Honeywell 38002 Enviracare Universal Replacement Pre-Filter

This was a great price and works well with the filter. I change every 4 months and my filter works great.

This is a decent filter - but it has too much of a carbon smell to it. It will take a long use to get that smell to go away. If you leave it in a room for awhile fresh out of the box - the room will have a carbon smell to it - instead of fresh air.

When Honeywell had to make a decision of how to still take care of customers of the 1990s (and some 80s!) models that are still going strong, it was either make a filter large enough for them all at a small cost, make a couple filters that take care of most models and say tough luck to some people (which probably would have brought in some third party charging $30+ per "custom size filter"), or make filters for each model and keep the price double what it is... well, the customers are always right, and most all customers are glad they chose to save us some money at a little effort every once in a while.

Depending on where it is and how heavy the use is, the pre-filter might need changing every 3 months, every 5-6 months, or even every month (lots of dust and pets, for instance)... I lucked out and, having the portable model to use in my bedroom, I get 2 filters from each box... While some might be annoyed at having to get out the scissors (a bit of charcoal dust does come off the filter in cutting), it's quite simple. I just take the hepa filter, wrap the new prefilter around it, secure it with the pieces of velcro (one from the old filter, one from the new usually), and cut around the edge of the hepa filter. The whole process is 2-3 minutes including discarding the other, and that's if I'm taking my time, which I tend to do when using sharp objects :)

I have had 2 of the portable cleaners (slightly different info displays and one has a remote, the rest essentially the same) since around 1999 and 2002, respectively. They have worked wonders in all kinds of living circumstances, a fluffy cat being a companion in all of them, a dog in a couple... I tend to leave one near the litter box for both the light smell and the dust that I like keeping confined to that area (I use the exquisicat crystals from petsmart, so there is little dust or odor, but still some of both right after business is done). The only time I resultingly smell any of the odor... is when the power goes out and I have to turn the unit back on. I can DEFINITELY tell a difference when it's been off a few days. That's my proof...

Oh, one important thing to mention about changing out the pre-filters... ok, so 2: some models have meters telling you how much life is left in both the pre and hepa filters (mine do, and I love it), and if you do change the prefilter often enough, your hepa filter will get VERY LITTLE work... not in a "why have it there" sense at all, but more that... they work SO efficiently together that the hepa filter doesn't have to be changed out for a reallllly long time in most cases. If your house is particularly humid, mind you, the hepa filter will need replacing more often, since that's about the hardest environment for an air cleaner of this sort to take. I've seen other air cleaners boast a whole lot, but for the ~$150 cost of a Honeywell, I, a scientist married many years to a fellow scientist, have found no convincing reason to change.

This pre-filter is necessary to make my Honeywell air purifier work optimally. And it does. I have just purchased 3 Honeywell purifiers, and have not replaced this pre-filter yet. But, I can tell that my house is less dust filled, and more importantly, less cat hair filled. That was my goal, and I reached it!

The filter came as a large sheet. For my Honeywell Enciracaire the large sheet needs to be cut into 8 stripes. Although there are perforations on the sheet, but the lines are not continuous, therefore difficult to cut straight.