I have blogged in the past about the fire hazards associated with dryer lint, and it is a very real hazard.
Today’s post is about another problem with dryer lint.
WATER
If you clog up the dryer vent cap with lint so that the air cannot escape, all that warm moist air will condense on the inside of the metal pipe all along its run to the clogged cap—especially in the winter, if the pipe is in unconditioned space and/or uninsulated.
Not only will it take WAY more time to dry your clothes and thus pick your pocket, costing you a lot more money to operate the dryer.
All that moisture has to go somewhere and will eventually leak out of the pipe and into the crawl space or some other place you don’t want it. Over time this can amount to many gallons of water entering the crawl space. It may pond on the crawl space plastic ground-cover as can be seen in the following picture.
Large amounts of water in the crawl space is conducive to decay/rot, mold, and wood destroying insects not only in the crawl space but elsewhere in the home as well.
The bottom line is that this will result in increased costs to operate the dryer and possible costs to repair the house structure—all for the want of 60 seconds of maintenance.
How clean and functional is your dryer vent cap?
By Charles Buell, Real Estate Inspections in Seattle
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