Bead stabilization?

Vidarien

About how long have your guys beads taken to get the RH to the designated level on the beads after loading them in.  I went ahead and bought a bunch of beads after my onboard humidifer was undershooting by 10% or so (55%).  I seem to be stuck at 55% RH currently a day later after loading them in, and I was just curious how long it has taken in your experience to get the beads to stabilize.

phobicsquirrel

From my experience with beads (heartfelt) they usually take a day or so. Depending on if your humi has been properly seasoned. If it hasn't the wood will suck up excess moisture and such. I just got a new humi and put my beads in last night around 7pm. This morning before work I checked and it seems as though it's staying steady at 68% which I'm fine with. I'm going to let it sit that way for about a week to make sure that it's holding. Then I'll start to fill it.

phobicsquirrel

Also maybe you need to add more beads. Depending if you saturated more beads than you should have. More beads is better as you will be more likely to hold the RH levels when you open up your humi and they will pick up excess humidity. But Kuzi's the expert when it comes to beads, hopefully he'll chime in here and nit pick at what I said.. =]

rmccloud

Have you calibrated your hygrometer? If not, you should probably do the salt test to make sure that it is reading accurately. I have always found that it takes a day or so to bring the humidity up after I place the beads into the humidor.

kaspera79

rmccloud:

Have you calibrated your hygrometer? If not, you should probably do the salt test to make sure that it is reading accurately. I have always found that it takes a day or so to bring the humidity up after I place the beads into the humidor.

I'm with Deputy McCloud here, Maybe you should check your hygrometer if you didn't see any change in the humidity level a day after adding beads.

Vidarien

I wanted to update about what has happened since...

 

I was able to get the humidity moving (Generally a good idea to have your humidifier at the bottom when possible as water weighs less than air) and the RH rose all the way to 64%, and then it tumbled the next 2 days and now its back down to 58%.  Its the damndest thing.

 

So basically the beads got the RH to essentially the rated number, and then it began to fall back to where it was originally.  My suspicion is that the RH had been too low for too long, the box/sticks absorbed the fresh moisture and the beads decharged.  My problem with this suspicion is that the beads are still somewhat clear.

 

Before I go on a humidity adventure and overcharge the beads, I would love to hear if anyone else had a problem like this.