I've done as much research as I can in FAQ on this forum and haven't found a reasonable answer to my query. I was hoping someone here has experienced the same problem that I have encountered and could give some advice. Following is the same letter I've sent to the bead company who will remain nameless for the time being.
I recently purchased 1 pound of your 65% humidity beads and have placed them in
all of my humidors/coolers. I have hydrated them with distilled water from a
spray bottle in a 80/20 mixture (80 being clear beads and 20 being opaque
beads). The relative humidity in all of the above humidors and coolers has
actually risen to 71%. I changed the mixture of beads to 50/50 and still no
change in humidity. Am I doing something wrong? I have the proper amount of
beads to cubic inches in all of the humidors/coolers. My RH was almost always
66-69% before beads. How can I remedy this problem?
Thanks in advance people,
Matt
[Reply]
First guess - the beads are still too wet and are not able to work both ways (absorbing and emitting RH).
:-)
Remember that your smokes and the boxes they are in all hold humidity too.
Try hitting them with a hair dryer (as long as they are in bags or tubes
:-)) for a couple seconds.
Also is your hgyro calibrated?
[Reply]
If you have recently calibrated your hygrometer, give the beads time to work. It will take at least a week or two to get rh down from 70 to 65. As high rh is your problem you can actually go 100% dry until you get down to 65. Then wet them. In my vinos I keep about 50/50, in my humidors I keep about 80% wet, in the winter time.
[Reply]
Yeah, the RH in my humi rises after I charge the beads. Give them time to do their thing. If the RH is still high after a week or so, dry the beads out and put them back in the humi. They will begin to absorb moisture and help bring down the RH. Then you can play around with how much water to add to keep things where you want.
[Reply]
