Bangkok Air Pollution

[MaxYakov]

This is TGTBT - Never seen a rapid falloff from "Sensitive Groups to Moderate to Good" like this one. It must have been the rain. The AirVisual site confirmed it at 29:

 

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

8 hours ago, MaxYakov said:

This is TGTBT - Never seen a rapid falloff from "Sensitive Groups to Moderate to Good" like this one. It must have been the rain. The AirVisual site confirmed it at 29:

 

 

Rained all night and into the early morning hours. Enough to -- at least temporarily -- wash all the <deleted> out of the air.  Don't worry though... It will be back soon....

 

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

On 9/20/2019 at 2:40 PM, saltedegg said:

Edit: HEPA filters are quite expensive here, no? I'm looking at PowerBuy. Should I be purchasing elsewhere?

 

One of the problems with air purifier purchases and sellers in Thailand is most of the retail stores and shops that sell the purifier units don't sell any REPLACEMENT HEPA filters for when the original one that comes with the units they sell wears out.

 

Normally, the store staff won't know where you can get replacement filters and will suggest you contact the local office of the manufacturer, if they have a local office here. And the manufacturer will often advise that they don't handle/sell their own filters but you can obtain them from some 3rd party supplier that may or may not keep them in stock.

 

It's a pretty shoddy and customer unfriendly way of doing business, IMHO. If PowerBuy is going to sell a particular model of air purifier, then they also ought to be stocking replacement filters for that unit as long as they continue to sell it. But they and the others similar simply don't do that, as a general rule.

 

Hatari is one of the few exceptions to that, where their purifiers are widely sold here in retail stores, and then Hatari sells the one replacement HEPA filter model that fits their one air purifier model via the Hatari TH website for about 1,000 baht a piece, last time I checked.

 

For my Thai purchased Sharp air purifier, the 3rd-party seller in BKK that handles replacement HEPA filters for Sharp units started out selling them for about 600b a piece, and now the price is up to around 1400b a piece as they apparently changed their HEPA filter supplier along the way. FWIW, my original HEPA filter now has lasted for about two years, which is longer than they predict in their product manual info.

 

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

On 9/20/2019 at 4:33 PM, MaxYakov said:

HomePro @Chit Lom was pushing the Hatari HEPA filters (had a stack of them for only 888 baht) and the corresponding air purifier (around 5K baht).

 That's interesting. That store is pretty close to my home, and the wife and I are in there often.

 

But when we were shopping there for air purifiers 1-1/2 years back, they had a bunch of different purifiers for sale including Hatari at that time, but ZERO replacement HEPA filters available to sell for any of them, including Hatari.

 

PS - I'd be a little bit leary of "modifying" a wrong sized HEPA filter. Obviously, the filter only works properly when it's air-tight within its purifier device, and room air isn't able to sneak thru any cracks or openings to emerge unfiltered.

 

Just thinking, it might be easier to take an undersized filter and then seal it around the edges within the purifier vs. cutting down to size an oversized HEPA filter. When you start cutting part of the exterior frame of the filter, I think you're pretty much losing its air-tight integrity.

 

 

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

Saturday today is better than yesterday. But considering the amount of rain that fell overnight and earlier in the day today, the current levels in central BKK are still surprisingly high.

 

[MaxYakov]

6 hours ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

 That's interesting. That store is pretty close to my home, and the wife and I are in there often.

 

But when we were shopping there for air purifiers 1-1/2 years back, they had a bunch of different purifiers for sale including Hatari at that time, but ZERO replacement HEPA filters available to sell for any of them, including Hatari.

 

PS - I'd be a little bit leary of "modifying" a wrong sized HEPA filter. Obviously, the filter only works properly when it's air-tight within its purifier device, and room air isn't able to sneak thru any cracks or openings to emerge unfiltered.

 

Just thinking, it might be easier to take an undersized filter and then seal it around the edges within the purifier vs. cutting down to size an oversized HEPA filter. When you start cutting part of the exterior frame of the filter, I think you're pretty much losing its air-tight integrity.

 

 

Yes, modifying a 'wrong sized' HEPA filter to avoid leakage when installed in a cooling fan device could be a bit tricky. All of my HEPA installations have been of this type where the filter was larger. Had the filters been smaller, I have a lot of scrap 6 mm, polyethylene foam insulation from the massive amount of heat insulation i have done for my very large, north and east-facing windows.

 

In two of my filter adaptations I used Velcro male/female seals as the primary sealing mechanism backed up with duct and scotch tape. The 12 inch exhaust fan adaptation was the most vexing and I nearly constructed an adapter manifold to match the fan's output size to the filter's size. But I got in a hurry (aka lazy and the project was already 4 years behind schedule!) and went with the Velcro and cutting the filter down. Part of the problem with the exhaust fan was that it was so powerful and the filter was such an impedance that holding the filter in place had to be done with screws because using tape would eventually fail and the filter would be pushed out of place. 

 

The third adaptation was the Hatari HEPA to Hitachi air purifier. The filter was too large in only one dimension and slightly thicker. But it was a drop-in filter so it was fairly to cut the filter down in the one dimension that required it and seal it with tape. I had to slightly modify the Hitachi's front cover in some minor way to deal with the difference in the Hatari's thickness, but cannot remember what it was though but it was to the front cover and not a major modification. Oh, yeah, i had to permanently remove a coarse, pre-filter screen from the purifier.

 

The easiest adaptation was an older Hatari filter to my (also older) Perfect Brandz PBC-333 evaporative cooler. The filter was only slightly larger than the 333's intake so Velcro was the primary seal with scotch tape as a backup/final seal. Modification of the filter was not necessary (other than removing the activated charcoal layer in order to minimize air flow impedance). Interestingly, the 333's squirrel cage fan is so powerful that with the filter in place it still puts out a relatively large air flow volume - enough for some skin evaporative cooling at a distance of 8 feet or more. So it functions as both a cooling fan and an air purifier, but I have to run its 3-speed fan on low or the fan suffers from what I call impedance cavitation (but this is another story).

 

i maybe have mentioned this before but all my HEPA filters are pre-filtered with a single layer of 3M Filtreté A/C filter material. This causes additional air flow impedance which I (mainly the fans) am willing to accept. It was easy to get a seal of this to the HEPA filters in every case with ordinary scotch tape or by integrating it with the Velcro seals. The idea of this layer is to catch the larger particles, lint, dust, etc so that the HEPA filters deal with, primarily, only the smaller particles for a longer HEPA filter lifespan. The longer lifespan has yet to be verified and, alarmingly, I ran my bathroom fan for a few days and the filter became visibly dirty indicating that its lifespan is not going to be great. So I now run it for shorter periods and do not plan to use it for massive cooling of my apartment in the future for any more than 1 or 2 hours a day since its filtering dirty Bangkok air directly. 

 

i'm sure this more than anyone wanted to know about adapting 'wrong sized' HEPA filters to various cooling fans. ????

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

9 hours ago, MaxYakov said:

i maybe have mentioned this before but all my HEPA filters are pre-filtered with a single layer of 3M Filtreté A/C filter material. This causes additional air flow impedance which I (mainly the fans) am willing to accept. It was easy to get a seal of this to the HEPA filters in every case with ordinary scotch tape or by integrating it with the Velcro seals. The idea of this layer is to catch the larger particles, lint, dust, etc so that the HEPA filters deal with, primarily, only the smaller particles for a longer HEPA filter lifespan. The longer lifespan has yet to be verified and, alarmingly, I ran my bathroom fan for a few days and the filter became visibly dirty indicating that its lifespan is not going to be great. So I now run it for shorter periods and do not plan to use it for massive cooling of my apartment in the future for any more than 1 or 2 hours a day since its filtering dirty Bangkok air directly. 

 

Thanks for the explanation re HEPA filter modifications!

 

As for pre-filtering, yes, pretty much you never want to be running a HEPA filter without some kind of pre-filter material. The normal and probably most common approach to that is activated carbon sheets like the following that are very thin, don't impede airflow much, and can be cut to size with regular scissors. Also, some purifier manufacturers sell pre-made framed prefilters with the carbon material enclosed inside.

 

This below from Honeywell is an example of the roll material that can be cut to size as desired. And believe me, the carbon pre-filter material is CHEAP compared to the price of any actual HEPA filter you can buy. So using a good pre-filter is definitely a money-saving proposition in the long run.

 

 

 

The other day at home, I did maintenance service on both of my HEPA purifiers, since smog season is approaching.  The big one in the living room probably hadn't been serviced in a couple months, since I haven't been running it as much because the air hasn't been that bad. (The bedroom purifier, in contrast, we run pretty much every night for all of our sleeping hours, regardless).

 

But, when I opened up the living room purifier's case, the black carbon pre-filter material's exterior surface was literally caked with whitish dust and gunk (more than I had realized until opening the unit). (On that particular unit, it's specifically designed to use the carbon material as a wraparound the entire HEPA filter). But the interior HEPA filter has remained pretty much its original white color.  In the absence of the pre-filter, all that gunk would have ended up directly on the HEPA filter and certainly have shortened it's lifespan and effectiveness.

 

In a similar vein, our bedroom unit is a TH-purchased Sharp purifier that has some kind of mesh material incorporated into the back air intake cover as a pre-filtering device. But ever since I bought it, I've been adding a cut sheet of carbon pre-filter material inside the unit sandwiched in between the rear cover and the HEPA filter inside. And while the rear cover mesh does catch and accumulate some dust, a lot still gets thru the unit's own mesh and ends up being deposited on my own carbon pre-filter that I added inside... once again, saving and lengthening the life of the unit's HEPA filter.

 

So pre-filtering definitely is the way to go.

[MaxYakov]

Another Bangkok RTAQ PM2.5 pollution measurement mystery. It was raining throughout the late evening and early morning in central Bangkok yet RTAQ does not reflect what one would expect to be a drop to 'Good'  in the 3 AM recording (or any of the late night early morning measurements). There still a couple of 'Unhealthy for Sensitive Group' measurements. Maybe it wasn't raining hard enough or some unknowns are operating? Reference my previous comment regarding a rapid falloff from Unhealthy to Good of 9/21 HERE;

 

 

 

 

[mstevens]

Could it be that some of the terrible smoke / pollution that has hit Malaysia may have drifted up to Bangkok and is a partial caused of the recent elevated pollution levels?

[ExpatOilWorker]

6 hours ago, MaxYakov said:

Another Bangkok RTAQ PM2.5 pollution measurement mystery. It was raining throughout the late evening and early morning in central Bangkok yet RTAQ does not reflect what one would expect to be a drop to 'Good'  in the 3 AM recording (or any of the late night early morning measurements). There still a couple of 'Unhealthy for Sensitive Group' measurements. Maybe it wasn't raining hard enough or some unknowns are operating? Reference my previous comment regarding a rapid falloff from Unhealthy to Good of 9/21 HERE;

 

 

 

 

Apparently rain does only marginally reduce the PM2.5 pollutants:

 

https://www.quora.com/Can-rain-wash-out-partly-PM2-5-in-the-air-and-help-to-decrease-the-pollution-level-for-a-short-term

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

I can live with this....

 

 

But have no idea what's going on with the 599 reading at the Ratburana Post Office sensor.

 

[phungo]

what do you all recommend for an indoor air filter for a 100 square meters condo?

where to buy? what brand? what features?

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

2 minutes ago, phungo said:

what do you all recommend for an indoor air filter for a 100 square meters condo?

where to buy? what brand? what features?

 

With that overall size, It depends on the layout of the condo, and how many and what self-contained rooms you have.

 

If you have a studio type one big open space, that would take quite an expensive and large sized purifier, or multiple smaller purifiers, to be effective.

 

But if you have multiple enclosed rooms, usually, people would use one purifier in their bedroom while sleeping, and the same purifier or a separate one in their living space room during the daytime. 

 

Purifiers here typically are going to be rated in their specs and manuals on being able to handle a certain amount of square meters of area.  You need to decide and identify what exact number of spaces and sizes you want to clean the air for, and then go from there.

[phungo]

 
With that overall size, It depends on the layout of the condo, and how many and what self-contained rooms you have.
 
If you have a studio type one big open space, that would take quite an expensive and large sized purifier, or multiple smaller purifiers, to be effective.
 
But if you have multiple enclosed rooms, usually, people would use one purifier in their bedroom while sleeping, and the same purifier or a separate one in their living space room during the daytime. 
 
Purifiers here typically are going to be rated in their specs and manuals on being able to handle a certain amount of square meters of area.  You need to decide and identify what exact number of spaces and sizes you want to clean the air for, and then go from there.

ah that helps a lot. we will get one for bed room and one for living room then.

is this Hatari Ap12 on lazada a good purchase in terms of its features? https://s.lazada.co.th/s.ZkaWl

[lopburi3]

10 minutes ago, phungo said:

ah that helps a lot. we will get one for bed room and one for living room then.

is this Hatari Ap12 on lazada a good purchase in terms of its features? https://s.lazada.co.th/s.ZkaWl

Have been using Hatari since previous version and using that model for last few years and feel it works very well.  It is one of the few models sold here that filters can normally be easily obtained (but always good to have spare on hand as when it gets really bad they do sell out).  

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

17 minutes ago, phungo said:

ah that helps a lot. we will get one for bed room and one for living room then.

is this Hatari Ap12 on lazada a good purchase in terms of its features? https://s.lazada.co.th/s.ZkaWl

 

I'd echo Lopburi's comments above. The Hatari model is a reasonably priced, locally produced model. And Hatari TH sells replacement HEPA filters thru their website for under 1000b a piece, which makes it an easy unit to maintain. The unit says it's rated for up to 32 sq. mt., so you can see how that matches vs the bedroom and living spaces you want to handle.

 

If you're starting out from scratch on this, the other area you need to think about is to weather strip/seal the window and door frames in your condo... Because, the less air leakage you have coming in from outside, the easier it is on your purifiers to keep the air inside clean. 

 

Also, the Hatari purifier is usually sold at a lot of the main store retailers such as HomePro, PowerBuy and others, so you can check it out in person before deciding whether and where to buy.

 

[phungo]

Lopburi and tallguyjohninbkk, thanks for the help! just went ahead and bought 2 of the Hatari AP12. from lazada.

 

Regarding replacement filters, this item here is only 220 baht https://s.lazada.co.th/s.ZkWjY, which is much cheaper than 1000 baht, so is this a legitimate item that just happens to be a good deal?

 

 

 

 

[lopburi3]

4 minutes ago, phungo said:

Lopburi and tallguyjohninbkk, thanks for the help! just went ahead and bought 2 of the Hatari AP12. from lazada.

Regarding replacement filters, this item here is only 220 baht https://s.lazada.co.th/s.ZkWjY, which is much cheaper than 1000 baht, so is this a legitimate item that just happens to be a good deal?

Not a valid link - am very sure no 220 baht filter is true HEPA unless vacuum cleaner size.

[phungo]

Not a valid link - am very sure no 220 baht filter is true HEPA unless vacuum cleaner size.

ahh I fixed the link (the , messed it up).

 

 

https://s.lazada.co.th/s.Zk0uS

 

[lopburi3]

6 minutes ago, phungo said:

ahh I fixed the link (the , messed it up).

 

 

https://s.lazada.co.th/s.Zk0uS

 

That is the pre-filter which mounts in front of the HEPA filter to trap larger dust.  The unit comes with one and it can be washed so normally does not need replacement.

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

40 minutes ago, phungo said:

ahh I fixed the link (the , messed it up).

 

 

https://s.lazada.co.th/s.Zk0uS

 

 

Here's the direct links to the Hatari purifier and its replacement HEPA filter:

 

https://www.hatari.co.th/parts/air-filters/R0310079N

 

https://www.hatari.co.th/airpurifier/HT-AP12/

 

 

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

FWIW, PowerBuy online, just for today, has a pretty good deal on a Philips HEPA air purifier for 3990b. List price 5990b.

PHILIPS Air Purifier (16-49 sqm) AC0820/20

https://www.powerbuy.co.th/en/philips-เครื่องฟอกอากาศ-1649sqm-philips-ac082020-250659

[seb2015]

FWIW, PowerBuy online, just for today, has a pretty good deal on a Philips HEPA air purifier for 3990b. List price 5990b.

Seems like a similar deal is running on the Xiaomi Mi 2s on Lazada .
Same price 3999 THB and I think it can handle a more than 20sqm. I may give it a try

Thanks for your tips on monitoring devices, I’ve been offered a fun little device that I can carry anywhere with me whether indoor or outdoor

https://plumelabs.com/en/flow/store/

When I look at the data for some of my trips it feels very scary

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

24 minutes ago, seb2015 said:

 

Seems like a similar deal is running on the Xiaomi Mi 2s on Lazada .
Same price 3999 THB and I think it can handle a more than 20sqm. I may give it a try

Thanks for your tips on monitoring devices, I’ve been offered a fun little device that I can carry anywhere with me whether indoor or outdoor

https://plumelabs.com/en/flow/store/

When I look at the data for some of my trips it feels very scary

 

 

AirVisual is probably the predominant and most useful air quality mobile app out there:

 

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.airvisual&hl=en

 

The info is credible and the data is reported on the international air quality scale, not the skewed Thai government version.

 

[ExpatOilWorker]

1 hour ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

 

Here's the direct links to the Hatari purifier and its replacement HEPA filter:

 

https://www.hatari.co.th/parts/air-filters/R0310079N

 

https://www.hatari.co.th/airpurifier/HT-AP12/

 

 

Is that the same model as the HA-9218 filter?

 

https://www.homepro.co.th/homePro/th/Welcome-Sale-เครื่องใช้ไฟฟ้า-เครื่องใช้ไฟฟ้าขนาดเล็กภายในบ้าน/แผ่นกรองเครื่องฟอกอากาศ-HATARI-HA-9218/p/177360?gclid=CjwKCAjw2qHsBRAGEiwAMbPoDJyt3OQt0lskmPTP0jld8ijl5xExCYeYR-rKZnlziRWblWZA76JAqRoCsSEQAvD_BwE

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

16 minutes ago, ExpatOilWorker said:

Is that the same model as the HA-9218 filter?

 

https://www.homepro.co.th/homePro/th/Welcome-Sale-เครื่องใช้ไฟฟ้า-เครื่องใช้ไฟฟ้าขนาดเล็กภายในบ้าน/แผ่นกรองเครื่องฟอกอากาศ-HATARI-HA-9218/p/177360?gclid=CjwKCAjw2qHsBRAGEiwAMbPoDJyt3OQt0lskmPTP0jld8ijl5xExCYeYR-rKZnlziRWblWZA76JAqRoCsSEQAvD_BwE

 

No, don't think so...

 

If you look at the specs for the one you've linked to on the Hatari site, it's an entirely different size dimension.

 

https://www.hatari.co.th/parts/air-filters/R0180079N

 

Quote

 

• Size 25.4 x 36.0 x 3.0 cm.

For models: HA-1244, HA-1293

 

 

 

The Hatari air purifier HEPA filter is the following:

 

Quote

 

R0310079N

AP12 air filter

฿ 888

Increase air filter efficiency HEPA + Activated Carbon

Able to eliminate odors and filter small particles such as bacteria, viruses, fungi, etc.

Size 35.8 x 37.4 x 3.0 cm.

For model: HT-AP12

 

 

 

[lopburi3]

22 minutes ago, ExpatOilWorker said:

Is that the same model as the HA-9218 filter?

 

https://www.homepro.co.th/homePro/th/Welcome-Sale-เครื่องใช้ไฟฟ้า-เครื่องใช้ไฟฟ้าขนาดเล็กภายในบ้าน/แผ่นกรองเครื่องฟอกอากาศ-HATARI-HA-9218/p/177360?gclid=CjwKCAjw2qHsBRAGEiwAMbPoDJyt3OQt0lskmPTP0jld8ijl5xExCYeYR-rKZnlziRWblWZA76JAqRoCsSEQAvD_BwE

No.  That is the filter for the previous model Hatari which I had to replace 3 years ago after about a decade of good service when Home Pro could not provide that filter anymore.  

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

9 minutes ago, lopburi3 said:

No.  That is the filter for the previous model Hatari which I had to replace 3 years ago after about a decade of good service when Home Pro could not provide that filter anymore.  

 

The fact that Hatari is still offering the HEPA filter for that old and now discontinued of one of their purifier models speaks well for them. AFAIK, Hatari currently sells only one HEPA air purifier model, the current AP12 version.

 

 

[lopburi3]

This is what the old model looked like - had one for many years of 24 hours a day operation with no issues.

[ExpatOilWorker]

3 minutes ago, lopburi3 said:

This is what the old model looked like - had one for many years of 24 hours a day operation with no issues.

Darn, I am not keeping up with the latest gizmo (again!). That is the exact model I am currently using.