Review of Kenmore 12 gal. Humidifier

Customer Ratings:

I have been running one of these for over 5 years now and have never had a problem with it.

It is on casters, so is easy to move. It has automatic settings so you can set the room for 25% and up.

The wicks are not that expensive and can be purchased from many suppliers and come folded up so you

have to unfold them and form a circle to fit in the obvious plastic standards that form a circle.

The lower tank and side tank hold around 4 gallons of water, and will put out 12 gallons in a 24 hour period

if set on high which I have never had to do and set it on the lowest (25%) setting. Argo, the lower the setting,

the less you have to refill the side tank.

A word of advice on all humidifiers:

Add vinegar to the mix every other or every third time to cut down on the lime build up. I do this with all my humidifiers and my large whole house evaporative cooler which is basically the same thing. This way I only have to

replace wicks/pads once a year; the swamp cooler pads in summer, and the wicks in winter.

I have tried the no mold additives, and to tell you the truth, nothing works better than good old white vinegar, just like Mom used to say.

Oh yea, one more thing, Go to the Sears web sight to buy the unit, you will save at least $20.00 on the purchase, even with tax.

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I purchased this at Sears and it was $139.95 not the $199.95 from this vendor, how can you justify a $60 price difference?? The first purchase just didn't work, I spent an afternoon trying to make it work an then returned it to Sears. The exchanged one had exactly the same problem, part of the LED was lighted but the functions did not work. I figured I could not be making the same mistake twice, so I took of the top part off and checked the electronics. (There is no surgery to be done here, this part is removable as part of the unit). I found that a wiring harness had not been connected, it could not have come loose during transportation because the wires were tightly placed and immovable and the connector had a snap lock on it. With some difficulty I snapped the connecters together and the humidifier now works like a charm. I am amazed that two units could be manufactured with same mistake!! It is nothing but a manufacturing error, quality control must be nonexistent.

Aside from this major problem, the unit is now functioning well. It has increased the humidity from 24% to 37% in a 1,800 sq. ft. home. I will update this review further down the line.

Update: The unit works fine but it will go through filters about every month, at least here in the desert. Hard water will make them stiff as a board so when "CF", change filter appears on the readout, do it right away as humidifier performance will drop quickly . I run mine at full capacity & fan, you will probably get longer life on the filter if you keep the fan lower and the humidity output lower. They have these at Sears for $12, they seem to have different manufactures but they are all the same. Any one will do.

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So exchanged for the 8 gallon unit. I am not happy with the filter. You're supposed to clean the unit every 2 weeks. The times I have, the filter gets more and more flaccid, until recently, the unit kept running 24/7 and wasn't bringing house up to proper humidity. I opened the unit and it was totally laying over and the top was dried out. Replace the filter today, $17.00 and ran it and it brought it up to proper level within a half/hour. The filter does NOT last all season long. Expensive to continue to have to replace it.

Purchased at local Sears store.

Started to work, after trying hard to line up the cheap plastic pieces together. Within a half-hour the unit wouldn't work properly. I set it up exactly as directed and it worked at first. The "F" (fill) kept flashing and I couldn't adjust the fan, even though I followed the directions for proper humidity settings, etc....and it did work at first.

The top of the filter discolored within minutes. My guess is it's been on the shelf awhile. When I called the salesman he said it shouldn't do that.

Ugh, it's 9 degrees outside and I have to make a trip to return it. I am not sure if I will exchange for another off the shelf unit as I may end up with same problems.

Don't know what to buy. I'm tired of running my shower to try to increase humidity in my home.