These units all seem to use the same guts, but have completely different control systems. Some with glaring design errors including the ability to turn on the heaters independently even when no fans are running if the processor crashes. The most common faults are heater failure, fan motor run-capacitor failure, thermal fuses tripping if the unit isn't allowed to cool down, furring up of the desiccant drum pores and leaking out of random orifices. I don't think any of them are properly rated to run at full power, so I always run mine at the lower setting, and they actually work slightly more efficiently at that setting. My current favourite is the Eco Air Simple since it has virtually no electronics in it. Just a mechanical humidistat that turns the unit on and off. As such, it has no cool-down time. The only niggle is that he humidistat is in the same box as a big desiccant drum, so it is slow to respond. Your unit has a better heater block than others I've taken to bits that had a simple mica holder that had puffed up with the moisture and heat, possibly causing the heater to fail at that point. These are definitely a great dehumidifier for winter use. Hopefully I'll be doing a video of some weird dehumidification experiments in the future. The video will go up whether they work or not.
+bigclivedotcom Hi Clive, I regret not getting a simple humidistat version, as the electronic versions have the disadvantage that they basically just run continuously at a high/med/low power until the water container is full. My classic refrigerant based dehumidifier can run unattended for much longer periods of time, as it allows a more granular (and sensible relative humidity) setting to be achieved. I look forward to your future experiments on this subject
+arcadeuk It is rather annoying that it only lets you choose from three humidity settings, ironically with the single drip graphic being the highest humidity. The electronic ones do at least have one advantage over the dumb unit. They run the fan to sample the air every so often. With the dumb unit the humidistat is in the same case as a freshly dried desiccant drum, so the hysteresis of the humidistat is really high. But there's a digital humidistat module already on its way...
We've been using the EcoAir DD1 models for nearly 10 years in our family. Yes have seen the early ones fail with heater problems, but they are great for colder houses and especially UK damp garages to stop the contents going rusty....
another thumbs up for the ecoair simple version. simple so not much to wrong, but also easy to fix. mine has been going for 7 years and not been opened, however have repaired a couple of friends machines. usually the problem come from bunged up drain hole, causing the condenser to fill up until it empties into the elecrtics
Hi there. I am currently going down the dehumidifier rabbit hole for collecting as much knowledge as I can collect because apparently that's what satisfies me 🤣. I live in a dry desert area and temperatures here touch 50 degree Celsius. No one I know has heard of domestic dehumidifiers, never seen domestic dehumidifier in real life and wanted to know how these things worked. Yours is the perfect video for that. I love UA-cam because I didn't think someone would have posted this. Just seen this I can think of at least 5 changes to improve the reliability. I wonder why companies makes such bad products.
some make low quality products to get your money, without spending much of theirs. I have high quality versions, which have been running for 6 years, without a single problem.
@@stargazer7644 it's humid here for some months along with high temp. Black/ red wet bulb temperatures. It's not a completely dry desert round the year of course.
Hi my Ecoair Desiccant Dehumidifier ECO DD122FW wont turn on and there are no lights showing. Having watched a few videos, I'm thinking it could be a faulty capacitor. Did try a multimeter on it and the needle didn't move. Is it worth the expense of changing the capacitor to see what happens? Or could it just as easily be a number of causes?. thanks.
Does anyone know if the desiccant wheel has to go only one way or can it go both? The motor turning it has died in mine and is marked ccw but almost all these motors are cw/ccw meaning they reverse when they encounter resistance. Am hoping I can just replace it with a cw/ccw model which would make the fix easy and cheap. The desiccant wheel on mine is very difficult to turn as in the video which I presume has lead to the motor burning out. Thanks for the very useful video arcadeuk!
My Ivation dessicant dehumidifier has started blowing very fine pieces of something all over the place. They appear like iridescent glitter on dark surfaces, and tan on white ones. I suspect this is maybe silica dessicant? The crap is everywhere now. I took it apart and can find no other source for it.
@@cancerionn I've had two Desiccant Dehumidifiers that run constantly. The Eco Seb packed in after 14 months and the company wouldn't respond to any of my inquiries. The second one, the "Ivation", ran fine for three years then the air condenser got blocked and it stopped working. It was an easy job to take it apart and remove the blockage and now it's running perfectly again. "Ivation" was a much better company that stood by their product and even when the guarantee ran out, they offered to sell me a new one at a huge discount. I didn't need it as I fixed it myself. I suggest you strip it and see if the air condenser is blocked so the water can't get out. Good luck!
How are you? Can you clean it? Mine extracts way too slow after 3 years of intensive laundry mode using. The rotor has some residues which I think prevent it from working well
Wow, that's mega complex compared to the ones that use a Peltier plate. I've got a couple that use the Peltier and they aren't very quick, although they do work - provided the room isn't that warm or they both stop working lol.
+GadgetUK164 Theoretically these are really effective, I just need to find a good brand. I got this one because of the wide temperature operating range (so it can be used in a cold garage etc) As you know yourself, the peltier ones have a narrow operating range, and the refrigeration based ones need fairly warm room
+GadgetUK164 The peltier ones are horribly inefficient. They pretty much draw around 60W all the time and take very little water out compared to a compressor or desiccant unit. One day someone is going to discover a simpler and cheaper way to extract moisture from the air.
+bigclivedotcom I wonder if something like the ceramic micro beads that chemists use to seperate water from other solvents. I think that they are porous enough to trap water very slowly on their own, but can be dried out with heat when needed. A "regeneratable dessicant" if you would. I should look into that instead of using calcium-chloride (such as "damp rid"), which produces waste that needs to be sent to a disposal centre or builder. edit, 7m later: googled it. silica gel, activated alumina, zeolite.... so many options, so little performance/efficacy data in the first page of results.
When the desiccant is heated, the moisture goes into air which is then passed through a condenser module which is basically some plastic piping which is kept at around room temperature (so it's cooler than the heated air temperature). This causes the moisture in the air to condense out and drip into a collection bucket at the bottom of the unit. This fills up and then you pour the water away (some units have a pipe you can put in a sink or drain so you don't have to empty anything).
*sigh* ok you've inspired me just enough to open up my meaco dd8l YET AGAIN to try and sort out this overheating fault nonsense. do you have any idea if damage to the dessicant wheel, ie potentially blocking up some of the pores with collapsed zeolite, could be contributing to my alleged overheat problem? (sorry i know your vid is over 2 years old...)
...oops.. i came across the same model I have, and is also broken (rattle noises+non stop+only blows cold air, and no water, regardless of the house looks like a sauna). maybe i just get a compressor instead..
![Lp. Сердце Вселенной #60 РОЖДЕНИЕ ЛОЛОЛОШКИ [Финал] • Майнкрафт](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/YoR0pAV9FVQ/mqdefault.jpg)
These units all seem to use the same guts, but have completely different control systems. Some with glaring design errors including the ability to turn on the heaters independently even when no fans are running if the processor crashes. The most common faults are heater failure, fan motor run-capacitor failure, thermal fuses tripping if the unit isn't allowed to cool down, furring up of the desiccant drum pores and leaking out of random orifices. I don't think any of them are properly rated to run at full power, so I always run mine at the lower setting, and they actually work slightly more efficiently at that setting. My current favourite is the Eco Air Simple since it has virtually no electronics in it. Just a mechanical humidistat that turns the unit on and off. As such, it has no cool-down time. The only niggle is that he humidistat is in the same box as a big desiccant drum, so it is slow to respond. Your unit has a better heater block than others I've taken to bits that had a simple mica holder that had puffed up with the moisture and heat, possibly causing the heater to fail at that point. These are definitely a great dehumidifier for winter use. Hopefully I'll be doing a video of some weird dehumidification experiments in the future. The video will go up whether they work or not.
+bigclivedotcom Hi Clive, I regret not getting a simple humidistat version, as the electronic versions have the disadvantage that they basically just run continuously at a high/med/low power until the water container is full. My classic refrigerant based dehumidifier can run unattended for much longer periods of time, as it allows a more granular (and sensible relative humidity) setting to be achieved. I look forward to your future experiments on this subject
+arcadeuk It is rather annoying that it only lets you choose from three humidity settings, ironically with the single drip graphic being the highest humidity. The electronic ones do at least have one advantage over the dumb unit. They run the fan to sample the air every so often. With the dumb unit the humidistat is in the same case as a freshly dried desiccant drum, so the hysteresis of the humidistat is really high. But there's a digital humidistat module already on its way...
We've been using the EcoAir DD1 models for nearly 10 years in our family. Yes have seen the early ones fail with heater problems, but they are great for colder houses and especially UK damp garages to stop the contents going rusty....
another thumbs up for the ecoair simple version.
simple so not much to wrong, but also easy to fix.
mine has been going for 7 years and not been opened, however have repaired a couple of friends machines. usually the problem come from bunged up drain hole, causing the condenser to fill up until it empties into the elecrtics
Hi there. I am currently going down the dehumidifier rabbit hole for collecting as much knowledge as I can collect because apparently that's what satisfies me 🤣. I live in a dry desert area and temperatures here touch 50 degree Celsius. No one I know has heard of domestic dehumidifiers, never seen domestic dehumidifier in real life and wanted to know how these things worked. Yours is the perfect video for that. I love UA-cam because I didn't think someone would have posted this. Just seen this I can think of at least 5 changes to improve the reliability. I wonder why companies makes such bad products.
some make low quality products to get your money, without spending much of theirs. I have high quality versions, which have been running for 6 years, without a single problem.
Why would you neeed a dehumidifier in the desert? When I lived in the desert we had humidifiers.
@@stargazer7644 it's humid here for some months along with high temp. Black/ red wet bulb temperatures. It's not a completely dry desert round the year of course.
Hi my Ecoair Desiccant Dehumidifier ECO DD122FW wont turn on and there are no lights showing. Having watched a few videos, I'm thinking it could be a faulty capacitor. Did try a multimeter on it and the needle didn't move. Is it worth the expense of changing the capacitor to see what happens? Or could it just as easily be a number of causes?. thanks.
Hey as long as it does its job now. Its worth the time and Effort., as a electronics Enthusiast Thats Our Motto!
Does anyone know if the desiccant wheel has to go only one way or can it go both? The motor turning it has died in mine and is marked ccw but almost all these motors are cw/ccw meaning they reverse when they encounter resistance. Am hoping I can just replace it with a cw/ccw model which would make the fix easy and cheap. The desiccant wheel on mine is very difficult to turn as in the video which I presume has lead to the motor burning out. Thanks for the very useful video arcadeuk!
My Ivation dessicant dehumidifier has started blowing very fine pieces of something all over the place. They appear like iridescent glitter on dark surfaces, and tan on white ones. I suspect this is maybe silica dessicant? The crap is everywhere now. I took it apart and can find no other source for it.
How is the condenser cooled?
I have DD8L and it cut off after 2 mins,Feb goes slow and error light comes on. Then after few min it stops working. Any advise??
@@cancerionn I've had two Desiccant Dehumidifiers that run constantly. The Eco Seb packed in after 14 months and the company wouldn't respond to any of my inquiries. The second one, the "Ivation", ran fine for three years then the air condenser got blocked and it stopped working. It was an easy job to take it apart and remove the blockage and now it's running perfectly again.
"Ivation" was a much better company that stood by their product and even when the guarantee ran out, they offered to sell me a new one at a huge discount. I didn't need it as I fixed it myself. I suggest you strip it and see if the air condenser is blocked so the water can't get out. Good luck!
I have DD8L and it cut off after 2 mins,Fan goes slow and error light comes on. Then after few min it stops working. Any advise??
Hi , I have also the same problem in my desiccant dehumidifier.
@@261divyesh Check my channel I've got a video taking my DD8L apart. You probably need to take it apart and clean it.
how to fabricate this desiccant wheel?
So who makes that one? (Make and model) so I know what not to buy
How are you? Can you clean it? Mine extracts way too slow after 3 years of intensive laundry mode using. The rotor has some residues which I think prevent it from working well
lol, love how much you hate this thing Luke, cracked me up a lot. looks cheap for sure but nice job getting it going again. i can see the frustration
+lukemorse1 Hey Luke, hows it going? Sorry for making you watch my non-arcade videos haha
Wow, that's mega complex compared to the ones that use a Peltier plate. I've got a couple that use the Peltier and they aren't very quick, although they do work - provided the room isn't that warm or they both stop working lol.
+GadgetUK164 Theoretically these are really effective, I just need to find a good brand. I got this one because of the wide temperature operating range (so it can be used in a cold garage etc) As you know yourself, the peltier ones have a narrow operating range, and the refrigeration based ones need fairly warm room
I took one of mine to bits twice thinking it was faulty - it was just the ambient temperature being either too warm or too cold I think.
+GadgetUK164 haha oh dear, at least you got to have a look inside, I think you might like taking things apart as much as I do ;)
+GadgetUK164 The peltier ones are horribly inefficient. They pretty much draw around 60W all the time and take very little water out compared to a compressor or desiccant unit. One day someone is going to discover a simpler and cheaper way to extract moisture from the air.
+bigclivedotcom I wonder if something like the ceramic micro beads that chemists use to seperate water from other solvents. I think that they are porous enough to trap water very slowly on their own, but can be dried out with heat when needed.
A "regeneratable dessicant" if you would.
I should look into that instead of using calcium-chloride (such as "damp rid"), which produces waste that needs to be sent to a disposal centre or builder.
edit, 7m later:
googled it. silica gel, activated alumina, zeolite.... so many options, so little performance/efficacy data in the first page of results.
so it takes the water out of the air and it put it back in the air ?
When the desiccant is heated, the moisture goes into air which is then passed through a condenser module which is basically some plastic piping which is kept at around room temperature (so it's cooler than the heated air temperature). This causes the moisture in the air to condense out and drip into a collection bucket at the bottom of the unit. This fills up and then you pour the water away (some units have a pipe you can put in a sink or drain so you don't have to empty anything).
*sigh* ok you've inspired me just enough to open up my meaco dd8l YET AGAIN to try and sort out this overheating fault nonsense.
do you have any idea if damage to the dessicant wheel, ie potentially blocking up some of the pores with collapsed zeolite, could be contributing to my alleged overheat problem? (sorry i know your vid is over 2 years old...)
...oops.. i came across the same model I have, and is also broken (rattle noises+non stop+only blows cold air, and no water, regardless of the house looks like a sauna). maybe i just get a compressor instead..
is it possible to replace the desiccant wheel?
So who makes that one? (Make and model) so I know what not to buy