Attic Fans
There is always something about that attic. No it’s not that movie where creepy creatures crawl. It is those no-longer used things, the sofas, the television, the drawers, the insects, the cob webs, the dusts, the rats, oh, if only one can make it a habitable place. But if ever someone did try to live in the attic, he would have already surrendered to the heat wave. It’s like having an oven at the top of your house. That is why people have resorted attic fans.
Attic fans nowadays come in different forms; there is that solar powered attic fan and whole house attic fan, and other types of attic fans. Small or big, branded or not, they are all the same and they are designed to suck out that heat accumulating in attic spaces. Why is there heat anyway? Well for the most part steel and metals are good conductors of heat. Your roof is a good example of that. And while your roof protects you from those harmful rays of the sun or from getting soaked with the heavy rain, the tin roof is like a big sheet of conductor that absorbs the heat of the sun and distributes that in the air space in the attic and other heat conductors found at the top of your house. Even during the night, attic fans are still spinning out that hot air left out during the day giving the dwellers a comfortable stay in their home.
Attic fans are not only present in houses but in factories were temperature is needed to be maintained and hot air needs to be released or in industrial places where there is constant production of heat like iron smelters and glass makers. The attic fan somehow works like an attic exhaust fan.
Other homeowners however find the attic fan not helpful. Why would they spend ventilation anyway in an area where they do not really stay? But mind this, in hotter places like Miami and Tampa; you may not imagine how hot a house can be without an attic fan. But then again, contrary to popular home building practices, the attic fan can be frustrating. It really does suck out all the heat concentrated in the attic space. And it does suck out so well, in fact, it disperses the cooled air produced by your air conditioning system inside the house.
Holes in wiring and cablings, and other open spaces will permit the conditioned air to pass through the attic. Instead of cutting energy for air conditioning, you get to pay higher bills. To remedy you may need to revamp insulation in your house or better yet add more insulation. Seal off those holes or places where most likely cool air may seep in. In not so hot day, you can turn off the attic fan to save on electricity. If one is using wind or solar power shut it down. It is also recommended to have your attic fans checked by experts to see if there are no electrical errors. Most home owners neglect and forget the presence of attic fans that by the time they installed it, their attic fans never got maintained. This can be potentially risky for the owners.
Experts have not really counted on the uses of the attic fan. Home builders these days suggest home owners to install to a safer approach and that is called the whole-house fan. This should not be confused with attic fan and though whole-house fans are installed in the attic. Far more different than the attic fans, the whole-house fan does not suck out heated air.
What it does is that it acts like a giant ceiling fan. It works best during at night, or when there is cooler temperature outside. Through open windows, the whole-house attic fan will help pull out that cold air while releasing the hot indoor air out through the attic. The whole-house attic fan can significantly drop the house’s temperature by five degrees Fahrenheit in a just a matter of minutes.
Now that you have known the pros and cons of attic fans, give it a second look and ask yourself if you are still fanatic about it.