Hi Mom's :-) Does anyone have any idea how to clean a humidifier? I live up in high elevations so it's necessary for us to have a humidifier in our 7 month old sons room. He had a bunch of congestion and super dry skin, but having the humidifier on while he sleeps at night has been an enormous help. We'll be moving in the next month or so, and my husband is putting a house humidifier in, so we won't really need to deal with this on a daily basis! But anyway, the "grates" on the humidifier, where the mist comes out, are starting to get like a red film on them, and I am not sure what to do. I threw the instructions away when I knew the humidifier was working, and I can't seem to get the "grate" part off; if it comes off at all. I wasn't sure if it was like a coffee pot, and you can run some vinegar or something through it :-) I thought I would ask and see if anyone knew anything about this! Thank you!
Thank you all for all your help and advice! I ended up going on line and getting the instructions for cleaning. I don't think I can get it clean enough so I am going to dump it and get a new one! Now that I know about how to clean it, I can do it on a weekly basis! Thank you all again!
Absolutely use vinegar, esp on that film. What I've always done is to use q-tips to get into the grate, all the hard to reach places. Then rinse well, and run it off before placing in his room.
you can go to goole and type in teh brand name and model # (usually on the bottom), plus the word instructions, and it should bring up a few sites, usually the brand (ie: Johnson's) website will have a pdf of the instructions!
Hope that helps!
Try distilled white vinegar, that is what my humidifier instructions say for cleaning.
I've never heard of a humidifier that you couldn't remove the 'grates'. What I always have done is take them out and wash them under the faucet. If yours don't come out, I can't see why a good vinegar water wash - running the humidifier through a cycle for an hour or so - wouldn't work. You might want to do it once, then one more time just to be sure it's all cleaned out. Whatever is causing that red film can't be good for your son to be breathing, in my opinion, so I'd try anything to get it out before using the humidifier in his room again. Another thought... can the whole unit where the grates are simply be put under the faucet for you to wash it? If the electrical part isn't in that part of the unit, I think it should be safe.
That red stuff could be staff bacteria! You need to get in there with a Q-tip and bleach to get it off.
OR toss it out.
