Thread: Ceiling fans, good and bad

Balancing a fan is not always an issue of weight discrepancies. It could also be one blade out of alignment, or in the case of wood bladed fans, warped. Here are detailed instructions on balancing a fan from the same site I mentioned before:

http://www.ceiling-fans-n-more.com/b...ing-issues.php

I dont see how the metal bladed fans would be any more or less likely to wobble than the wood bladed fans, assuming properly balanced and installed. It is harder for the metal blades to come out of alignment, and they are less likely to have a weight discrepancy, so I suppose out of the box they may be less likely to wobble. If you have one that is shaking or making noise it most likely needs to be balanced.

Originally Posted by bitingmidge

I am 190cm (5'15" in the old measurements!) which makes me a tad taller than the average bear.

P

I would have thought this makes you only a tad taller than the average dwarf....

One very important consideration is where the ceiling joists are located. A friend has her bedroom fan fitted centrally with some awful wood work her hubby did in the ceiling to support the spindle of the fan and ...still it wobbles and makes those whoom-whoom noises. If it had been fitted sucurely to a joist all wood (sic) have been well and quiet.

Their fan is an old four-blade rattan style with a light in the hub. Do they still make those awful things?

' means feet " means inches so 5'15" is 6 feet 3 inches.

Put two fans in the MIL's unit , remote controlled and the quietest I have, or in this case haven't heard, with a halogen lamp with 5 step dimmer
They are from Hunter Pacific ... Model Concept 52 con (L)
Very pricey though at around $400 each :eek:

I Also have fans in all the bedrooms lounge and study all with lights , with 12' celings we were able to drop them 3' so they are very effective at low speed, and the 3 blade mistral's are a lot noiser than the four blade unit .



Rgds

Originally Posted by Knurl

One very important consideration is where the ceiling joists are located. A friend has her bedroom fan fitted centrally with some awful wood work her hubby did in the ceiling to support the spindle of the fan and ...still it wobbles and makes those whoom-whoom noises. If it had been fitted sucurely to a joist all wood (sic) have been well and quiet.

A properly balanced ceiling fan should not wobble or make noise regardless of how it is mounted. In some older ceiling fan designs the fan is mounted by a rubber grommit and hung from a single j-jook. If you move the fan by hand it will swing back and forth, but it is mounted stably.

That having been said, for safety's safe, make sure the fan is securely fastened to a ceiling joist or appropriate bracket.

Originally Posted by Knurl

Their fan is an old four-blade rattan style with a light in the hub. Do they still make those awful things?

With the light in the center? Yes. Rattan? Not much in the US, they are still popular in the UK and I see them occasionally on Australian fans.

I happen to like the rattan ceiling fan designs from the 70s and 80s!

Another consideration...

Those rattan blade type fans are a PITA to clean! They catch a lot of dust.
Nice smooth metal blades much easier to clean

As you say ...the only solution was to move it from the centre of the room to a joist and repair the (fortunately small) hole in the gyprock ceiling. I did that and all seemed well and quiet. They sold the house some years later - so I don't know how it lasted.

On a lighter note - I do a lot of speaking and on one hot day I was standing on a dais in a hall, just under a rotating ceiling fan that I hadn't seen. I was waving my hands around in my usual annoying manner, and very pleasantly surpised at the positive response and laughs I was getting from the audience. Then someone had the heart to call out "watch that fan, mate!". Those metal blades were very close and really moving!

Just replaced a fan we had in the bedroom. Old metal fan with rattan inserts had it's light fitting wiggle out of the screw and after a few times trying to get it back it in it eventually stripped the thread and was hanging on by the power cord!!!!!!

Bought a bottom of the range Hunter Pacific as someone mentioned earlier (was about $250) knowing that the majority of compentry would be the same as the higher priced models. Nicely finished wooden blades, required no balancing and quiet as a mouse. Needed to replace the old inductive speed switches with a capacititave one but that wasn't too hard.