Your air purifier works hard to clean the air in your home. But where does all the dust and particles end up after your purifier cycles the air? In your air purifier of course.
To get the most out of your air purifier, you will want to make sure that you clean the unit regularly, at least as often as suggested by the manufacturer.
Here are some good cleaning tips for various types of purifiers.
Filter Changes
The most obvious cleaning action that can be taken is to clean the filter itself. Most air purifiers can be taken apart to access the filter somehow. Take your unit apart (as directed by the manufacturer) and clean the filter as needed. You may need to wash certain parts with water, but most of the time you can just use a vacuum to suck all the dust and particles from the vacuum itself.
Cleaning the filters can be a dusty experience, so to prevent from contaminating the air in your home that you are trying to keep clean in the first place, consider cleaning your filters outside of your home, or in your garage or something.
What about electro-static types of purifiers? These are the types of purifiers that use magnetics to trap particles. Most of these types of purifiers can be cleaned by removing the plates that collect the particles and washing them. In my experience these types of units are easier to clean, but often aren’t as effective at purification itself.
Clean the Purifier Internals
While you have the unit open to pull out the filters and other parts for cleaning, take the time to use a vacuum or otherwise to clean up the internals of the air purifier. They can get pretty dusty as well. Use a flashlight to put a good amount of light into the unit and you will easily be able to see where dust is collecting. You might be surprise how dusty the inside of an air purifier can get.
Clean the Fans
You air purifier might also have exposed fans, or fans that can collect dust. Have you ever seen dusty fans on a computer, or in car vents? Or how dust can collect on ceiling fans or basic cooling fans? Well, those fans aren’t even designed to clean the air and they can get plenty dusty. Think of the fans in your purifier, they are designed to specifically cycle dusty air. Of course they will get dusty.
Once again, just use a vacuum or something similar to clean the dust off the fans, if you can access them.
Clean the Casing
Ok, we’re just about done cleaning everything, but there is one more thing to consider – the casing of the air purifier itself. Take the time to clean the dust off the case and make sure that the ventilation ports are free of any blockage. Some purifiers might not need this sort of maintenance, depending on the design. But I know for sure that I need to regularly clean and vacuum off the cat hair and other visible debris that tends to build up on the very outside casing of my air purifier.
