Customer Reviews

Ventamatic CX1500 Power Gable Ventilator Fan

5 star:		(53)
4 star:		(47)
3 star:		(17)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

This is a well made fan that mounts easily and comes with it's own thermostat. Once mounted, set the thermostat (I set mine @ 90 degrees) and you're in business. Now my AC doesn't run as much as it did before installing the fan. I installed a wall switch to turn the fan on & off, so that when I am going away from home for a few days I can simply turn the fan off & save some electricity.

I was not sure how good this product would be. I ordered. With shipping under fifty bucks total. As I had been looking inside the big warehouse stores for a attic fan and for anythjing decent two hundred bucks was the starting point! I purchased this item about three weeks ago installed myself under two hours and am a total klutz with household repairs. Very easy instructions and less wiring than a standard old table lamp. Great built in thermostatic control seems very accurate so far, so good. The biggest bonus was our attic temp dropped twenty degrees during the day. At night fan shut off by 5:00 PM everyday leaving the attic at or below seventy five degrees. Did I mention we live in the Mojave Desert in some of the hottest weather conditions in the entire United States!! I highly recommend this product to anyone wanting to lower their attic temperatures.

Thank you, James W.

I installed this fan today in my attic over the gable. The instructions recommend cutting a 15 1/8 hole in a piece of plywood and then mounting the fan to the plywood, and then to 2X4 studs around the gable. The Fan provides quite a bit of air movement with a slight hum in the garage. I will probably add some foam strips between the studs and the plywood mount in order to decrease vibrations. We live in Arizona, so the attic can get quite hot. The fan kicked on at 95F and turns off once the temperature dips below that degree. You can adjust the thermostat as needed with a flat head screwdriver,(has a nice indicator for precise adjustment). Great fan, easy install. I would definitely recommend.

First off, I'm a woman, and I was able to do most of this project myself. I live in a "Tri-level" home and the master bedroom faces west and never seems to cool down in the summer. I could have the AC set to 60 and my room would still be a pressure cooker. For the past 10 years I've tried several techniques to cool the upstairs without freezing out the 2 lower levels: Runing a swamp cooler, using box fans to push cool air upstairs, leaving the A/C fan set to "On" position, running ceiling fans all day, etc. Some of my neighors installed "turtles" in their attic, but didn't notice much difference. So I finally decided to install an attic fan and after doing lots of research, settled on this model. I have an 800 square foot attic that is probably around 2500 cubic feet. I mounted the fan on an old piece of chip board and screwed it to the inside of the gable, over my kids bedrooms, so that I wouldn't hear the noise if there were any. My friend ran the power, tapping into the line for the smoke detectors. He installed a switch so that I can override the fan without climbing into the attic and he also installed an attic light at the same time (I store my Christmas stuff up there).

I ended up wiring the thermostat incorrectly so the fan was running continuously. I took a picture of my wiring job and emailed it to Alan at Ventamatic who quickly diagnosed my problem. In a few minutes I had it wired correctly and now the thermostat works perfectly. It makes a quiet hum when it's running, which I don't find annoying at all (and I'm really sensitive to noises).

The day we got the fan running, the attic was 147 degrees (I put my oven thermometer up there and left the display hanging down from the access panel so I could monitor the temp throughout the day). Now the attic doesn't get much above 120 degrees on a 105 degree day. It stayed in the low 100s on a recent cloudy day. Before the fan, the ceiling in my bedroom would be warm to the touch. When I'd turn on the ceiling fan, I'd feel hot air blowing down on me. Now the ceiling is cool and the ceiling fan actually blows cool air! I can really notice the difference.

The entire cost of the job (without the sweat equity) was under $100, including wiring, switches, etc. I should make that up in AC costs the first year.

My experience with Alan in the customer service department was outstanding. I highly recommend this fan and this home improvement project for anyone who has oven-like attic space.

I was surprised at the number of reviews/people that bought the 1600 or 1500 instead of this one. I can't say enough good about it. Let me first say that chewing 1.4 Amps less over the long haul with a PSC motor is a big winner (not to mention the better warranty). I had to custom make my own gable shroud to mount fan - no problem there. Adding sound damping barrier foam to metal standoffs on shroud and to motor mount has made it very low resonance and reasonable sound level. It's quiet enough but a little more work could reduce it more.

Note, I'm using this in Arizona! I have the shutoff temp set for 87deg F. If you let it, it'll run from 7-8am to 11pm (or longer). Too late for me - so we put it on a 15A timer circuit. Works like a champ in that it gets AC circuit power on from 7am to 9pm, of which the only time that varies in the summer is the turn on time (not turn off, it never reaches 87F before 2am.) That's not the fan's fault - it's my need for quiet rest that is the override.

Is $20 more expense going to be recovered with lower energy bills over the other models? That verdict is still out, but I'm guessing a resounding yes.

Well, I have seen lot of those come and go over years, this one is no different. I have changed lots of those. I took this motor apart to see if anything has changed, NONE at all. Failure is bound to happen in A season or 2 because there is no real ball bearing on the shaft, it has bush/sleeve (High Maintenance) with no lubrication ports. Per instructions came with the fan says lubricate often (With non detergent oil) but how??
Construction of the motor is same as it used to be for the last 15-20 years with some minor changes but shaft and bearing housing assembly remains the same. It used to be $20 motor, it went up gradually over the last couple of years to $55, no matter where you buy it from Homedepot or online.
I'll give it 2 stars for the reason, price is right especially it comes with thermostat. I installed mine couple of months ago, it's good. Made some mods to lubricate front & Back end of the shaft.
Just a thought to share, expensive motors have low maintenance because they have permanent lubricated sealed bearings.

I've installed 2 of these gable vent fans so far and if I install any more I'll definitely get this one again. They are easy to hook up and when running are really quiet. I'd researched a lot of fans on the net before buying these and they don't produce any vibration or extra noise in the attic. One of the main reasons that I chose these is that the current drawn by them is at least 1/2 of most gable fans, These run pretty continuosly over the summer would definitely pay for any small increase of price over ones from HD or Lowes's. One fan however had a loose blade but this was minor so check it before mounting.

I purchased three of these fans based on the reviews on Amazon. I have never installed any fans whatsoever and the reviews proved true, saying that they were simple and easy to install. It took about an hour and a half to install, three vents fans I purchased for a very large house. I used 2 x 4 between two wall studs to mount the fan on. I am pleased with the fans ease of installation and operation especially for the price.

I would recommend this fan, it works great and is an unbeatable price, but I had a few minor issues. The wires from the motor needed to be connected to the thermostat but the thermostat cover is held in place with a one way screw. Not sure if that's the right name but the slot in the screw head doesn't allow you to back it out with a screwdriver, so just use pliers to grasp and turn it. Once you get it off it's just black (hot), white (neutral) and ground wires.

The other issue I had was clearance between the fan blade tip and the bolt heads for the L shaped connection brackets. The fan shroud wasn't perfectly round (possibly bent in shipping) so when the blades turned they hit one of the bolt heads. The fan blade corners are cut off so as to miss them but no amount of adjusting could fix it. I couldn't understand why they would have the bolts located there in the first place. I also noticed when the L shaped brackets are attached as shown in the picture (short part to fan shroud, long part to the wall) the fan wobbled when on. I think this was because the mounts that hold the motor to the shroud are at the back while the mounts that hold the fan to the wall are in the front. So to solve both problems I turned the L brackets around so the short part was on the wall and the long part was bolted to the back of the shroud, closer to the motor mounts and away from the fan blades. Problems solved. If my description doesn't make sense just look at the way the brackets are attached to the fans in the pictures for the CX 1500 vs. the CX 2500. Mount it like they show for the CX 2500.

A few other suggestions mentioned in previous reviewers I did and recommend; wire in a switch to control power to the fan so you can turn it off if you want - I located mine in the garage. The other was to use a gasket between the fan and the wall to isolate the vibrations. I used foam weather stripping they sell at every hardware store. I don't have before and after comparisons but the fan isn't very noticeable when running.

I think this fan is well worth the money and you shouldn't hesitate to buy this one.

The unit is easy to install and comes complete with all hardware except lag bolts or wood screws. Temp controller is fairly accurate and instructions are easy to follow. They have definitely helped drop the temp in my walk through attic. I can feel the air being drawn up the stairwell when the door is left open.
It is a bit noisy so try to avoid placing over a bedroom. I have two mounted in the gable ends of both sides of my home. One is over a garage area (cannot hear it running until I head outside). The other is over a bathroom area and can be slightly heard at night, but not while in the bedroom.