Clean Your Dryer Vents

Here’s what 16 years of no-cleaning looks like. Almost had a fire.

How’d that water bottle slip by the filter?

Awesome tip!

I clean mine twice a year. Luckily, my dryer sits directly on an outside wall, so the vent pipe is about 8″ long. I do use my air compressor to blow out the dryer. Stick the nozzle in where the filter is, and blast out the interior of the dryer. Then I clean the vent pipe.

That’s a big ball of lint! I’m glad that didn’t light up on you!

I’ve got another drier vent story that was very depressing to me, but you all might find kind of funny. My drier is on ground level with a half level crawl space underneath. Even though the drier is sitting right against an exterior wall, the home builder ran the vent straight down through the floor, into the half height crawl space and then sideways out the exterior wall. Well…….a week ago, we were re-arranging some storage items and finishing off packing away the christmas stuff, etc. I don’t fit in the half height crawl space, so I sent my son in there to shuttle storage items in. He says “Dad; there’s a hole in the house and I can see outside”. I thought maybe there was a gap in the insulation and he was just seeing some daylight shine through, but he confirmed that no; there is more like a hole in the wall. Then he says “hey, the dog just ran past outside”. Now I’m thinking “just how big is this hole”? I crawl down there and find that the 4 inch dryer vent pipe has pulled free from the exterior wall and is hanging straight down venting the drier directly into the crawl space and there is a 4 inch hole directly to the outdoors. Now you all are probably wondering why the exterior flapper for the vent isn’t preventing us from seeing all the way outside right?…. The dogs must have heard or smelled a mouse in there and tore the flapper off the exterior wall. So here I’ve been all winter on the coldest of winters with a 4 inch vent hole in the side of my house. Nothing like pissin’ away money to the gas company .

Oh man! Maybe the heat loss was evened out by the dryer heat you were retaining in the house!!

Your house had to be crazy humid! Was this an electric or gas dryer? Surprised your CO detectors didn’t go off if it was gas.

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Oh man! Maybe the heat loss was evened out by the dryer heat you were retaining in the house!!

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Yeah something tells me the outside air trumps the heated drier exhaust . You want to come over and help clean all the lint out of my crawl space Again; my chubby butt doesn’t fit down there very well……

Electric drier….. Here’s the funny part. 2 days before this, my wife and I were commenting on how our house didn’t seem to be near as dry as previous winters. We thought that was crazy with the cold weather we’ve had….DUH…. I guess that was a pretty good clue, but the crawl space would have been the last place I looked.

Suzuki,
I bet it won’t take as long to dry your clothes now either.

Oh hell no. Already tested it last night!!! It’s like new again. It has been going down hill for years but my wife got tired of complaining about it. I feel bad.

Now you guys got me thinking. My dang vent has to be underneath a snow drift. I sure hope the lint catcher is getting most of the lint.

How do you do that ? My vent is like 25′ of hard pipe to the out side wall

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How do you do that ? My vent is like 25′ of hard pipe to the out side wall

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Leaf blower.

I don’t think compressed air could have cleared mine. It was stuck to the walls like glue. In one straight section I could not see any light. I bought a dryer vent brush at Home Depot. It came with about 9 feet worth of extensions. We had to break my pipe down into three 6 foot sections to clean it. And the brush still got bound up a couple times. You will need something along the lines of a sewer pipe snake to clean 25′ unless air works for you Whether created by a compressor or shop vac.? But then again mine sat for 16 years. Get the brush now!!!!!

If it’s done on a yearly basis any kind of blower works pretty easy.

Mike, what clued you in to the impending disaster? I have never cleaned mine, but I’ve only got about a 10′ section. I’m hoping the house sells before I need to do it.

Long story short-Sears repairman tore it apart last week for something unrelated. Said we were going to have a fire if we didn’t clean it. He pulled out tons of lint (some burned) from deep inside the dryer. Places I could not get to myself. Also why many of our clothes have been getting a stain on them. Dryer seals were sooted up and they occasionally rub on the clothing. He replaced those. What a mess. Learned my lesson.

BTW-its a gas dryer.

Don’t use the flexible vent, only use galvanized dryer vent. Lint gets caught in the flexible pipe and it is made out of plastic. That stuff burns like gasoline. I have put out many dryer fires in the last 22 years. some from overloading, some form not cleaning and having the flex hose.

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Long story short-Sears repairman tore it apart last week for something unrelated. Said we were going to have a fire if we didn’t clean it.

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A the Snake Oil saleman trick. He had that in his pockets the whole time.

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Long story short-Sears repairman tore it apart last week for something unrelated. Said we were going to have a fire if we didn’t clean it.

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A the Snake Oil saleman trick. He had that in his pockets the whole time.

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No. He said I needed to clean it. Not him.

Dryer vents should be alum pipe less seams the better less turns the better no screws. Make sure crimp pipe ends point towards outside.
Code is insulate 3ft in from outside used to be 5ft

Galv pipe rots out from moisture

Flex dryer pipe clogs fast

By the way nice pile of fuzz at least it’s not all over the back of the dryer

Nearly every home I inspect has a notation of cleaning the dryer vent.
I have seen those flexible hoses burned up in crawl spaces and the home owner never knew there was a problem.I clean mine 2 times a year.

Mine has a 20′ run. I use a spring style pipe snake. Take off the outside flapper, run the snake from the outside and let the dryer run while you snake it. works nice.
DT

sorry, I did mean aluminum, that is what mine is anyway.

Scare em and save em….lol