Anyone try this trick to heat your house with your clothes dryer?

Hello
Does it make much of a difference?

 

That seems perfectly logical to me, I know I get a lot of heat coming through the ceiling in summer. Bad part is the wife would never let me cut a hole in her new dryer and wouldn’t tolerate the looks of it. If I was a bachelor I’d be all over that project.

 

Seems like it would work! The builders and the dryer companies should work together to promote this.

 

And one thing not enough of these guys promoting the "lint bucket heating trick" remember to specify is that it only works with electric dryers...doing the same with a LP/gas dryer is a good way to set off the CO alarm!

 

What happens when the air in the attic is 10*f?

 

How so?

 

The guy is talking about using air from the attic that is 120*f . Ain’t no 120*f air in my attic in February.

 

Right...but you also aren't pulling 10* air into your home through every little crack n crevice to make up for what the dryer is "using"
I hear ya though...its certainly not going to help your dryer efficiency any.
I think best of both worlds would be to use this mod in the summertime, then in the winter switch back to using indoor air and discharge into the lint bucket. It would be easy to switch, just add a tee and a manual duct pipe damper to the pipe going to the attic...pop a cap off the side of the tee, then close the damper going to the attic when ready to use the dryer...when done just pop the tee cap back on

 

If ya cared about efficiency, one wouldn't be using an electric drier to begin with.

 

The cold, outside air comes into the house in the winter either way you have that intake air for the dryer.

 

They are actually not that bad...I've compared months where we hung everything out to dry, VS not...was not a big difference in the electric bill (to my surprise)
But I would rather have an electric dryer anyways...too many fires start with gas dryers...from lack of maintenance yeah, but its easy for things to get away from you in the dryer lint dept...I would rather find that out because the dryer won't dry than the smoke alarm going off!

 

How do you figure?
Obviously if your house is not well air sealed and insulated then this is true to some extent...but at least you aren't "power venting" even more cold air in with the dryer this way (and pushing the heated air out)

 

If a dryer or exhaust fan blows out 60 cubic feet of air from your house 60 cubic feet of cold air must enter your house from outside if it doesn’t your house would collapse from the vacuum

 

yes, but pulling it from a vented attic is better than pulling it from the cracks in the house.

 

I'm starting think you are yankin my chain now.
Nobody thinks their house is gonna collapse...and yes, everybody is on the same page here...60CF out means 60CF in...either through this dedicated attic vent, or through all the little cracks and crevices of your home where cold air can get in (or hot air in the summer time)
Like I said, best of both worlds IMO is to use this mod in the summer, and then my tee/cap/damper mod in the winter (along with the lint bucket discharge)

 

I use to have an attachment to the dryer hose that had a damper so the hot air could blow into the house instead of outside. It worked ok not great

 

One thing that did occur to me while watching this was the cold air coming down the pipe and turning your whole (uninsulated) dryer into a huge ice cube when not in use...kinda seems like a better "Florida" mod...

 

Just cut a hole in the back where she would not see it.

 

The bats hibernate and the mice move into the basement ?


I'm not so sure I'd want hot moist air being delivered to a DRYER in the Summer, nor cold moist air in the Winter. Gimmee nice inside of the house conditioned air so that the dryer runs a shorter cycle.