Contra Wirecutter on the IKEA air purifier

Re:Contra Wirecutter on the IKEA air purifier by Marsymars on Wednesday January 10, 2024 @09:42PM (#38946792)

I have, unfortunately, found "low speed" mode on air purifiers to be not very effective at improving air quality.

Measured with an Airthings sensor, in my 1970s house, low-speed mode just clears temporary indoor-source pollutants marginally faster than having no air purifiers. In the case of exterior-source pollutants (i.e. wildfire smoke), low-speed mode is insufficient to keep PM2.5 in an acceptable range.

And this is with five air purifiers throughout the house that are sized for a significantly larger space.

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Re:Contra Wirecutter on the IKEA air purifier by jfim on Wednesday January 10, 2024 @10:20PM (#38947101)

This really depends on the rate at which air inside the house gets exchanged with air from the outside.

In my 2008 house, two air purifiers on low are sufficient to keep AQI at 0 and in the single digits during wildfires. They're rated for about 350 square feet each, while the house is about 1500 square feet.

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Re:Contra Wirecutter on the IKEA air purifier by Marsymars on Thursday January 11, 2024 @02:31PM (#38957582)

Yes, completely true - if you had a home with positive pressure and a filtered HRV/ERV with sufficient volume, one wouldn't need internal air purifiers at all.

I've long wished for "smart" inwards-blowing window fans that took filters and conditionally only turned on when the air outside was an appropriate temperature - wouldn't be appropriate in all climates/seasons/times, but in my geography would pump clean air in into the house for months out of the year.

https://naturescoolingsolutions.com/ecobreeze-2-1-smart-wind... exists, but is pricey and isn't from a major-enough manufacturer to make me confident of after-sales support.

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