Installation of supply and exhaust ventilation: independent work, main stages

Very often we have to talk about the need for high-quality ventilation, as many still do not understand its importance in ensuring a good microclimate at home, apartment or any individual room. The absence of such will necessarily affect the well-being of the residents and the state of the structure of the building itself. This article will be about the need for ventilation. In addition, we will definitely touch on the topic of its proper operation and, of course, learn how to install it without the help of professionals. But to do this, several questions need to be considered.

The principle of operation of the ventilation system

Any ventilation system provides for air exchange, i.e. one air replaces another. The air that leaves the room is called exhaust air, and the one that replaces it is called supply air. The air masses in the house are heated in the process of human activity and the operation of heating appliances. According to physical laws, heated air becomes lighter, therefore it rises, and colder air is located in the lower part of the room. After that, the cold one again heats up and rises, and the colder one takes its place. And so on ad infinitum.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=11N1kOzkbpE

Warm air in the upper part of the room finds a hole called a hood, getting into it, it is drawn out through the duct and out of the house. But something must fill the void, and then supply air flows appear, which are colder and located at the bottom of the room. And where do they come from? There are several ways: through loosely closed doors, through window slots or air inlets. This circulation has its own name — natural ventilation, which was originally equipped in our apartments, industrial premises, etc.

Choosing a ventilation system

But in order to install ventilation, this knowledge is not enough, you need to choose the most suitable ventilation system scheme for your home. There are actually only two of them:

1. Natural.
2. Forced.
3. There is also an intermediate option called combined ventilation.

For all its simplicity, natural ventilation has several limitations and disadvantages:

• Atmospheric phenomena greatly influence the efficiency of the natural ventilation system. It should be warm inside and cold outside. The concepts of heat and cold are somewhat exaggerated, but the essence remains the same: it should be warmer in the rooms than on the street.
• To remove the exhaust air, a vertical, direct ventilation shaft is needed. In the event that it is not vertical, or it is not there, then there will be no draft in the channel, which means how warm air will be drawn into it?

Forced ventilation does not have such restrictions, so it looks more attractive. For its arrangement, you only need a couple of fans that will work, one for air exhaust, and the other for its inflow. For their work, only electricity will be needed, and even then a little.

Now that we know about the two main ventilation systems, it’s still too early to start installation. The next step will be design and calculation.

Design and calculation

If we decide that we will do forced ventilation in our house, let’s choose its type, and there are several of them, and each has both advantages and disadvantages.

• Supply. The extract air will work as usual, and the air will be supplied through the supply fan.
• Supply and exhaust. Both extract and supply will work with the help of fans installed in the air ducts.
• Exhaust. If the supply of fresh air in your house is organized well, then the hood can be equipped with an exhaust fan.

The design of any type of ventilation system must begin with an accurate calculation of the equipment. In addition, you need to calculate on paper how many meters of the exhaust pipe for ventilation you will need to remove the exhaust air, accurately calculate the required diameter of the air ducts and the number of meters of the pipe for the inflow of fresh air, and draw the location of the devices of your future ventilation system.

What are the criteria for the calculation. There are special tables and methods for this, but for a simpler calculation, you can use a simplified system. To calculate the power of the exhaust fan, you need to multiply the volume of the room by 12.

Example:
The volume of the room where the hood will be located is 20 cubic meters. We multiply by 12 and get 240 cubic meters / hour.

To calculate the power of the supply fan, you need to know that at least 3 cubic meters per hour per 1 m2 of area must be supplied to residential premises. We multiply the area of ​​u200bu200bthe room by 3 and get the approximate performance of the supply fan that we need.

Even now, when you have learned about the rules for calculating equipment and design, it is still too early to start installing the supply and exhaust ventilation.

What are the costs of ventilation

In order to approximately represent how much hard-earned money will need to be spent on arranging ventilation, several factors must be taken into account:

• Room dimensions.
• The number of people living.
• Appointment of premises.

Even these minor factors will help you figure out how much investment you need. Please note that the amount can increase by an order of magnitude if you invite a specialist for installation.

Features of installation work

• To equip ventilation, you will need ventilation pipes. They are plastic round or rectangular and galvanized round and rectangular. For self-assembly, it is better to choose round PVC pipes. They are lighter, easier to mount, they have a large selection of all kinds of angles, tees, etc.
• Ventilation ducts require fastening to walls and ceilings. For this, special clamps or clamping strips were invented.
• During the operation of the ventilation system, you will encounter such a problem as the appearance of condensate inside the channels. It is necessary to immediately provide for the manufacture of a device for collecting condensate, which, as a rule, is taken out into the street.
• If you do the installation of ventilation with your own hands and in the process of work you are faced with the need to lay horizontal ventilation ducts, then consider immediately installing fans in them.
• In order for the air flow to move in the right direction, consider installing check valves. These inexpensive devices will prevent air from flowing from one room to another.

We do the installation step by step

We learned everything that was needed for work, and now you can proceed to the long-awaited stage of installing the ventilation system of your private house. Of course, you can invite a team of professionals for this, but an independent device has its own charms. You will do what you want and in the time you want. In addition, you will thoroughly know every centimeter, and save a little money, which is always nice!

1. We prepare the necessary tools and determine the scope of work.
   

   Important!
   Think over all the nuances in advance so that you do not have to redo it later.

2. We make markings in each room. Supply pipes should be located 50 cm from the floor, and exhaust pipes 10-30 cm below the ceiling.
3. We install a fan in each pipe. The fan should not be 1-2 cm in diameter less than the diameter of the pipe.
4. According to the marks, we drill holes in the walls for the pipe. They should be a couple of centimeters larger than the diameter of the pipes.
5. Thoroughly clean surfaces of debris.
6. We install the fan in the pipe, fasten it well with standard fasteners and mount the pipe in the prepared hole. We do this with all ventilation equipment.
7. The gap between the pipe and the wall is filled with mounting foam.

After 12 hours (the foam dries), you can move on to scraping the walls for wiring and switch boxes. After connecting all the elements of the wiring, lay it in the grooves and fix it with brackets. After that, you can move on to decorative elements, namely, puttying recesses in the wall for wiring, connecting switches, etc.

Important!
At the end of each pipe you need to put on a decorative grille.

Now you understand how complex and important the ventilation system in the house is. Following our tips, you can easily equip the simplest supply and exhaust ventilation with your own hands.