Good evening folks!
I have recently completed construction on a new basement gun room. I noticed tonight that it is holding fairly steady at 77% humidity. Obviously, that's not good. Any tips on a good dehumidifier to use? It's a 10'x10 room. Concrete floor and two concrete walls(insulated and drywalled), and the other two are insulated 2x6 with 1" plywood and drywall. There is no floor drain. My guns, ammo and gear thanks you from the bottoms of their little hearts.
And yes, I should have posted this in the gun section but I'm hoping for help from all prepping enthusiasts on this forum.
Thank you!
If your guns are in vaults inside of your room, then http://www.remington.com/en/product-families/accessories/storage-and-safety-families/dehumidifier.aspx might ba a solution. That's what I use and it works well. If your entire room is your vault, then I think your only option will be a plug in dehumidifier that you will need to empty regularly.
I have never seen a dehumidifier that would not do a room that size.. Pretty much any one you can plug in would do the job. As for best and worst i couldn't tell you. Each house is different for humidity so when looking at stats i would just look at how long they run before failing, how quiet it is, how big of tank it has for fewer empties per week.
ok, I don't know if this would help or not but its a enclosed room right, have your considered trying to throw in a couple dollar store damp traps and seeing what happens?
Super cheap, can buy in bulk and change out easy and does not require power to work.. there are so many different brands, I just linked in the photo area, I pay 1.25 for mine and they last a couple months and work quite well
http://livingmydreamlifeonthefarm.wordpress.com/
While not a perfect answer I reuse those "do not eat" packets fount in lots of food products, into my tool boxes to ward off rust on tools. It seems to be working so far and while not 77% the humidity here has been pretty high.
Tossing a few of those packets into a gun safe probably wouldn't hurt. Just saying...
Than= I’d rather be rich than poor.
Then= I first became hungry then I ate.
There = She is there now.
Their = They have their things.
They're = They're going to the mall.
To = They came to the house.
Too = That's too bad.
While not a perfect answer I reuse those "do not eat" packets fount in lots of food products, into my tool boxes to ward off rust on tools. It seems to be working so far and while not 77% the humidity here has been pretty high.
Tossing a few of those packets into a gun safe probably wouldn't hurt. Just saying...
Though a thrifty idea, those little packs are usually already saturated by the time they get to you, so they wouldn't absorb much more moisture.
Great responses! I appreciate all of them. I had considered the plug in style large room dehumidifier and swap it out between the gun room and the rest of the basement. Cost is an issue. Budget prepping and all that. Going to definitely try the dollar store response. I did try leaving a 60w bulb on over night and it was 73% in the morning. Currently I'm using a Dri-Z-Air pot style that I purchased at Canadian Tire. There's a lot of water in the pot but no real reduction in humidity. Work in progress, I suppose.
Keep us updated! (Oh, and I somewhat envy the gun room!)
Gun room? I'm envious 🙂
I run a plug in Dehumidier in my basement "Toy" Room 365 days a year. Sometimes it will goes weeks with nothing then other times it will fill up in a matter of hours (very little consistency, its weird).
I would recommend any basic plug in dehumdier, and then in each gun safe/ammo can put in silica gel packs to absorb extra moisture just in case. 1oz - 3 oz Gel packs can be bought off Amazon pretty cheap. I've also heard of people baking the gel packs they find in shoe boxes to "recharge" them.
Hope this helps.
DaScribbler
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That does help. It's going to have to be the plug-in style. I'm trying a floor heater which works but just by warming the air. As soon as it's turned off the moisture seeps back in. I was trying to cheap out but that's not going to work. So I'll buy a good dehumidifier and not worry about it so much.
That does help. It's going to have to be the plug-in style. I'm trying a floor heater which works but just by warming the air. As soon as it's turned off the moisture seeps back in. I was trying to cheap out but that's not going to work. So I'll buy a good dehumidifier and not worry about it so much.
Energy consumption wise, a dehumidifier will cost you much less to run then a heater. Look for sales, with the size of your room, it really doesn't have to be very big. You could probably also just run it on a timer for a coup,e of hours a day (testings will allow you to figure out how long it's needed to get the effect desired.)