The air quality index in many cities and towns in India is in the unacceptable range. That is, above 150 AQI. Even AQI between 100-150 is not good for people with sensitivities like asthma. Don’t know the AQI in your area? You can check the air quality index in your phone OR you can go to aqi.in that shows the air quality index in your surrounding area. In addition to external factors, cooking, use of cleaning agents on floors, pets, dust in the vicinity and even the furnishing around us are sources of air pollution within our homes.
WATCH INSTEAD OF READ?
In my latest video on best air purifiers, Honeywell was one of the brands I recommend for large rooms. Honeywell kindly sent me the Honeywell Air Touch v4 for the demo.
Let’s see how it handles smoke, pollen, dust, mould, VOCs and more!
1. The Smoke Test
To demonstrate, let’s light an incense stick or agarbatti close to the air purifier. The Honeywell Air Touch v4 has a HEPA13 filter which removes 99.99% of PM2.5 pollutants - H13 or H14 are the recommended filters for Air Purifiers. You can see the Air Purifier automatically senses higher density of smoke particles and the display on the device shows the air quality level going bad due to the smoke in the room. The Honeywell Air Touch v4 circulates clean air 5 times every hour (or once every 12 minutes), so it takes about 12 minutes for the air quality to come back to normal in this case - which is an above normal performance.
2. The VOC Test
Volatile Organic Compounds (or VOCs in short) are the next key pollutants in the home. Chemicals released from the use of paint, perfumes, disinfectants, floor cleaners and cleansers in our homes contribute to VOCs which can also be captured by the Air Purifier. To demonstrate this, let’s spray some perfume close to the air purifier. The Honeywell Air Touch v4 has a Carbon Filter which helps to capture the VOCs. You can see the air quality level deteriorating due to the perfume sprayed - which can be seen in the display going towards orange and red. Due to the air purifier circulating clean air every 12 minutes, it takes as much time for air quality to come back to normal.
3. The Distance and Space Test
Obviously, pollutants are not going to arrive close to your purifier like shown in the demo earlier. Let’s see how the air purifier fares with cooking fumes from the kitchen which is about 15 ft away in my case. The Honeywell Air Touch v4 is quick to detect this and turns on automatically which is quite impressive. It adjusts the fan speed automatically based on the air quality level. And it took 10 - 15 mins for the air quality reading to come back to normal. This air purifier can cover rooms of upto 542.5 sq ft (an equivalent of 15 x 36 ft) - so ideal for large rooms like living + dining room combined.
4. The Noise and Aesthetics Test
Everyone wants a roommate who is not noisy and takes very little space. The Honeywell Air Touch v4 is perfect in that sense - with a noise level of 56db which is equivalent to a ceiling fan at half speed. It is quite compact and aesthetic looking - so can be placed on a side table in your room.
Continuous purification
Let’s talk about some best practices. Keeping the air fresh in your home is critical to avoid build up of mould, bacteria and VOCs in air, especially when you are out of home for more than a few days. It’s ideally recommended to keep the air purifier running for some time each day for continuous purification. The Honeywell Air Touch v4 is equipped to handle this well with its UV LED and Ionizer that helps to kill harmful bacteria.
Running Costs
One of the key questions I get asked all the time is about the running costs of air purifiers. Air purifiers have filters that need to be replaced on a periodic basis. The filter life is about 3000 hours. So if you run it for 8 hours every day, then it will last you for about a year. If you run it for about 4 hours every day, then it will last you for 2 years - and so on. The filter costs about Rs. 2700 as of Dec 2022. Power consumption is about 40W - which is as much as that consumed by a tubelight. You can optimize the power consumed and filter life by using the shut off timer feature that helps to turn off the device automatically after a specified period of time between 1 and 12 hours.
Usability and convenience
The Honeywell Air Touch v4 comes with a 1 year warranty on the product. It has a remote control which you can use to change the fan speeds, set the shutoff timer, turn on/off the UV/Ionizer modes. This model cannot connect to the Honeywell app using wifi but their more advanced models like P2, U1 do. It offers a clean air delivery rate of 350 m³/h - which is one of the highest in this segment of air purifiers. While it does not have a hot air mode - well, ideally one should use a heater for this - or oscillation, the Honeywell Air Touch v4 is a great air purifier option for large sized rooms upto 542 sq ft.
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