Dryer Vent Cleaning in Norwich, CT
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Step 1 of 3: Equipment
Cold vents give lint somewhere to stick
Your dryer pushes out warm, damp air every time it runs. From October through May, that air is moving through a vent that sits cold for most of its length, with nights averaging 24°F. The moisture in the exhaust cools fast against those cold walls, and the lint riding along with it sticks rather than blows clear.
A vent that is narrowing with lint takes longer to clear the moist air out of the house, and it makes the dryer push harder to move air through it.
- 24°F
- the average winter night, and cold vents catch damp lint
- 8 months
- October through May, the vent stays cold
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NOAA 1991–2020 monthly normals
- How often should a dryer vent be cleaned?
- Once a year, at minimum. If you run several loads a day or have a long duct run to the outside, once a year is still the rule, but pay attention to how long loads take to dry between cleanings. Lint builds up gradually, so a full year of drying can leave more in the duct than you'd expect.
- Can I clean my dryer vent myself?
- You can clean the first few feet yourself, but you likely can't reach the whole run. Pull the dryer out, disconnect the duct, and clear out what you find with a vacuum or a brush made for this. The rest of the duct, especially where it bends or runs up through a wall to the outside hood, needs a longer brush and rod system to clear properly. A contractor doing this work also checks that the outside hood flap opens freely and that the duct itself is metal, not the plastic or foil kind, which sags and traps lint.
- What are the signs of a clogged dryer vent?
- Clothes that take longer than one cycle to dry is the clearest sign. Others include the outside of the dryer feeling hot to the touch, a burning smell during a cycle, and the outside vent hood flap not opening much when the dryer runs. Lint around the hood itself, or lint you notice has stopped collecting in the lint trap the way it used to, both point to a blockage building up somewhere in the duct.