Does anyone else have one of these in your house? For the past 2 months, I have been pretty ill with alot of resperatory problems, general colds, sinus infections and what not. My wife eventually also got sick and has been sick with respiratory problems for a few weeks (to make it worse, she already has Asthma) To top that all off, my lil one came up with another ear infection (his 7th since he has been born) a few weeks ago. We put him on antibiotics and it cleared up. Not two days after he finished that round of antibiotics, he gets yet another ear infection. So I finally decided to get the air in my house checked to see if thats what was causing my problems. Chance put me in touch with Mark Hinson of Egan and Hinson (they are awesome btw) and they came out and set up an indoor air quality monitor). Supposed to get the results back today. Anyway, he asked me if we had any air purifiers in the house. I told him we had 2 Ionic Breezes, one in our bedroom and one in the kids bedroom. He told me that there is currently a class action lawsuit against Sharper Image over this things. 1) They apparently don't clean the air as well as advertised and actually, don't even clean the air as good as a normal HEPA air purifier. 2) They produce OZONE. Shaper Image discloses this on their product manual and says its a "safe level". But research shows they actually produce more OZONE than first thought. This past weekend, we decided to turn the one off in our bedroom for a few days. Boom. The wife and I have felt better than we have in several weeks. Im not yet saying 1 and 1 is 2 on this...ill wait for the test results. I just wanted to encourage everyone to do research on this in case you own one and find you are having similar problems to my family. Here is a link to the article from Consumer Reports: http://www.alamn.org/Asthma/aircleaners.asp http://www.quackwatch.org/14Legal/ionicbreeze.html BTW ...Eagan and HInson charges about $50-$75 for this indoor air quality test. Im so glad I did this.
Thanks for the insight, I've been wanting one of these for a while and my gf always tells me I'm crazy because they're so expensive. I guess I'm going to have to admit she was right and go for a cheaper one. I've also thought about Eagan and Hinson with all I've heard on 610 about them, I thought they came out and did a free test of some sort to check the air, I guess that's not what they did for you. Oh well, at least your feeling better Pugs
Kind of on the same topic, does anyone know of any really good air purifiers? I've been wanting to get one for a while. I was looking at the Sharper Image Ionic Breeze, but couldn't make up my mind on it. Codell is helping that decision be easier now. The models (regular HEPA filter) I used to see a few years ago seemed much more sturdy than the ones I've seen recently. That might not mean anything though. I guess how well they work is the main thing.
I have two Ionic Breezes as well. When I lived in Houston I noticed that my Ionic Breeze didn't collect anything. Then when I moved to NYC, I noticed how much dust and grime were being collected each week, especially when the boiler is running in the winter. I'm not sure about the efficacy of the Ionic Breeze as far as measurable air quality standards go, but the metal plates are visually dirty when I clean them each week. So the Ionic Breeze does work at least in that aspect. Consumer Reports recommends the Friedrich, model C-90a that costs $500 and one from Whirlpool for $270. It's model AP45030h0. http://www.wowt.com/news/features/2/482592.html
Anyone try the Oreck air purifier yet? I would like to but wanted to hear from those who have used one already.
Defender AM4000 will suck everything out of the air, but the filters will run you about $120 per year.
The negative v positive ion thing makes some sense to me (i.e. how you feel invigorated before a storm), but I'm not 100% on the ozone thing. Apparently, ozone can be damaging, acting like oxidants. Some ion generators have claimed that if properly designed, they produce no ozone. Not sure if that makes sense, so I've held off on purchasing any. I learned about this because I liked the freshness of the air created by the Ionic Breeze in the store. If I cannot assure that the ion generators won't produce ozone with that freshness, I'll pass on them. BTW, you can also get large units built in to your Central Air System. By far the most effective way to reduce pollutants in the home.
Do those things have a fan in them? If not, I don't see how good they can be unless air is being circulated. I've heard they aren't all that good and definitely not as good as the price may lead you to believe.
Let us know what the results were. I seriously wouldn't be surprised to hear that you had abnormal levels of Ozone in hour house!
