2 common issues with dryer vents

Throughout my dryer vent cleaning career, I have seen many problems, however, the two most common ones have been flex lines and covers. These two things account for around 60-70 percent of the problems I see at a customer's house. When it comes to flex lines they are generally too long causing unnecessary turns in your dryer vent or the dryer is pushed back too far crushing the flex line. I will break each of these down in more detail.

As I mentioned flex lines are generally way too long, well why is that?  When the delivery team comes to install your dryer, they are generally not concerned with optimizing your vent. So they install a longer-than-needed flex line because that is the most convenient thing for them. However, this makes your flex line have unnecessary turns in it, those turns end up slowing down the airflow and costing you money every month on the electric bill. The same thing will happen if the line gets crushed or has a kink in it, from the dryer being pushed too far back. Most dryer manufacturers suggest that the dryer be 6 inches or more from the back wall to prevent this from happening.

Unlike most vents on your house, the dryer vent exhausts more than just air or gas. It also exhausts lint, which means that certain covers do not work for dryer vents. Why? Well because a vast number of exhaust covers have holes or bars that are too tight for lint to get through. On other occasions, the cover might be fine but chicken wire might be attached to the dryer vent cover. If the cover has chicken wire over it or is improper, lint can't get exhaust, this creates a clog.

Both of these issues will cause backpressure, increasing your risk of a fire. So it is important that when you have your dryer vent cleaned both of these problem areas are inspected and addressed if need be. Below are some pictures of improper flex lines and covers.

A flex line that was way to long

A flex line that got crushed when the dryer was pushed back

A video and a picture of a bad cover