Mist Humidifiers - Things You Need to Know

Air humidifiers are used to maintain the appropriate level of humidity in your home. The humidifiers act to keep the humidity level within the healthy limits and prevent various undesired effect of dryness to you as well as your wood furniture and other precious objects. The humidifiers help to prevent the sinus headache, dry skin, sneezing, and coughing that usually occur due to dry air.

The mist humidifiers can be of two types, the warm moisture or warm mist and cool moisture or cool mist humidifiers. The different types act differently but produce the same result. They are designed to improve the level of humidity in air. The selection of a cool or warm humidifier depends on personal preference.

The warm moisture humidifiers make use of a heating component for warming up the water available in the humidifier, leading to generation of hot steam inside the room. Some of the warm mist humidifiers are also designed with an optional absorption pad intended for mineral absorption. This is set in the heating component and it gathers the mineral deposit generated from the warm water. The amount of mineral deposit depends on the hardness of the water. This optional pad is very economical. There is no other filter that requires changing with the warm mist humidifier. Although the heating component makes use of more electricity compared to a cool mist humidifier, the warm ones also prove cost effective in the long run.

The water inside a warm mist humidifier is very hot; therefore, you need to be careful to prevent your children from nearing it. The warm moisture humidifier makes the room air little warmer because of the warm steam it disperses in the air. The warm moisture humidifiers are ideal for smaller rooms as these are not fit to generate sufficient moisture for covering a larger area.

The cool mist humidifiers can be categorized into two types, the Ultrasonic humidifiers and Evaporative humidifiers.

The ultrasonic humidifier utilizes a tiny metal diaphragm that vibrates at ultrasonic frequency. It generates small water droplets that in turn get converted into a vapor mist. It disperses mineral from the water. These minerals are called white dust. Generation of white dust can be checked by using distilled water in the system. Such humidifiers function with almost no sound.

The evaporative humidifiers utilize a fan, which blows off the dry air of the room through the evaporative wick filter. This filter is made of absorbent, paper-based materials and set within the humidifier's base for soaking water. The water present in the wick filter gets evaporated when the air is blown through it by the fan. This evaporated air is spread in the room as humidified air. The wick filter may lead to the growth of bacteria and fungi. However, using antibacterial cartridges and bacteria treatments will help to stop this problem. In every two months you need to replace the wick filter for best use.