Keeping East TN Cool Year-Round
Indoor Air Quality Solutions
Let Tradewinds Mechanical help you to improve your home’s indoor air quality with proven, efficient systems that will keep your indoor climate consistently clean, comfortable, and most importantly, keep your family healthy!
Dehumidifiers
A fan collects air from the surrounding area, pulls it into the dehumidifier, the air passes through and comes into contact with the dehumidifier’s cooled coils. These coils create condensation to pull moisture from the air and the collected moisture remains on the coils, dripping into the dehumidifier’s reservoir. The system then reheats the air and exhausts it back into the room. Dehumidifiers are usually separate from your HVAC system and are typically used in the summer months.
Dehumidifiers balance your home’s humidity by reducing mold- and mildew-causing moisture, helping to protect against the harmful effects of allergy and asthma symptoms. They preserve your home and any contents susceptible to warping and rot and help prevent pests. For homes with crawl spaces, Dehumidifiers help ensure the integrity of encapsulated spaces by controlling humidity from within.
HUMIDIFIERS
A whole-house humidifier is connected to the home’s hot air ducts and cold air return. It can either work with or independent of the heating/cooling system. The system works by water accumulating inside of a collection tray, the air passes through the heating/cooling ducts, travels through the collection tray, picks up moisture, cycles through the furnace, and then returns to the duct system where the moisture-laden air is distributed into your home. Humidifiers are typically used in winter months. Humidification systems come in three styles:
Evaporative Humidifiers
This style of humidifier works by adding moisture to warm air via a furnace. These types of humidifiers take warm air from the home’s heating ducts and pass it through a water tray. This allows the air to collect moisture which is then delivered back into the house. They can be installed on the supply or return plenum of your central air system and typically need to drain their water supply.
Fan-powered humidifiers
The difference between a fan-powered humidifier and an evaporative humidifier is that the fan powered unit uses a fan to push air through the water tray for increased water evaporation. Fan-powered humidifiers are able to produce up to a gallon more of humidity per day compared to an evaporative humidifies. Because this is a powered flow-through system, it doesn’t require a duct which allows it to be installed in smaller spaces. A fan powered whole-house humidifier is great for homes built on slabs or with HVAC systems in a closet.
Steam humidifiers
Steam humidifiers work by electrically boiling water to create humidity in the form of steam. The steam is then picked up and pushed throughout the ventilation system. Steam humidifiers are the fastest and most efficient way to increase and maintain a good level of humidity in your home. Steam whole-house humidifiers also provide the purest and most natural form of humidity that you can have within your home.
UV Lights
UV lights for HVAC systems use UVC rays and are installed in either your air handler or in your ductwork. When germs move through the central air system, they eventually make it to the sanitizing light. Once the germs are exposed to the light, they absorb the light’s UV rays, disrupting the DNA of the germ. When bacteria or mold’s DNA is damaged, it will either die or become unable to reproduce. There are two varieties of UV sanitizer lights. Coil sanitizing lights sit near your evaporator coil. Air sanitizing lights are placed in your return vents, which are part of your ductwork.
An HVAC UV light helps you stay healthy by sanitizing the air moving through your HVAC system, reducing the mold and viruses distributed into your home’s air.
Electrostatic Air Purifier
Electrostatic air filters clean air by means of static electricity. If you have ever rubbed your socks on the carpet then you’re already familiar with static electricity and how powerful it can be. The difference in charges of particles is what causes static electricity. Electrostatic air filters use this phenomenon to remove particles from the air by attracting the particles to the air filter. When air flows through an electrostatic air filter, electrical charges are generated in the filter’s media that allows the filter to attract particles. As particles that are suspended in the air stream flow through the air filter, they first pass through a section that charges the particles. This charging is called ionization. Some filters have multiple layers that increases the attraction of the particles. Next, the charged particles pass through a section in the filter that has an opposite charge to the particles. As the charged particles pass through the filtering section, they attract towards the filter media due to their opposite charge. This process is called collection since the particles are collected in the filter. Some air filters have multiple layers, so the process can repeat several times, filtering out additional particles each pass.