Its humidifier season here, and boy did these ones get crusty

So I’ve got the auxiliary humidifier going max, and have installed a ultrasonic one for my office. But the main two furnaces also have ‘power humidifiers’ and those should work, and yet somehow my humidity is dropping. Hmm. What to do? Maybe its time to check these big power humidifers?

OK, the 2 main furnaces have GeneralAire 1042L. These were installed in 1996. Basically, they work by re-routing some of the cold air-return into a big vat of water with a sponge on the side of the hot plenum. When the thermostat calls for heat, a 24V solenoid opens and some water trickles down the sponge. Not too complex. I have a water softener so these things tend not to get too crusty… Lets open it up.

The horror! Its a rusty mass of crusty coral. Probably not that absorbent. Um, lets see, who carries these ‘filters’ for a 21 year old product (hint amazon!). OK, several cases of tetanus later and I have removed and CLR’d and installed. Lets see what this graph looks like in a couple of days!.