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Outnumbered
04-18-2004, 11:57 PM
My 3-year-old has some allergies and the pollen here in the mountains is brutal in spring. So I have been looking into gettin a purifier. These Living Air/Fresh Air dealios are about $600 and that is too steep if it does not work. Turns out my wife's friend is selling these things. She gives us a unit to try out for free. These are the ozone types with an UV bacterial killer, yadda, yadda. Its called a Fresh Air by EcoQuest, MSRP $699.
Well we plug this thing in and it friggin stinks. We don't have any pets or smoke or any thing so we didn't need it for odors or anything, just allergies. Well it smells like ozone (I guess that is what smells) so bad we had to turn it off.
Does anybody know about these things? How they work and which one is a good one that is not an overprice/over hyped POS?
Thanks for the help.
OL

Craig
04-19-2004, 05:35 AM
Friend of mone bought two of those made by Sharper Image and he says they work great. They have cats and he says they have to clean the "filters" once a week or so they pull so much crap out of the air. We're thinking about getting one now.

Kilrtoy
04-19-2004, 05:38 AM
Son has Asthma,
We have one in his room, Forgot the name but we got it at Costco for $150 and it works great and gives off no smell.

bigq
04-19-2004, 08:01 AM
Originally posted by Old Lavey
My 3-year-old has some allergies and the pollen here in the mountains is brutal in spring. So I have been looking into gettin a purifier. These Living Air/Fresh Air dealios are about $600 and that is too steep if it does not work. Turns out my wife's friend is selling these things. She gives us a unit to try out for free. These are the ozone types with an UV bacterial killer, yadda, yadda. Its called a Fresh Air by EcoQuest, MSRP $699.
Well we plug this thing in and it friggin stinks. We don't have any pets or smoke or any thing so we didn't need it for odors or anything, just allergies. Well it smells like ozone (I guess that is what smells) so bad we had to turn it off.
Does anybody know about these things? How they work and which one is a good one that is not an overprice/over hyped POS?
Thanks for the help.
OL
Living Air has a new model out brand new that does not have the smell. It also does like 2,000 sqft, most only do one room from what I understand. When is Arizona, should be better out there, right?
I think it is the first one:
Living Air (http://www.livingairclassic.com/)

Outnumbered
04-19-2004, 08:40 AM
Originally posted by bigq
Living Air has a new model out brand new that does not have the smell. It also does like 2,000 sqft, most only do one room from what I understand. When is Arizona, should be better out there, right?
I think it is the first one:
Living Air (http://www.livingairclassic.com/)
That is the exact same unit. Living Air re-badges them for EcoQuest. It smells bad. Its a brand new 2004 model. The sales gal said you get used to it and it also gets less noticeable as it breaks-in. I say no way, it smells like cat piss.
Yes, AZ is supposed to be good for that type of thing. One more reason to move.
Thanks for the help,
OL

Outnumbered
04-19-2004, 08:44 AM
Originally posted by RiverDave
Well I'm not sure about all these Ozone dealios.. But if I was just looking to filter air I'd go and buy a "Hepa" filter. They are usually a 2 stage filter and there going to catch just about anything and everything in the air.
I think I got my big one for 300 bucks? and then it's 30 bucks for replacement filters that you should do once every 2 months or so.
RD
Ya RD, seems kinda like a scam. I did a little research and the opinions are mixed. I think Costo may have a HEPA filter.
Hey, Kilrtoy, what model did you get at Costo? Is it a HEPA.
Thanks for the replies,
OL

Freak
04-19-2004, 08:49 AM
90 day free trial on the Oreck - get one and let me know how it works.
http://www.oreck.com/air-purifiers/air8.cfm?bclick=23
Better yet a whole house HEPA+electrnic deal-e-o
April air model 5000

HM
04-19-2004, 09:16 AM
On the Ozone style (Living Air), if you can smell the ozone, it means you have it set to high. The fan setting is not critical. Also, locate the unit high or near the kitchen (works very nice in getting rid of burned popcorn smell). If you have it set correctly, when you walk in your home from outside, you will notice a very light bleach smell (ozone) for about 5 - 10 seconds. If it lasts longer than that - turn it down a little more on the coverage setting.
I used to sell these things - and I have two in my home, and my wife will never let them go. There is no clinical proof on any of these devises actually killing any significant levels of bacteria, mold, alergens, and etc. They are all EPA approved for home use - meaning only the EPA found them safe - not necessarily effective (anyone remember my Spam Jacking thread and Mandelon laid the smack down on clinical vs. antedotal?). There are lots of antedotal stories, including my own, on how much people love them. Setting them up correctly is the biggest problem. Oh, and some say there are no collecting rods to clean and so forth - they all will require major cleaning several times a year - if they don't, then you don't need them.
Also, some have a hepafilter on the back. Hepafilters can many times have a "smell" at first. It is the coating on the filter and goes away over time. That could also be the part of the smell you have.
My antedotal story is that I have a ton of allergies and two dogs, one of which is a 9 year old beagle that is really stinky for numerous reasons. Before we got the purifiers, all you smelled was our stinky dogs. Now, everyone asks us if we just cleaned because they said it smelled clean. My allergies are almost non-existant in our house. So, it works well for me and my family. There are others on these boards that used them and found them useless - although I sold over 5,000 units, helped my customers properly set them up, and only had one returned - from my father-in-law (he would not let me adjust the settings, he just wanted it gone). House cleaning actually gets worse - but it is actually a good thing (sorta). It makes air-born particles fall - so there is much less floating, but there is much more to clean on surfaces - especially glass. This is probably the number one reason why it works so well with people with allegies - it does not neccesarily kill stuff, but it takes it out of the air, so you breath much less of it. So, would you rather breath it and clean less or vice versa. Mandelon really got me thinking and researching this conclusion makes the most sense.
One last thing - with the ozone type - if you like to burn scented candles - you are out of luck. They knock down or eliminate their scents!!
I don't sell them anymore, as I like to focus on one pyramid scheme at a time ;) . I find it much easier to help people save money on their utility, internet, and phone bills than trying to get people to pay $700 (bro deal) for an airfilter.
I was thinking of starting my own pyramid marketing RD's misters!!:D

Havasu Cig
04-19-2004, 11:29 AM
What Holy Moly said.....We have one and it works great, does 3000 sq.ft.

Mandelon
04-19-2004, 11:32 AM
Oh here it comes...............
Living Air.....
Ozone will indeed remove odors. The extra oxygen molecule produced by the machine gloms onto the odor molecules and physically changes it to something else.
The ionizer part helps dust clump up get heavy enough to drop to the ground.
They can't kill mold unless set so high as to be a health hazard to humans.
Silent Breeze
The Silent Breeze at Sharper Image do pick up dust but only in the immediate area of the machine itself. They do not need replacement filters. They were rated "worst" by consumer reports.
HEPA
A standard HEPA filtration unit has filters that need to be changed out every year or so at a cost of $20 to $30 for a new filter. But they are extremely effective. HEPA means that it will take out 99.97% of all airborne contaminants down to .3 microns. This is a very effective method. The filters actually get more effective as they fill up.
Some HEPA air cleaners offer UV light treatment. This may be effective in killing bacteria and some molds.
We do mold remediation work and have our project's air quality tested frequently. We use huge 4 stage HEPA air machines to keep our containment areas of airborne pollutants.
A quality vacuum cleaner can help a lot as well. A regular vacuum just blows the invisible particulates all over the place again. Air out his room with fresh air as often as you can.
My son has allergies and asthma as well. He is allergic to the cats, but the family won't give them up. I use a Honeywell unit in his room. It is quiet and has the UV light. No odors at all, except from his shoes...:D

mikev
04-19-2004, 02:10 PM
I have allergies bad and went the cheap route and put the 3M filtrete filters in my hvac system. I got the best ones they were 15.00 each and made a huge difference. I would try that first before I spent big $$ they worked for me just run the fan for a few hours when you first install them to clean all the air in your house then just keep the windows closed.

Kilrtoy
04-19-2004, 02:24 PM
honeywell
it has a pre filter and a HEPA filter, basical a dual filter system,
ever since we got it, it has dramatical lowered the attacks my son has, Well worth it, very quit too all things considered.

502procharger
04-19-2004, 02:30 PM
the alpine air xl 15s you can find them on e-bay 250-300 i have several in diff homes and bought my parents one. once you have one you will never ever be without it.

Mandelon
04-19-2004, 06:08 PM
You go, Dave. !! Its nice to be right sometimes.
Mandelon..(thinking that RD learned that from my old posts) :D

Outnumbered
04-19-2004, 09:40 PM
Thanks for all the replies.
Holy Moly, thanks for taking the time to help out. Considering that I'm not going to be a fellow Kalifornian for much longer, that was cool of you to do:D .
Regarding the settings, it has sqft from 100-2500 I believe. I started it out on 500 in the main hallway because I was aware of the possibility of these machines making dangerous levels of ozone if set full-blast in a small house/room. Our house is 1,800sqft. The smell was bad so I turned it to 100. Got a little better but still funny. I think I will try running it at 100 from the start and see if that helps.
We have a HEPA vacuum and that helps quite a bit. Maybe I'll try a HEPA filter like Costo's combined with the Fresh Air. My wife's friend is giving the unit to us for free because I did a free appraisal for them a while back. So I would like to give it a chance. I would hate to give it back since they were nice enough to let us have it.
Thanks again for the input,
OL

Cas
04-19-2004, 09:51 PM
another ditto on what HolyMoly said. My daughter has/had asthma and the rest of us have allergies. The Living Air has really helped a lot.
Hey Holy, email me about your utlility, telephone, internet thingie.

MagicMtnDan
04-20-2004, 05:26 AM
A couple of you mentioned a unit made by Honeywell - can you provide a model number or more info? Thanks

Mandelon
04-20-2004, 07:22 AM
This is the one we have in the office.
http://images.amazon.com/images/P/B000050AOV.01.LZZZZZZZ.jpg
http://www.trueair.com/index.html