Clothes dryers

[spaceacewannabe]

We have a traditional clothes dryer. It has stopped working because the venting is such a problem. As I research this, I have discovered this is both costly and very dangerous. Even fixing the venting (which would be very difficult and expensive to do), I would like to look at other dryer options.

I am reading up on them on Wikipedia, and I wondered if anyone in the U.S. has experience with any of the ventless dryers (towards the bottom of the page):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clothes_dryer
If so, where did you buy them? Do you like it? What do you have and how much was it? Capacity? These seem to be pretty typical outside of North America, but I don't even know where to look here. I haven't seen any of these in the stores, but perhaps I'm looking in the wrong places.

Thanks so much!

 

[BelleBeautyandtheBeast]

My parents plan on getting this washer/dryer http://www.homedepot.com/Appliances-Laundry-Clothing-Care-All-in-One-Washer-Dryer/h_d1/N-5yc1vZby6n/R-202336996/h_d2/ProductDisplay?langId=-1&storeId=10051&catalogId=10053 at Home Depot.

"Ventless condensing drying system allows you to dry your clothes without the need for external venting and only requires a water hookup and standard outlet for installation."

Their reason for wanting that is different than yours, they want to move the laundry area from the basement to the first floor due to my mom's decline in health. I did lots of research and while the condensing type dryer dries more slowly than a traditional tumble dryer, it does work. There are cheaper ones out than the one I linked.

Ages ago when I got my first washer and dryer we did not have a vent as the washer and dryer were in a bedroom (how odd!) and the dryer had a contraption hooked up to the vent that blew the hot air into cold water and caught any lint that escaped.

It looked similar to this http://www.improvementscatalog.com/imp/10105?cm_mmc=Froogle-_-Maintenance-_-2011-_-204952&code-macs=MP1WFGL&SourceCode=MP1WFGL&mr:trackingCode=15E4FEAF-AA35-DF11-9DA0-002219319097&mr:referralID=NA.

I also remember as a kid my parent's house (back then) had the washer and dryer in the kitchen (again, how odd!) and there was no venting. Mom placed a fan in the window and let it suck the hot, moist air outside, or at least some of it. I can only imagine how miserable she was having to cook dinner in there after doing laundry all day.

While I cannot actually answer your question, I just babbled a whole bunch anyway.

 

[spaceacewannabe]

Not babbling---that did help! I am intrigued by the indoor dryer vent link. I'm up for any solution at this point!

 

[acourtwdw]

Keep in mind that ventless dryers take over twice as long as vented ones to do the job. That is the probelm with this type of dryer.