Dehumidifier is running but no water is in bucket

If you have a dehumidifier that is not producing any water then you are wondering what you need to do to get this thing to work for you. In some cases you may be able to do something and in other situations there may be nothing that you can do.

If you do not hear the compressor running and the unit says that the humidity in the room is higher then the setting, then you have a problem with your dehumidifier.

A few things that can cause this are:

The circuit board relay has gone bad…replacement of this board will often cost more then a new unit. This also is a very common problem with many dehumidification units.

The compressor has failed…if you hear a buzz for a few seconds, every few minutes, then you have a bad compressor or at least bad start components on the compressor. Either way it again is a costly repair.

If the compressor is running and the coils are not getting cold then you have a refrigeration system leak. Recharging or fixing these units is very difficult and is another costly venture compared to the price of a new dehumidifier.

If the compressor is running but the fan is not, this also will cause low water production and continual freezing of the coil.

If the compressor and the fan are running but the coil is totally blocked then you will get no water production. Air needs to be continually moved over the cold coil to get the water out of the air.

If nothing is running, then you may also have a control board failure. Or the humidity sensor or humidistat has gone bad which tells the machine to run. If the sensor says that the humidity is low enough then it will never run.

Also if nothing is running check the float switch or the bucket switch. Many of these switches are very touchy and if you do not have the bucket in place just exactly right it will not trip the switch to allow the unit to run. These switches often are more fragile then they should be and break easily. The good thing is that when available they are easy to replace and relatively inexpensive.

There are some parts available for a few brands, but with the prices for most of the parts that you can replace running anywhere from 40.00 – 80.00 dollars, replacement parts with labor to install them, makes a repair more then the few hundred dollar cost of many of these dehumidifiers.

As you can see there are quite a few things that can cause your dehumidifier not to work. Systematically go through the list and eliminate things to get to the bottom of the issue causing your problem and then decide if it is worth spending the money to try to fix the old unit. Only you can make that decision.

http://www.fixya.com/support/r4662033-dehumidifier_freezing_up_not_working

http://www.fixya.com/support/r3877515-dehumidifier_problems_dehumidifier

http://www.fixya.com/support/r4688381-dehumidifier_problem_shows_bucket_full