Humidity.
Whynter 251S. 200 cigars. Govee and Boveda hydrometers calibrated with Boveda calibration kit. One pound of 65% Heartfelt beads, 1/3 on bottom, 1/3 in middle and 1/3 on top. Humidity stays at 72% on top, 70% on bottom. Put in some Damprid to bring down humidity. Brought top down to 68%, bottom to 65%. Removed Damprid. Added nothing, took away nothing else. Over night Humidity is back to original levels. Humidor door seal does not leak. What can I do to maintain humidity level Heartfelt beads are designed to provide?
Best Answers
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Bob_Luken
Posts: 10,734 ✭✭✭✭✭
@peter4jc said:
@wing15601 said:
Bob_Luken, Ok, how do I tinker with the heartfelt beads to lower the humidity?Microwave. Oven.
or conventional oven on lowest setting 150? Tinkering later on you'll need a clean spray bottle of distilled water to spritz the beads to add moisture. keep tinkering until you get what you need.
Post edited by Bob_Luken on6 -
BKDog
Posts: 1,229 ✭✭✭✭✭
I own a Whynter 251S and have been toying with it on and off for a couple years now. Sure, it's easy to set up (for me at least), it's nice to keep those cigars cool, and it looks great. I've added some gel beads to offset the Boveda drying out in the winter, and it worked for me. But in the summer months, it's just Boveda and nothing else. I've long since decided to just use Boveda year long, and a little less humidity in the winter is fine. I won't ever try to maintain 69 or 70 RH, that's just too much. The TOP of the Whynter will almost always read higher than the bottom. It's just the way the damn thing is designed. The best way to try to offset this is to have your primary humidification at the bottom and just give it a few weeks to settle.
The thing is, I have multiple Coleman coolers all around the place filled with cigars, too. All I do is toss in the full boxes or loose cigars, some are filled to the top, others about half way, but all of them have Boveda 60 gram RH 65%, anywhere from 6 packs to a dozen each. Years later, no trouble. Sometimes I buy a few cases of Boveda and change them out, sometimes I do nothing if they are still charged."Love is a dung heap, Betty and I am but a c.o.c.k. that climbs upon it to crow."5
Answers
Did you add water to, or "soak" your beads? If you think you oversaturated the beads you can dry your beads out in the oven (on low setting) and start over to see what happens. Have you tried keeping your hyGrometers in the same spot to see if you're getting equal results? A few percentage points difference top to bottom is not that big of a deal to me but if you want you can install a small computer fan to circulate the air inside.
The beads came “ready to use” so I did not add water or do anything other than put them into shallow glass dishes and into the humidor. My concern is that the beads supposedly provide 65% humidity and that’s the level I want my cigars and I cannot get my humidor to that level.
Or you could go with just Boveda
Beads are great, but it looks like they either were sold w/ too much moisture or managed to pick some up along the way. You can also microwave them on high for a few minutes. In the winter I add water to my beads - spritz, spritz - and when summer rolls around I want the beads dryer. So in the microwave they go... you'll be surprised how much steam there is when you open the door.
The one thing I didn't see you mention was how long did you wait after you placed the beads in there before that reading? Also what was the rh level before doing this? Is the fridge jam packed or half empty?.......Ok that's more than one thing.
Thank you all for taking the time to respond. Quickdraw, I initially put in 1/2 lb of beads as that’s the recommended for 2.5 sq ft. Upon reading other people’s experience I ordered another 1/2 lb and put that in. I only had one reliable hygrometer, the Govee so I also ordered the Boveda Butler which came with a calibration pouch and I used that pouch to calibrate both hygrometers about 2 weeks ago. I had previously ordered a Cigar Oasis but it registered such wild swings I ordered the beads and sent it back. I have used a wooden humidor and several tupperwear containers prior to getting the Whynter last month. Humidity was always fairly steady with Boveda packs. I’m aware that humidity will be higher on the top shelves in a cooled humidor but it would seem that somewhere in there it should be at the level the beads are rated for. I have about 300 cigars in there now, not jam packed but I’m not ordering any boxes for a few months. Your microwave idea is interesting but aren’t the beads supposed to put out or absorb moisture to maintain a humidity level?
I used to be reasonably proficient using silica kitty litter, which is made of the same stuff as HF beads, but required more tinkering to get the desired results. I know you can dry them out or add moisture to either HF beads or Kitty litter and affect change in RH levels. But, I gave up all that hassle years ago and bought 60 gram bovedas by the dozen until I had my coolers running like I wanted them. Unless you want to tinker with your beads to get the results they claimed you'd get without any tinkering, I recommend you return the beads and use boveda packs. They are entirely reliable as long as you use enough of them. Never tried a wineador, although I thought about it from time to time. Good luck.
@wing15601
If you are interested in tinkering with your Heartfelt Beads to raise or lower humidity, we can offer semi specific advice as to what we've tried, but I always felt like a mad scientist messing with his monster. But the funny thing was once I got the stuff balanced out I added a new element, Boveda packets in tandem with my Silica KL. That worked really well, but then when I was ready to start my next new cooler I went with only boveda. I never tinkered with silica after that.
Bob_Luken, Ok, how do I tinker with the heartfelt beads to lower the humidity? Did you find the Boveda evens out your humidity top to bottom better than the beads in a cooler? For what it’s worth, I put the Damp Rid back in the Whynter and got the humi back down to 68% top and 66% bottom. Removed the Damp Rid last night and humi is back to 71% today
Microwave. Oven.
What's the temperature in your Whynter?
Yakster, current temp is 65 degrees on top shelf according to Boveda Butler, 65.1 on the very bottom according to the Govee. 66 Degrees is the highest setting for the Whynter but you can never be exactly certain of the readings you get. I just added another two boxes of cigars so I expect some fluctuations over the next couple of days. I’ve herald the sellers raise the humidity of their sticks before shipping them but That doesn’t tell me the number when I get them. I’ve always gotten fluctuations in the smaller humidors when adding a new box so two boxes in this one shouldn’t be much different.
Bob_Luken, I don’t see how removing moisture from the beads will cause them to perform the way they’re supposed to. Right now the beads are 50% clear, 50% white so according to Heartfelt they will absorb excess moisture or add moisture to get the humidity to 65%. But they don’t work!
Seems to me your issue is the beads. I know you're financially invested in them but it seems you're mentally invested in them more. Give it up. As others have suggested, go with just boveda and stop with all of the fussing. We don't own stock in boveda but we do use it and it works just fine.
Trapped in the People's Communist Republic of Massachusetts.
Edit:
I went on a whole diatribe on why I don’t like nor trust beads...... But this is what I will add. I like many other forum members like Boveda because they work.... and very well. I threw out my beads and I’ve never been happier. They had humidity swings as low as high 50s to mid 70s. I never liked them. I had kitty litter before the beads which took work but actually worked better. Buy Boveda
@wing15601 Thanks for accepting my answer! I also feel like I should add that I've experimented by moving the drawers around in different positions with the Whynter, and this will also change the humidity and how the air flows inside. It's trial and error, I suppose. I would also like to mention that the cigars we have stored inside are also like sponges for humidity, so any changes will take time one direction or the other.
I don't fret over the small changes as long as humidity is below 68 percent.
Thank you everyone for your responses. Last night I took out all of the Heartfelt beads and put in all the 69% Boveda packs I had stored in a tupperwear container. I will give it a couple of weeks and post my humidity levels. Right now, after 12 hours, there is no change in those levels.