How to control temp and humidity

[Darryl Young]

If you are doing a true wet bulb/dry bulb test, as long as you have a good temperature gauge, believe that. You can test the temperature gauge by putting it in an ice bath (with a lot of ice and little water) and it should read 32 deg. If it does, it's at least accurate at one point and likely accurate in general.

Digital gauges are notoriously inaccurate.

[tippie53]

I have gotten away from digital RH gauges and am now using older ones that I get at antique shops. 3 of them are within a few % points, the digitals are about 30% different from each other.
You can also make a simple one like Thomas Jeferson did . It still works today. 2 pieces of wood cross grain one and glue to a straight grain. Make them about 1/16 inch and you can see that move. I have one in my shop and when it cups down it is wet up it is dry.

[Ben-Had]

Some makers include a pair of saddles one for summer and one for winter.

+1 on that, that's what I do.

[kencierp]

Tommyboy

The Larrivee link you provided
http://www.larrivee.com/features/humidity.php

is the best, most detailed article I have every seen on the subject!

Thank you

[rgogo65]

We have a central air with built in furnace and AC ventilation system in our home. I've tried, a couple buckets of water seem to have little or no bearing at raising RH.Thanks guys. I'll go right ahead and start building. Another question I do have though: how high RH can you build at and not have a problem later when the RH falls down to 25% for prolonged periods? Is 35% too high.

My shop is 18X12 and I use one bucket. This is all that I used. I played with controlling the humidity for 3 months, I borrowed my Daughters humidifier and it worked us to death and still wasn't "Controlled". I also tried a couple of other methods to no avail resulting in only frustration.

Finally I put on my thinking cap (I hate the smell of burning rubber) heheheh but it suddenly dawned on me that I was "Over-thinking" this entire process...what I NEEDED was a WICK! I opened the lid to the 3 gallon bucket (Kitty litter square) hung a towel from a small sawhorse, let the bottom end of the towel rest in the bucket... filled it within a couple inches of the top and made sure the entire towel was wet...the capillary action kept it that way. I have a 3" fan I pointed at the towel from about 4 feet away....I control the temp and humidity with ventilation from a window which I open just a crack to dry things out and close to get them wet...I'm at 68 degrees and 27-30% and the bucket lasts 4 days. We add a pitcher of water a day to keep up that's all that's needed.

hope that helps with your issue,

Ray :)

[kencierp]

Outstanding!!!

Great suggestion Ray

From what I understand, the thin pieces of wood used in guitar making become acclimated to the RH in their surroundings in just a few hours. Perhaps, storing the pieces to be assembled, in a humidified room, (bedroom, den, whatever) for a day prior to assembly, would be sufficient to properly humidify the wood so that assembly could be safely accomplished in the non-humidified room. Once assembly was completed the assembled piece could be stored in the humidified room or non-humidified room, awaiting the next procedure.

tommy