Blower Door Test Procedure

Professional energy auditors use blower door tests to help determine a home s airtightness.

Blower door test procedure.

Blower door test during a home energy audit. Using a blower door only not recommended the basic idea behind using a duct leakage tester to test for duct leakage is. Once you ve got those results unseal the vents and run your blower door test. When the fan is turned on it creates a pressure difference between the outside and the inside.

As air is exhausted out of the house or building envelope the house becomes depressurized relative to the air pressure outside the house. The multi point blower door test procedure results in a series of known values of q n fan and p n building. We ll also get to find out what the major inf. Our energy saver 101 infographic explains the importance of a blower door test during a home energy audit.

C building and n building. As discussed in more detail later in this guide the air leakage test or blower door test uses a calibrated fan and digital pressure gauge to either pressurize or depressurize a home to a standard test pressure of 50 pascals with respect to the outside and measure the air leakage flow at that pressure. Instead do all your setup upfront. Typical p n building values are 5 10 20 30 40 and 50 pascal.

The second part of this series will pick up with our blower door test from the moment we turn on the manometer. Measure the airflow through the fan with the duct system at pressure. Blower door testing is usually performed in a depressurization mode. Ordinary least squares regression analysis is then used to calculate the leakage characteristics of the building envelope.

Use a calibrated fan to pressurize the duct system. These are some reasons for establishing the proper building. A blower door test is used on buildings in order to quantify the amount of air leakage through its enclosure. Then run your two duct leakage tests.

During this test a calibrated fan is installed in an otherwise sealed door or window while all the other openings to the exterior are closed. If it s a hot humid or cold day when you run the blower door first you re making the house uncomfortable for the whole time you re setting up the duct leakage tests.