I've had a motion sensor setup in the shower area for about a month and I'm noticing how ridiculously long it takes for the humidity level to fall. Right now for example it's been running for 45 mins and still reports 94% humidity. Odd thing is I can walk in there and it doesn't feel humid at all. Its a small area with just a shower, about 5'x8' and 10' ceiling. The sensor is the wall mount variety and mounted sideways at ceiling level, close to the exhaust fan. The fan is a Panasonic which is highly regarded and you can feel air pulling in from under the door . Eventually it does fall to a reference point of about 48% which matches the sensor just outside that shower, but it takes atleast an hour or longer to shut off at 70%. Doesn't seem to make much of a difference with the door shut or wide open. So is my shower really this humid?
Some sensors are just unresponsive to small changes, they then seem to jump like yours do from humid to normal (dry).
I tried a whole bunch of sensors, and the only ones that were acceptable were Zigbee, and specifically the Iris V3, and the Xiaomi Aqara. The Aqara were the best of all the ones I tried for sensitivity.
Depending upon many factors like ambient humidity, room size, and so on... In my experience 15-20 minutes is more normal.
A simple test would be:
when it has been running long enough you think it should be lower, move the sensor(s) out into the next room and time how long it takes to get to 48%. This should give you an idea whether the sensor is not responding fast enough or the bathroom is still humid.
I don't have one of these, but looks like you can set humidity reporting interval in the driver? What do you have it set to?
I may put a 2nd one in there for a test temporarily. Nyce are the only sensors I currently have. I'm wondering if mounting sideways is a problem. like maybe it's collecting water internally?
Its set to report on 1% change which is the default. And it does that, I can watch it go down 1 by 1. Seems like once it gets down to the low 80s it drops faster and faster, but in the 90s it can stay a long time.
I wouldn't think so, but maybe???
I would go with the lowest setting, 0.5%, and see if that made any difference.
I'll try that this. I'm also gonna try mounting it normal side up. Now that I'm watching it tonight, the fan shut off at 70, the door is still closed, and it's still dropping at a similar rate which I wouldn't expect. I'm really wondering if it's somehow getting wet internally. Its a small shower and we have a ton of water pressure so it's kind a like a sauna in there when my wife takes her crazy long showers. Do most people mount them at ceiling level or would lower be better?
I mounted mine near the ceiling, but not at the ceiling. It was a guess based upon where I saw steam hanging out after showering. It is probably somewhere between 8 and 10 inches below ceiling height. Not sure if this is the right way or not, but it makes sense that you want to measure the wetter part of the room whereas the lower part of the wall will typically stay drier.
One thing you might want to do is get an inexpensive hygrometer like this one used in humidors:
It pretty accurate and you can compare with your sensors. It has a magnetic backing which is nice. Have been monitoring my Konke sensor in my master bathroom.
I put the Konke sensor high up on the wall near one side of the shower enclosure..
This morning I put a 2nd NYCE sensor in for a test, its one of the round ceiling mount models. I think they have the same sensors tho. Anyways, I also put it about 3 feet lower on the wall and it dropped significantly faster. So its either the sensor or the spot. I'll keep experimenting.
Try resetting the sensor that seems way off. If that doesn’t help, the sensor is bad. Not the first time I’ve heard of this with NYCE humidity sensors unfortunately.
The Aqara are excellent, but don’t stay paired directly to HE unfortunately. I run mine through HA and bring that back into HE for comparison against a reference sensor in Rule Machine.
For direct pairing, the Konke are said to work well on three specific channels. Otherwise, shell out for another NYCE and hope that doesn’t fail too.
Well I did buy that sensor used on ebay since NYCE stock is non existent. I've got them all over the house so I may try swapping it with one that I don't need humidity control with.
I used humidity for years to control shower fan. I just threw my iris v3 inside the shower fan cover and have motion trigger it and run for 15minutes after motion stops. I have my fans right above the shower. Works way better. My old ones I always had to tinker with the humidity levels all time as the house humidity varied.
One of the issues with response rate is that the sensor is inside the case of the device. Moisture has to travel in and out of the vents on the case to reach the sensor. If you mount the sensor in a area with little air movement, it will react much more slowly than if it is in an area with higher air movement. If you take the sensor and wave it around, you will find that it will reach equilibrium quickly.
If you mount the sensor near your exhaust fan, it is likely to respond more quickly.
I like the idea of using the sensor to turn on the fan, but then have the fan turn off after a suitable time based on the size of the room and the capacity of the fan.
They’re available on Amazon now (or they were yesterday, at least).
This makes a lot of sense. I'll have to experiment with placement a bit. I like the idea of putting it inside the exhaust fan, but then I'd have to double up to have a motion sensor. It seemed to like the spot where I ran the test so I'll try the original sensor there when I get some time to bring the ladder in.
I wound not put it inside the fan, but a few inches away might allow it to report both motion and humidity.
I think we have a winner! I moved the sensor to the new location. While I had the ladder in there decided to also clean out the exhaust fan real good. Took it apart and cleaned it throughout. Between the 2 things I'm seeing much better results now. Its already gone down 7% in just a few minutes so I think it's gonna work out now. Thank you to all who helped!
I noticed the same thing with my NYCE humidity sensor. It responded much quicker if it was not mounted than if it was mounted. I have it mounted on the ceiling just outside the shower. So what I did was place a small washer on each screw between the mount and the ceiling which leaves a small gap between the sensor mount and ceiling. You can barely see the gap but it must let the humidity in to the sensor better. This made the sensor as responsive as it was when it was not mounted.
