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If I need to buy one, any recommendations yea or nay?

I replaced two last year and searched for the quietest that I could find. Honeywell, a great company by the way, was recommended. I've used two of them (different locations) in two consumer sizes from Lowes for a year now and they are great. Quiet, remove a LOT of water when it's around and flawless performance.

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Ann Arbor Guitars

I've been running one of these in my shop 24/7 for the last 6yrs. I've had to clean it a couple of times and that's all.

https://www.drieaz.com/DEC_Product_Base.aspx?decID=1059

Best, M

I also like the Honeywell dehumidifiers.
Buy one that is bigger than the square footage of your shop. I used to match the humidifier to the space and it ran continuously and burned out after a couple of years. The larger one runs less often, doesn't heat up the room as much and handles those 98 degree days. My shop is almost always at 45% in the summer.

My basement is unfinished and I have all my wood stored there. The RH was unusually high and with 2800 square feet to keep dry, I went with a Santa Fe Classic from Thermastor. It performs very well and I can maintain 45% even in the most humid outside conditions. If I were to finish off the rest of my shop, I would get one for there as well.

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jw ( o)===:::

I run a Santa Fe Compact 2, the smaller one. I just feed the hose out through the wall. Not as easy if you are below grade, but you can get a pump to push the water out. Keeps my unsealed shop at 40% without a problem. I did have an issue with the first one after about 9 or 10 months, and they just sent me a new one. No questions asked.

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Waddy

Photobucket Build Album Library

Sound Clips of most of my guitars

After burning up a dozen homeowner models in my first few years at $200 ea I finally got smart and got one of these.....
https://www.sylvane.com/aprilaire-1850f ... ifier.html

Fully sevicable with recharge ports, been 4 years now and nothing but regular cleaning. I needed two homeowner units to keep the shop proper in summer abnd this replaced them both.

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Brian

You never know what you are capable of until you actually try.

https://www.howardguitarsdelaware.com/

Brian--

That Aprilaire 1850F looks great. How is the noise, compared to the homeowner units?

It is a bit louder than a homeowner unit but not much.

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Brian

You never know what you are capable of until you actually try.

https://www.howardguitarsdelaware.com/

For anyone interested:

I did a lot of online research over the last several days, to see what would best suit my needs. I narrowed it down to the Aprilaire and Santa Fe brands. I need a free standing unit big enough for a whole house (as opposed to a ducted unit for the whole house). Those are the two brands that sell higher capacity, free standing dehumidifiers that are designed for long term use, as opposed to short term flood recovery (like Dri-eaz).

The Aprilaire 1850f recommended by Brian was the right balance of features and capacity for me, so I looked for the best price on one. Sylvane had the best price for this model, but Supply House was slightly better on some other similar models (like the larger 1870f). Money saving hint: by Google searching for an 1850f, and picking Sylvane over the other choices, I got an 8% discount compared to no such discount when I navigated directly to the Sylvane website and picked the 1850f. That knocked around $100 off an already decent price. It cost me $1,090.00, shipping included.

I'm looking forward to setting it up! My dinky dehumidifier died (as they all do), and RH here in West Virginia has been above 60% for a month, with at least 2.5 more months to go just like June.

Don, when you get your new humidifier going, you will be amazed at how efficient these "pro-sumer" units are at controlling the RH. One thing I did was put mine on a digital timer so that it can't run from midnight to seven AM. Don't know about the Aprilaire but the Sante Fe can be a bit loud when it runs.

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jw ( o)===:::

Thanks for the heads up, Joe. My wife and I are actually going to be OK with the noise, because the dehumidifier will be in the walk-out basement (where my shop is located) and we sleep on the second floor, so we have a two story buffer.

By the way, when I said the RH here was above 60%, that's inside, with air conditioning. Outside, it is consistently over 80% this time of year. The home store units are just not up to the task of removing the kind of moisture in the air we have around here in the summer.

Well, you will be fine on the second floor. That RH level will be easily handled by the unit that you are getting.

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jw ( o)===:::

Update: The Aprilaire 1850f dehumidifier arrived yesterday, and I set it up last night. As long as you know where you want the water to go and where the electricity will come from, setup is simple.

It is working great! It dropped the indoor RH by about 13% over the span of 9 hours. There's still more work for it to do in order to reach my goal RH level, but it is way better already than it has been over the last month. I swear, West Virginia might as well be the darn Everglades this time of year.

Noise: Manageable. It basically sounds like a window unit AC, perhaps a bit quieter and more even sounding. I would rather live with the white noise than live in a rainforest.

Helpful hint: According to some online reviews I read, some folks use silicone caulk to keep the hose connection from leaking. I just used plumber's tape and screwed the barbed fitting into the outlet good and snug. No leaks at all, and since it is not a pressurized hose (it just lets water trickle), I don't think leaks will be an issue. I will keep my eye on it, though.

Overall first impression: Well worth the money. Glad I pulled the trigger on it. Thanks for the recommendation, Brian!

Glad you got a great dehumidifier. It makes a huge difference. That brand you picked is one of the ones I was looking at.. From what I could tell - they have a good reputation.

For me - I looked over the numbers... 5 homeowner units vs 1 commercial unit... The home owner units last 1-2 years... So that's 5-10 years before the price "pays" back for me.... By then - I am likely to have clogged it up with sawdust several times..

Granted - there is the headache of homeowner units taking a dump when you aren't prepared.... And there is also the headache of floor space, dumping buckets (or running a hose), and the noise...

John--

For me, power, reliability, and the ability to be serviced were the things that led me to want a more robust dehumidifier. The homeowner unit I had before was not big enough, the pump broke (which led me to have to dump buckets every day), and fixing it is just not in the cards. With the Aprilaire, it is big enough to handle the task (I'm at about 46% RH inside the house), it is a pretty rugged unit, and there is an Aprilaire authorized repairperson in my town for any needed service. Plus, I just have a bad reaction to disposable appliances. I know most of them are these days, but if I have a choice, I like going with something that is capable of being put back into service instead of adding to the trash heap at the landfill.