylene open cell foam filter material. I cut a square and put it over the dryer discharge leaving a little sag where the sand can collect. I’ll check it in a month to see it it has to be cleaned or replaced. A little more work but it’s still free (recovered) heat and with a new high efficiency furnace, I need it down there.

 

[telestratosonic]

I installed an inside two way valve thing for that purpose, had a small filter to reduce the lint vented inside.
My Mother vented her dryer inside for the heat too, made the basement a little too damp and linty.
Good points though.

I installed an inside two way valve thing for that purpose, had a small filter to reduce the lint vented inside.
My Mother vented her dryer inside for the heat too, made the basement a little too damp and linty.
Good points though.

I'll fire up the dehumidifier in the spring. The humidity builds up then and into the early summer.

I'm in southeast Alberta, an hour northwest of Medicine hat and a couple of hours southeast of Calgary. It's bone dry here in winter and the humidity is below 40% on the main floor of our bungalow right now. I've had a humidifer going for weeks trying to get the humidity over 40%. I have several acoustic guitars with those Oasis humidifiers I keep in the guitar cases.

We have a chinook moving through right now but no wind, thankfully. This is the second one in two weeks and should last for a week. Chinooks really break up the winter. It's 10C/50F outside right now (1:42 PM Mountain Time) with the snow melting and the sun beating down.

I love it!

 

[telestratosonic]

View attachment 942962
I have one of these, hanging in my boiler/utility room.

-and one of these, in the garden.
View attachment 942965

I put up a clothesline in the basement for the wife to use in winter. It cuts down on the electricity bill (electric dryer) and gives us much-needed humidity in winter.
By the way, my wife's great-grandfather was from Dundee, Scotland. He served in the North-West Mounted Police (now known as the Royal Canadian Mounted Police) in what is now southwestern Alberta from 1884-1889.

 

[1955]

I did that for about 10 years in an 1800’s townhouse. It was a 1970’s Kenmore and I was very poor. The dryer was in the kitchen and it helped take the edge off the merciless cold winter air stabbing through every crack.

I staple-gunned plastic and blankets over every window and made barriers for every open door/hallway. I tried catching the lint with a screen contraption, but nonetheless, I would still have to vacuum lint off the walls every couple weeks.

I kept the lint tray clean, but despite that, one time the whole dryer caught fire while I was in the kitchen.

I took the whole thing apart and cleaned out burned lint from 40 years. Thing kept going until I left that miserable, black mold-infested, plaster falling from the ceiling, mushrooms growing out of the walls, hellhole.

Landlords…

You do what you gotta do.

 

[telemnemonics]

I did that for about 10 years in an 1800’s townhouse. It was a 1970’s Kenmore and I was very poor. The dryer was in the kitchen and it helped take the edge off the merciless cold winter air stabbing through every crack.

I staple-gunned plastic and blankets over every window and made barriers for every open door/hallway. I tried catching the lint with a screen contraption, but nonetheless, I would still have to vacuum lint off the walls every couple weeks.

I kept the lint tray clean, but despite that, one time the whole dryer caught fire while I was in the kitchen.

I took the whole thing apart and cleaned out burned lint from 40 years. Thing kept going until I left that miserable, black mold-infested, plaster falling from the ceiling, mushrooms growing out of the walls, hellhole.

Landlords…

You do what you gotta do.

Can you tell us, in a few words, how you felt about that 1800s townhouse?

 

[billy logan]

Just thinking - depending on your local humidity - you MIGHT vent to outdoors for the first 10, very humid, minutes of the dryer drying, THEN flip a flap and BENEFICIALLY vent the rest of the dryer's run indoors to heat and moderately humidify.

Yes, having to set and listen for a 10-minute timer would be a hassle to a degree (of temperature) - a real bother of some percentage (of humidity) <that's high hilarity there, ICYMI.

Many households have dry air in winter causing guitar necks to shrink across their width then the frets stick out. otoh Admittedly you don't want mold or condensation dripping on the inside of exterior windows.

Bortyeast's suggestion post#7 sounds good. I'm not pro-lint.
You could make a 2-stage lint filter for the interior exhaust where the exhaust hits a layer of fine mesh first, then hits a (larger wider area) layer of VERY fine mesh. You could re-purpose the bell of a Sousaphone. I understand that 1955 wouldn't have room in the kitchen for the bell of a Sousaphone.

2nd layer wider so that the real fine lint doesn't end up clogging the exhaust. Yeah you'd be checking timers and filters all the time, but could be worth it.

 

[P-Nutz]

Done this for years after the vent pipe broke; never fixed it, and blocked the outside vent. Use nylon stockings as filters (cheap!), and in a drafty 106-year-old house, there’s enough air flow to keep it from getting moldy!

Plus it keeps the guitars and our red slider warm and happy, as it’s our music room as well!

 

[Engine Swap]

Occasionally see “parasite” shelters hooked up to HVAC exhausts in the city.