Here's the deal. This product is basically a bucket with a huge electrode in the middle of it. The system fills the bucket with water and turns on the electrode. This creates steam which is pumped into the air ducts. Other humidifiers work by passing air over a water soaked filter. The idea of not having to deal with a nasty filter but rather having steam injected into the air flow is amazing. Because this unit basically boils the water, it leaves behind all of the calcium and lime in the tank. It does try to flush the tank every so often to get rid of it but as we all know, hard water builds up on everything. Unless you have VERY soft water the system will eventually need a cleaning. When you follow the instructions you have do due a hard water test and then buy a filter product. The product comes with a hard water test kit that you use to tell how hard your water is. There are 3 levels and at each level Honeywell recommends a product to reduce the water hardness. I am telling you, you need a method to get rid of the calcium or lime in your water or this product will not work. As with everything, people try to do it as cheaply as possible and not buy a filter. Then the system doesn't work, even though Honeywell told you want you need and people complain that this is junk. The $250 item the other reviewer is talking about is a reverse osmosis kit that removes all the calcium and lime from the water. Sure it sucks to have to buy another item but you'll need one for other products as well, unless you like chipping away the build up every so often. The part number you need is Honeywell 50045947-001. If you have really bad water pressure get 50045947-002 which comes with a pump. 50045947-001 runs about $178.
With that said, Honeywell advertises this as being able to be installed in 5 minutes. That is only true if you have: 1. a drain nearby, a dedicated 15 AMP circuit (this product draws 12 amps), and a water source. You also need spot on your HVAC outflow duct large enough to mount this on. I didn't have a dedicated 15 AMP line in so I put one in easy enough but if you aren't good with electrical you'll have to hire someone to put a line in. This comes with a saddle value which allows you to tap onto an existing water pipe without having to call a plumber. It worked great. You can use this with any humidistat or thermostat that has a humidity control. I have the Honeywell Prestige thermostat and wanted to connect this to the system wirelessly. To do that I had to buy an additional Honeywell wireless adapter. The wireless adapter made it easy though. Connect A to A, B to B, C to C, D to D and you're done. All in all my complete install was about $800-$900 (including reverse osmosis filter). Is that a lot of money? I guess, but I like the best.
So if you want to be successful make sure you buy the Honeywell reverse osmosis system or you'll be sorry. Installers, quit selling this to people without also selling the reverse osmosis system.
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What a frustrating expensive disappointment this humidifier has been.My wife wanted more humidity in our home. Pretty dry out here in the desert southwest. We had this unit professionally installed in our 7 year old home. We have two split HVAC systems in our 3000 sq foot home. We live in Western AZ. It was installed in one of the air handlers. We have a soft water conditioner and the recommended water filter in the system. We had some initial issues with a defective pump assembly and erroneous error codes that were due to a bad water sensor. Once those items were corrected, it worked great for about two months. Then we would get air flow, but no humidity change, or it wouldn't come on at all. The HVAC company has installed complete system installations for us on a few homes we had built over the last several years. They have a good reputation in this town and know what they are doing. We have had at least 12 service visits since it was installed in January of 2012. Our air handlers are installed in our attics, which is typical for this area, but makes reading the service lights and doing repairs a real pain in the rear and costly.Our HVAC contractor now wants to refund all of our money and remove the system. They too, have had enough with this unreliable system. They have a few others installed in town that are causing them issues.Tech support with Honeywell is pretty good for the Techs, but the homeowner support phone number is in India and their service,in my opinion is poor, very poor. I am retired now, but I have HVAC experience. You can press one for English, but that won't get you anyone that speaks it very well. When I asked to speak to someone at Honeywell in the U.S., I never received a return call back as promised. Buy a portable humidifier, you will be happier with it and save a lot of money.
Update: The humidifier system was removed on 03/11/13 at the request of the contractor and we received a full refund.
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Honeywell HM506H8908 Truesteam Humidifier, 6-GallonIt sounded so good. Bought online and installed it myself and my HVAC friend set up the wiring into my system. Worked OK a few months, but added about $100.00 a month to my electric bill. Then, the little red trouble lights started blinking, so I cleaned it repeatedly and replaced parts, but a day or two later the defect light was blinking again. Got a new one on warranty and it did not last any longer. The new manual, when the red light flashes, says just call your installer for a service call!!!! Ripped it all out and into trash.
Honest reviews on Honeywell HM512VPIAQ TrueSteam Humidifier - 12 Gallon
I have a TrueSteam humidifire. Half of the parts are replaced at least once. It has cost me way more than its price to maintain it, not considering all the time I put into it, all the nights I wend down to the furnace room to reset it, and days off work to be home to open the door for my tech guy. Don't be deceived by the 5 year warranty, it is just a gimmick to lure you in. Once you're hooked you have implicitly accepted paying Honeywell hundreds of dollars without having a choice. Consider buying a unit which is more expensive and have it properly installed. Just think about it, if you buy a decent humidifier twice as expensive and it works for you for ten years you have saved yourself at least $500 because with Honeywell you must buy at least three units to get through 10 years of service, let alone your time to baby sit them.
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Do not buy. I have four of these units; two in my home and two in my parents' home. They are very poorly designed and I strongly recommend you avoid them. In the two years I have had them, I have had the following problems:
1) Three water overflow sensor errors. Even though these can be removed and cleaned, in each case the fault would recur despite their relatively short life span and no obvious visual sign of wear. I ended up purchasing new sensors for all three. (About $90 each as I recall). Oh, and Honeywell won't talk to you or let you order parts if you are not a HVAC professional. The result of this silly policy is that people end up going to internet supply houses and buying parts that they might not need because Honeywell won't help with diagnosis of problems.
2) These get very hot when working. You need rubber drain hoses or hi-temp PVC. Both of my resevoirs have discolored and on occasion, water boils up through the top vents. and down the face of the unit. Frankly, they are a little scary and had I known how hot they would get, I probably would not have bought a plastic unit. I can't really blame Honeywell for that (it is supposed to make steam after all).
3) The automoatic drain cycles are almost useless and you can plan on cleaning these a couple of times a season or the heating element and the water resevoir where the overflow sensor sits will start to build up with scale and you will start getting error messages (blinking lights). Over the summer, fill the tank with a mix of CLR and water and leave it unplugged. After a few weeks, all the crud and scale will dissolve.
4) Two of the four units leak from the bottowm of the water resevoir near the resevoir retaining and drain stem. I've disassembled the valve assemblies (clean and lube), but there are no washers -if you want to fix the leak, pull out your wallet and buy a new internal stem. I just keep a bucket underneath them for now because I plan on replacing all four units at the end of this season.
All in all, good concept, bad execution.
