The bathroom remains an important part of the house where users are vulnerable to the existing temperature, no matter the time of the year. Therefore, it’s important to be able to control how cold or warm it gets in any season of the year. It’s common to find a mini split in the house—usually in the living room or kitchen—but many people wonder if they can put a mini split in the bathroom.
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You can put a mini split in the bathroom, provided an exhaust fan is available to dehumidify the room. As common to bathrooms, a high humidity level often negatively impacts the functioning of a mini split. Therefore, you must have a bathroom exhaust fan installed in your bathroom.
The rest of the article will explain what a mini split is, how it works in any room, its basic components, the types available for different home specifications, and its overall importance. Keep reading.
You Can Put a Mini Split in the Bathroom To Heat It
Indeed, many people don’t concern themselves with the bathroom when installing a mini split, as they may not feel it’s the right space for it. Or, they might want to use an alternative heating system to warm the bathroom. While using a mini split in a bathroom isn’t so common, it’s not impossible to use it.
The mini split is ideal for maintaining temperatures in small spaces like your bathroom. While walking into a bathroom might feel like walking into a furnace in summer, it might equally feel like an ice room in winter. You may use a mini split to supply heat or cool air into a bathroom.
When your bathroom is not warm enough to take a shower, a mini split system can be used to heat the bathroom. However, it is essential to check the instruction manual of your mini split because they usually cannot operate above a certain level of humidity.
And since the bathroom is more humid than most parts of the house, you’ll need to find a way to manage the humidity in the bathroom not to damage the mini split system.
Therefore, to keep the humidity as low as possible, you can use an exhaust fan so that the mini split can work comfortably.
Apart from that, high humidity levels can also damage your health, weaken bathroom walls and cause mold.
A smart air exhaust, when installed, will help to dehumidify your bathroom when necessary and won’t run all the time. You can then power on your mini split for your bathroom when humidity is out of the way.
However, if the idea of combining a mini split with extractor fans installed doesn’t work for you, you may seek other heating options for your bathroom. You may use duct lines ducts to supply air from another room where a mini split is installed to your bathroom. Or install a mini split on the wall adjacent to your bathroom door.
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Read: Mini Split In Dry Mode Vs. Dehumidifier: Which One Is More Efficient?
What Is a Mini Split?
Many have benefited from the efficiency of a mini split system. They use it to warm or cool their homes through various seasons of the year. This then leaves many to wonder if the efficient operations of a mini split can be extended to the bathroom.
A mini split is also known as a ductless air conditioner, designed to serve as a flexible and efficient source of cool or warm air inside the house. Compared to other home heating and cooling options, the unit serves as space and energy-saving system.
Also, it allows for an efficient combination of two functions within the same unit, thus making it relevant for all-season use.
The unit can be used in different parts of the house as a heat or cooling source and offers the flexibility of controlling each room’s temperature to whatever degree is preferred without affecting the preset temperature in other rooms. Of course, this happens to be the case when using a central heating or cooling system.
Read: Mini-Split Humidity Problems
A Mini Split Serves Indoors and Outdoors
The functionality of a mini split isn’t far from the components and configuration of the system. It comes in two separate units, including the indoor unit known as the evaporator and the outdoor unit, serving as a condenser.
Both are installed not too far from each other for a simpler setup; the indoor unit is installed indoors, depending on the mount type (ceiling, wall, or floor), and connected via a line of pipes and wires.
Both units are positioned strategically to ensure sufficient room for the units to function correctly for easy air distribution and access during maintenance.
Read: Is Ductless Heating Cheaper Than Gas?
You Install Your Mini Split Based on Zoning and Mounting Position
Various types of mini-split systems are available for you to choose from, depending on what works for the structure of your home. Here are common types based on zoning and mounting position:
Based on Zoning
- Single-zoned mini split systems: This type is designed to work in a space with its indoor and outdoor units. The mini split only functions in a single area, such as a large living room or garage.
- Multi-zoned units: This type can be installed in different parts of the house in up to four rooms, all connected to a single outdoor use. It’s perfect for a small house with more than one room and allows for the flexible setting of the room temperature without affecting each other.
Based on Mounting Position
- Wall-mounted: This mini split type is positioned on the wall for even distribution of cool or warm air around a room.
- Ceiling-mounted: As the name implies, this type is cosseted within the ceiling for better airflow and aesthetics. You incorporate it nicely in rooms with a standard ceiling or larger than regular.
- Floor-mounted: This type sits on the floor rather than on the wall, although often placed close to it. It’s best for low-walled rooms with more horizontal space than vertical space.
Read: Why Is House Smells Musty?
How Does a Mini Split Heat a Room?
A mini split can effectively distribute heat in a room via its heat pump design that allows heat to be drawn into the home instead of taking it out, as is the case with cooling.
A mini spit heats a room by using a continuous pattern of evaporation and condensation via a refrigerant—it determines the best temperature level within a room. It uses its heat exchanger coils in evaporation by sucking up heat from the available area, which is then diffused during condensation.
Then, the heat pump in the system thus makes available the required degree of heat within the room.
Such a system heats a room via a complex process of evaporation and condensation. The heat outside the room gets evaporated via the outdoor unit, where it’s absorbed and transformed into gas by a liquid coolant (refrigerant).
Then, the gas is heated and pressurized within a compressor, after which it then moves through the condenser coils. The airflow is enhanced by a high-powered fan, allowing heat to be dispersed out of the system indoors.
A mini split can supply warm air indoors even in freezing conditions not lower than 0°C (32°F). As the refrigerant temperature drops significantly, it’ll still be able to draw heat available within the area, as heat will always travel from warm to cooler surfaces.
Read: What Is Heat Pump? Everything You Need To Know
Conclusion
When it comes to using a mini split in a bathroom, it might not be the most efficient way to supply heat to the bathroom. Although the idea isn’t impossible, most homes with heat needs for their bathrooms often use different heating options to keep their bathroom warm in winter and cool in summer.
You may consider using a duct system to supply air from another part of the house to your bathroom if it’s expedient. But if you’re wondering if you can substitute with a mini split, it’s possible to do so if you have air extractor fans installed.