Our Philippine House Project – Ceiling Fans. We find that fans are an essential part of life and keeping cool in the Philippines — without spending a fortune on electric bills to run air conditioning 24/7. We were enamored with the idea of ceiling fans, maybe because they were stylish. After all, slowly revolving Casablanca-style ceiling fans are a fixture in every movie about the tropics.
We foreigners can sometimes be a bit arrogant. Sometimes we think that Filipinos make choices because they don’t have the savvy, the technology or even the finances we do. We think fan and automatically are drawn to the expensive and stylish ceiling fan. We assume that Filipinos use cheap stand or floor or desk fans because they are not as informed and affluent as we are.
Frankly, our ceiling fans have been a bit disappointing The ceiling fans we bought just don’t move enough air on a hot day. Perhaps the situation would be better if we had bought higher volume ceiling fans rather than the ones we bought. But remember, truly good ceiling fans are quite expensive. When it’s hot we often use a conventional stand or floor fan which directs more air to us than the more diffuse effect of our low performing ceiling fans.
When we first moved to the Philippines in 2006 we lived in rented apartments. We bought three portable floor fans. We used these until we moved into our new house in 2010. We looked forward to getting rid of the floor fans which we were constantly tripping over.
We did not do a great deal of research before buying our ceiling fans. We should have done more. The ceiling fans available in Iloilo were made by Hunter, Westinghouse and then various less expensive commercial fans. The Hunter and Westinghouse fans were similar with a traditional faux old-fashioned design having five wooden blades. Some were hugely gaudy and festooned with lights. The Hunter fans seemed to be the top quality available, at least they were the most expensive and appeared to be well made. The Westinghouse fans seemed to imitate the Hunter designs, but at a lower price.
$170 Hunter Builders Select 52″ Ceiling Fan
If we were doing our shopping all over again, I’d take a look at the Hunter Osprey which is available in the Philippines. The Osprey is an all metal fan in a modern design. It offers high airflow, high electrical efficiency fan at a modest price. It moves more air with less electricity than the traditional Victorian-look fans which are so popular and which we bought. For example the Hunter Savoy uses 70W and moves 14,500 cubic meters per hour. The Osprey uses 80W and moves 20,000 m3h. The 56″ Osprey is best suited to large rooms with high ceilings. See http://www.hansenwholesale.com/ceilingfans/hunter/model.asp?ProdNo=28496 Westinghouse makes a similar industrial ceiling fan at a lower price.
Hunter Osprey Fan
Emerson Midway Eco Fan – 24 watts, $449
Installing the fans.
Hunter fans come with good quality mounting accessories intended for mounting to wood joists or to concrete. Our Hardiflex ceilings are supported by welded angle bars. Anticipating the ceiling fans, we put a heavier (2″ x 2″) angle bar in the center of each room. The Hunter mounting bracket is bolted to the angle bar making for a very secure mounting. If mounted as-is, the fan would be about one foot below the ceiling. Since our ceiling are 10′ high, the fan would be too high above the floor for good air circulation. Hunter sells “down rods” in various lengths to bring the fan further down. Of course these are not easily available. Fortunately these down roads are just 1/2″ iron plumbing pipe so we were able to buy 1/2″ x 12″ pipes (nipples) and use these to lower the fan an additional foot. The pipe was painted white to match the fan. The length of the supplied wiring harness was just long enough to allow the 12″ extension. The mounted fan is about eight feet above the floor.
There are various options for controlling the fans; wireless remotes and wall mounted speed and reverse controls (at extra cost), but we just wired ours to a regular wall switch. We felt we would never want to reverse the airflow to flow upward as one might do in cold climates, nor would we use the lower speeds. When we turn our fans on they are in the downdraft rotation mode on high speed.
Bracket for Hunter ceiling fan bolted to angle bar joists
Hunter fan showing 12″ down rod
As noted, we bought five Hunter ceiling fans and installed them when we built our house. This was quite an investment and we hoped that these fans would last for many years. Now, after three years, the first of the fans failed. From the symptoms it appears that the problem is a defective capacitor. Each of our ceiling fan has three capacitors in the switch module. Evidently, capacitor failure is common in ceiling fans. Of course we went on-line to find out where we could find service and parts for Hunter fans. It turns out that, despite the fact that Hunter fans are widely available in the Philippines, the Hunter website does not show any Philippine distributor and provides no guidance on parts for international models other than a a generic email address. We have received no response to our email to Hunter global.
The availability of parts and service should be a consideration when deciding on purchasing ceiling fans (or any other expensive items). I was able to easily order parts for a $30 3-D brand floor fan but not so for a $170 Hunter ceiling fan. After giving up on Hunter itself, we went back to the retailer we purchased the fans from, Handyman Hardware at Robinson’s Mall in Iloilo City. First we had to prove that we bought the fans from Handyman. Fortunately, I had scanned the sales receipt. Otherwise, we’d be out of luck. Like many merchants, Handyman used a thermal-type register receipt, just like to old thermal fax paper. These can fade to invisablity in a short time leaving the purchaser with no way to prove the place or date of purchase. Hence we scan such receipts and save them online.
Fortunately, they had the exact same fan in stock. It has a lifetime motor warranty graphic right on the box which I was able to use as part of my case. The manager asked me to bring in the while fan motor. We already knew that the problem was not in the motor because we own five of the same model of fan. When we tried the switch module from one of our other fans, it instantly solved the problem. We convinced him to send just the switch module to Manila. He asked that we pay P200 ($5.00) for the shipping. We did so and in a couple of weeks we received a message that our part was in. When we picked the switch module up, it appeared that they had just given us a replacement module, rather than repairing ours. In any case we were grateful for this good service from Handyman. There was no cost for the repairs beyond the P200 shipping fee.
Just in case it might be of use to others, this is the address of the repair facility to which Handyman shipped our part. From what we can garner online, NKD International Trading is a Philippine distributor for Black and Decker, Stanley, DeWalt and evidently Hunter Fans.
NKD Int’l c/o Mr. Michael
#10 Conseco St. San Francisco Del Monte
Quezon City (Metro Manila)
$25 floor fan
April 18, 2013 at 8:06 am
My biggest problem is with floor fans. All the fans we bought failed after 18 months of use. I traced the failures to bushings that had used up all their lubricant. The motors have no oil holes so I had to disassemble them to add oil to the reservoirs around the bushings.
When I checked the fans in the stores they all had bushings instead of bearings except for the ceiling fans. It looks like the manufacturers are willing to spend the extra dollar a sealed bearing costs them in a ceiling fan.
April 20, 2013 at 8:53 pm
Peter,
Maybe the brand matters. I have noticed that many commercial users buy Panasonic. I still see “National” brand stand fans in use. Matsushita phased out the National brand in 2004 and adopted the Panasonic brand name, so these fans have seen up to a decade of use. That said, there is a lot of junk out there. We bought three 3-D floor fans in 2006-08. Only one is still operational. That’s not to say 3-D is junk. It’s one of the better units. We got 5+ years out of a P1,300 fan.
Bob
March 19, 2013 at 1:39 am
Hello Bob & Carol,
Living in Pavia for a year and a half now, I’d like to share our fan experiences. After a stand fan failure which almost ended in a fire in the sleeping room at night, we went to Citi Hardware and bought three Westinghouse 52″ ceiling fans. One of them is a beautiful looking one called Eurostyle (Php 5700), the two others were a bit cheaper (Php 5200). We chose them because the first one was the only of its kind available. The Eurostyle is whispering silent, even in highspeed there is no motor noise at all, just the wind noise from the fan blades, which turns out to be soothing when going to sleep. The other two—even though their housing looks almost the same—are considerable hummers and wobblers at high speed, and I sort of regretted buying them, but obviously not enough to bring them back to Citi Hardware…
Even though we’re living in a 2 storey concrete house with tin roof, we almost never need to run them faster than level 2 to achieve a decent air circulation in the room. Before we bought the ceiling fans, we also used to run stand fans, but actually I don’t like the direct horizontal blowing of air at all. I often got a stiff neck while working in front of my computer while the fan blows towards me. The ceiling fans don’t give me such a hard time.
I did not notice an increase in power consumption after switching to ceiling fans, perhaps because they’re most times operating on slow speed. However, it is time for A/C now, at least in the most crucial rooms of the house. Our little one (3 mos.) has a hard time sleeping well at night, which is at least partially caused by the warmth. And I guess my work will turn out to be much more efficient than last summer with some decent cooling in the room.
We will check out the combination of A/C and fan, either floor or ceiling, thanks for the tip.
Warm(!) regards from Pavia,
Willy & May Belle
March 23, 2013 at 10:55 am
Willy,
Thanks for sharing your ceiling fan experiences. I think we may have gone a little overboard in criticizing ceiling fans. This was for two reasons. We was annoyed that we chose the wrong model, one of those old-timey-looking fans that really did not move enough air, and secondly that one of our expensive (p8,000) Hunter fans failed so quickly and getting repairs and parts was so problematic, as compared with getting parts and repairs on ordinary floor, desk and stand fans. We spent almost P40,000 on our Hunter fans and the idea that they would poop out after a few years was not a happy thought, especially compared to the ease with which we were able to order parts for our P1,300 3D floor fans
We do agree that having a conventional fan blowing directly on you can be annoying compared to the overall, more gentle circulation of a ceiling fan. We’ll go back an revisit our ceiling fan post and try to be a little more balanced, Thanks again for your comments.
Bob and Carol
October 21, 2012 at 5:39 pm
i agree ,you should try some loctite,i think it will sovle your problem about the loose blades.
May 19, 2012 at 2:41 pm
Bob and Carol,
In regards to the loose bolts, the ceiling fan I recently purchased and installed in the states had some loctite on the threads (http://www.amazon.com/Loctite-38653-Purple-Strength-Thread/dp/B0002KKTT0/ref=pd_cp_hi_2). The Purple is the lowest strength incase you ever need to remove the blades or other mounting hardware and the blue is what they use to secure oil drain plugs on cars. Perhaps a buddy can send a tube your way thru the mail or next visit?
Hope this helps,
Zac
January 24, 2012 at 3:45 pm
Enjoy your posts… I do have a question… Does anyone use a whole house fan in the Philippines… Seems that they would be good to get the heat out of the houses with a relatively low cost system… I am thinking of locating in Cebu and with the cost of electricity I need an efficient way to cool the house… I can remember when i lived in a house cooled by a whole house fan… Seems like it would be perfect in the tropics… Does anyone have any ideas??? Your help will be appreciated…
February 2, 2012 at 10:01 am
James, I have heard other foreigners talk about whole house fans for the Philippines but I’ve never seen them in stores here. However, there are lots of high output industrial fans available. Because it cools off so quickly, I agree that such a fan is well worth trying. Bob
September 5, 2011 at 4:19 pm
Hi, Bob–Liked the above article; very informative. I didn’t see a post on ceiling light fixtures. Is there a way to use U.S. ceiling lights in the Phils? Just like with ceiling fans, there are so many more choices here in the U.S. and at better prices than in the Phils. The Home Depot guys I talked to said there’s a way to do it but I thought I would check with you. Would appreciate your input on this.
September 5, 2011 at 7:39 pm
Incandescent (not fluorescent) fixtures should work fine. You just need to use 220v incandescent or compact florescent bulbs with them. Any 120v fluorescent fixture which has a ballast is a problem.
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December 25, 2010 at 8:35 pm
Hello.
Merry Christmas to you Bob and Carol.
I read your thoughts about energy saving and other.
I have comments to the importing issues.
50HZ or 60HZ, it means that the rotationational field is 50 or 60 times a second. In a motor, the magnetic field is switched 50 or 60 times a second, but it make no difference in normal soft-iron motore, as they can deal with it. A very slightly higher loss in the iron is all, but the rotation field in a 3 pole / 3 line motor will be 20% higher, but as the fans are only 1 pole, and a “Shadow pole” the speed at 60Hz might not be that much more.
The higher speed will give more air, and a higher consumption, but as long as the motor isn’t overloaded, its not a problem.
Its a lot to save on energy between the mentioned fan’s. ??
from Emerson ECO to hunter its a 2000 pesos a year in consumption, which in the end will pay the more expensive ECO models. Evens its on sale for 449$ in Hansens, again the hunter 107$. Give a pay – even time of 6 years.
With regards.
John Thede
December 23, 2010 at 9:07 am
Hi Bob, its always worth planning for the bedrooms to be on the East facing walls, then the sun wakes you up but leaves the room at noontime.
A fan also keeps the mosquitos away since they are poor fliers and don’t have stabilizers hoho
Hope you and Carol have a nice Christmas in your new home, best wishes for the new year and may your vegetables Flourish.
Peter
December 23, 2010 at 2:17 am
Bob, I find it admirable that you are making a strong attempt to live with out air conditioning. I have to admit that if it was me there would be air in the bedroom and perhaps another room that I spent a lot of time in. My air would run most likely every hour I was in that particular room. I am also sure that my electric bill would be high but its a luxury I think I would avail myself with. Merry Christmas.
December 23, 2010 at 10:10 am
Hi Ron, we are not martyrs! When we need air con to be comfortable, we’ll get it and use it. The wiring is all in and ready. The air con units are already researched and selected. Our house design will reduce but not eliminate the need for air con. I think we are just so enjoying having the construction over and living here that we are putting off further work (wardrobes, screens, aircon) to give ourselves a break. Best wishes — Bob and Carol
December 22, 2010 at 2:42 pm
Well, Bob, we’re over in nearby Guimaras and don’t have any ceiling fans installed yet. We did install an air con in our bedroom, however, this past April, as I just couldn’t take the heat anymore. Before that we were just using the oscillating fans that you mention.
December is the best month for sleeping in the Philippines, at least in our region, and I usually don’t even need any fans during the day now. Looks like you have done a lot of research. Definitely will check out the ceiling fans, though. Thanks for the info.
December 22, 2010 at 7:50 pm
Hi Dave, before we moved into our house we were in a very nice apartment, but it was so hot we had to use aircon in our bedroom almost every night. When we built the house we put in circuits for split aircon units. We’ll probably install at least one unit in a guest bedroom. We have a good friend who has emphysema who we want to come visit us. He could not survive here without aircon. As for our bedroom, we’re going to wait to see how comfortable we are without aircon. If we have to get a unit it will be a Panasonic inverter type split unit. We had Panasonic splits in our apartment and loved them. But even with aircon, ceiling fans can allow you to turn up the temperature on the aircon. In our apartment we used a fan plus the aircon set at 29 degrees. Regards Bob
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