Why You Need A Bathroom Exhaust Fan?

The importance of a bathroom fan

Bathroom exhaust fans are hugely important! When you have a hot shower or bath this generates large amounts of excess steam and moisture, generally you will notice the mirror fogging up straight away! This steam and moisture will also collect on the walls and ceiling. If there is no means of this excess moisture escaping you will most certainly experience a build up of mould and mildew, which will have adverse effects on your bathroom, both visually and potentially structurally. Moisture will swell and rot wood, peel paint and wallpaper from your walls and slowly deteriorate plaster or wallboard. It will get behind tiles and begin to loosen them – basically inadequate ventilation spells the beginning of the end for your nice shiny bathroom!

Cant I just open a window to ventilate my bathroom?
No for a couple of reasons: firstly a open window will not provide the same level of air circulation as an exhaust fan. Secondly, its not always convenient to have a window open in the bathroom! You will be glad you have your exhaust fan on those cold winter mornings for example, or even on those rainy days! Not to mention the privacy issues (not ideal in a bathroom :) ). By mechanically pulling air from the bathroom you will noticeably reduce the humidity level, therefore alleviating all of the problems mentioned in the above paragraph.

How to pick the right exhaust fan:

The primary concern is to ensure the fan is appropriately sized for your room. A tiny little toilet will require a much smaller capacity fan than a multi cubicle bathroom for example. The basic steps required in picking out the correct exhaust fan are:

Determine what variant of exhaust is required and how it will be mounted (eg wall, ceiling, window etc)
Calculate the area being exhausted in meters (Length x Width x Height). This will give you a figure in m3 (cubic meters).
Multiply this with the number of air-changes required (8 for a subfloor/meeting area, 13-15 for a bathroom/toilet, 15+ for smoke exhaust). If you like to have long, hot showers or are concerned about steaming up the bathroom then please use a figure of 20 – 30 air changes per hour.
Determine whether to duct directly into the roof space, duct out through the roof or through a wall/eve. Most exhaust fans are ductable and in an ideal world you would have all exhausted air going straight outside via an external wall vent or roof cowl for example.

At Pure Ventilation we stock a huge range of bathroom fans to suit your needs!

Now you know why its important to have a bathroom exhaust fan and your armed with the knowledge of how to pick a fan you can click on the relevant link below to be taken to our online store! Our website has lots of tools to help you narrow your search – look out for the ‘interactive expert’ on the left hand side, or as we like to call him ‘online Andy’. He will help narrow your search by things like exhaust fan capacity, colour and hole size!:

So I have picked my fan – what now?
Generally your fan will need to be installed by a qualified electrician to ensure warranty validity and ultimately your safety! How the fan operates is your choice, many people opt for the fan to be wired in with the light switch, meaning its guaranteed to come on each time you turn the light on. However this may not be preferable if you dont want it coming on every time you need to use the toilet! It can also be wired to an independent switch, alternatively we can put a plug on most fans meaning you can just plug it into any standard powerpoint like most electrical items.We also sell optional timers if you wish the fan to continue operating after turning the switch off. The choice is yours!

As Australia’s leading ventilation and exhaust fan specialist – any questions feel free to contact us!