More about humidity!

I'm the one in Baltimore with no humidifier.

I finally got a humidity gauge, digital, and it started out at 66F and
24%

It varied a trifle and then i took it upstairs, where after a few
hours it is up to 70F and Lo% Lo means it's lower than 20. But I'll
bet not much**. (It reads only from 20 to 90%.)

I had found a really nice gauge/thermometer, with max and min even, on
Amazon, Cheney brand, for 13 dollars and eligible for free plus-$25
shipping. But a couple days later it was listed as out of stock.
Other places were more expensive. A couple days after that, it wasn't
listed as available from Amazon at all, only other places, and a
couple days after that they were up to 26 dollars with shipping. Too
much for me.

Today I was at Harbor Freight and they had one for 10 dollars, 4x4",
bigger than I wanted (The Cheney is 2 1/2 x 3) but with all the same
features, including min/max, F/C, a clock and alarm clock, and
measures temp in tenths of a degree, although it only claims one
degree of accuracy. You should note that when I had done
google-shopping, the model didn't show up at all by any vendor, still
doesn't, and when I googled, if it was there it was so far down I
didn't see it. Searching in Harborfreight.com doesn't' find it under
humidity gauge but does under hygrometer!
http://www.harborfreight.com/thermo-...ock-96417.html
So far, 8 hours, it seems to work.

Went back to google shopping and looked for hygrometer. Found the one
I originally wanted cheaper but out of stock at 2 places.
And some more expensive fancier ones, like
http://www.magnetdeals.com/indoor-ou...ygrometer.html
a blue inexpensive one
http://www.amazon.com/Pretime-SH102B.../dp/B002J4C8K0
but still found no place that sold one I just got at HarborFreight.

Even google-shopping on one stop gardens hygrometer didn't find
it, and googling on one stop gardens hygrometer got only one hit,
the harborfreight page above, quoting the reviews, which you might
want to read, especially about the "salt calibration test", and the
third review where the person didn't know what a "time stamp" is.

For example http://www.cubanmadecigars.com/howdoicamyhy.html
But it seems you can tell how humid it is by the way your cigar
smokes. Most of the pages on the salt cal. test are from cigar
companies. This website is BETTER:
http://exoticpets.about.com/od/herpr...grometer_2.htm


**(BTW I think the mere fact that it's a little hotter here means the
% RH would go down a trifle even with the same humidity, since warm
air would hold more humidity if it were available.)

On Sun, 23 Jan 2011 21:03:25 -0500, mm
wrote Re More about humidity and gauges!:

More about humidity!

Thanks for the update.
--
Work is the curse of the drinking class.

On Jan 23, 9:03*pm, mm wrote:
More about humidity!

I'm the one in Baltimore with no humidifier.

I finally got a humidity gauge, digital, and it started out at 66F and
24%

Just FYI I got some of the dial type "cigar humidor" hygrometers from
Amazon, just stuck them to the wall in various places around the house
a few years ago. Did the salt calibration with them and all were
pretty close right out of the box, and cheap too.

nate

On Jan 24, 10:36*am, N8N wrote:
On Jan 23, 9:03*pm, mm wrote:

More about humidity!

I'm the one in Baltimore with no humidifier.

I finally got a humidity gauge, digital, and it started out at 66F and
24%

Just FYI I got some of the dial type "cigar humidor" hygrometers from
Amazon, just stuck them to the wall in various places around the house
a few years ago. *Did the salt calibration with them and all were
pretty close right out of the box, and cheap too.

nate

what is the "salt calibration"?

I have 2 dial hygrometers and 1 digital. It looks like they all have
a hard time reading low levels below 30% or so.

The digital one reads in 5% steps below 35% i.e. it can read 35%, 30%,
25% 20%... I have never seen it go below 20%.

Above 35% it reads in 1% steps.

Mark

On Jan 24, 10:41*am, Mark wrote:
On Jan 24, 10:36*am, N8N wrote:

On Jan 23, 9:03*pm, mm wrote:

More about humidity!

I'm the one in Baltimore with no humidifier.

I finally got a humidity gauge, digital, and it started out at 66F and
24%

Just FYI I got some of the dial type "cigar humidor" hygrometers from
Amazon, just stuck them to the wall in various places around the house
a few years ago. *Did the salt calibration with them and all were
pretty close right out of the box, and cheap too.

nate

what is the "salt calibration"?

I have 2 dial hygrometers and 1 digital. *It looks like they all have
a hard time reading low levels below 30% or so.

The digital one reads in 5% steps below 35% i.e. it can read 35%, 30%,
25% 20%... I have never seen it go below 20%.

Above 35% it reads in 1% steps.

Mark

here's one link

http://www.stogieguys.com/2006/07/st...tion-test.html

basically, a closed container with some damp salt in it will stabilize
at exactly 75% RH at typical room temperatures, so that is typically
used as a calibration point. If you need precise measurements at low
humidity that won't help you much, but if within a few % is OK, the
salt calibration is quick cheap and easy.

nate

On Mon, 24 Jan 2011 07:47:10 -0800 (PST), N8N
wrote:

On Jan 24, 10:41*am, Mark wrote:
On Jan 24, 10:36*am, N8N wrote:

On Jan 23, 9:03*pm, mm wrote:

More about humidity!

I'm the one in Baltimore with no humidifier.

I finally got a humidity gauge, digital, and it started out at 66F and
24%

Just FYI I got some of the dial type "cigar humidor" hygrometers from
Amazon, just stuck them to the wall in various places around the house
a few years ago. *Did the salt calibration with them and all were
pretty close right out of the box, and cheap too.

nate

what is the "salt calibration"?

giyf.

I have 2 dial hygrometers and 1 digital. *It looks like they all have
a hard time reading low levels below 30% or so.

The digital one reads in 5% steps below 35% i.e. it can read 35%, 30%,
25% 20%... I have never seen it go below 20%.

Like I say, the one I bought just says Lo below 20, and won't go above
90 either.

Above 35% it reads in 1% steps.

Mark

here's one link

http://www.stogieguys.com/2006/07/st...tion-test.html

basically, a closed container with some damp salt in it will stabilize
at exactly 75% RH at typical room temperatures, so that is typically
used as a calibration point. If you need precise measurements at low
humidity that won't help you much, but if within a few % is OK, the
salt calibration is quick cheap and easy.

Right. It would be great to be able to also check 20 and 50
percent, but no one has found a similar way to do that.

nate

.....
here's one link

http://www.stogieguys.com/2006/07/st...tion-test.html

basically, a closed container with some damp salt in it will stabilize
at exactly 75% RH at typical room temperatures,......


interesting....

thank you

Mark

On Jan 24, 8:09*pm, Mark wrote:
.....
here's one link

http://www.stogieguys.com/2006/07/st...tion-test.html

basically, a closed container with some damp salt in it will stabilize
at exactly 75% RH at typical room temperatures,......

interesting....

thank you

Mark

and this
http://www.kingofthehouse.com/hygrometer/

On Mon, 24 Jan 2011 17:20:25 -0800 (PST), Mark
wrote:

On Jan 24, 8:09*pm, Mark wrote:
.....
here's one link

http://www.stogieguys.com/2006/07/st...tion-test.html

basically, a closed container with some damp salt in it will stabilize
at exactly 75% RH at typical room temperatures,......

interesting....

thank you

Mark

and this
http://www.kingofthehouse.com/hygrometer/

Hey, this is great. It gives a little more explanation -- I'm still
trying to understand why this works -- and it tells how to calibrate
33%. Do you have any manganese chloride I could borrow?

Although it does sound like this guy spends too much of his time
calibrating hygrometers! :-)

On Mon, 24 Jan 2011 17:20:25 -0800 (PST), Mark
wrote:

On Jan 24, 8:09*pm, Mark wrote:
.....
here's one link

http://www.stogieguys.com/2006/07/st...tion-test.html

basically, a closed container with some damp salt in it will stabilize
at exactly 75% RH at typical room temperatures,......

interesting....

thank you

Mark

and this
http://www.kingofthehouse.com/hygrometer/

And he says to use pure salt. There isn't much iodine in iodized
salt, but what other impurity could he thinking of, garlic salt?

Why does he recommend Morton canning salt? Who cans. I'd rather buy
some non-iodized table salt. It takes me a year to use up a 24 oz. of
that. Probably take you guys 4 years if you live alone, but if you
eat fish, you get iodine there.

He says Magnesium Chloride Hexahydrate is not that expensive on ebay,
but the only auction for the flakes that he uses is 60 dollars for 10
pounds. Like I say, he must spend a lot of time of his spare time
calibratinng hygrometers. I know, I shouldn't make fun of a guy who
gives all this info to needy people. YOu can also buy 100 tablets of
Magnesium Chloride, which apparently people take a so-called
nutritional supplement! I don't know how much that weighs, not much I
guess, but it's only 20 dollars.

Better to buy 500 g of Magnesium Chloride Hexahydrate for 30 dollars.

On 1/24/11 11:02 PM, mm wrote:


Better to buy 500 g of Magnesium Chloride Hexahydrate for 30 dollars.


Why not go to Ace Hardware and buy 20 pounds for $17?

I prefer using an indoor-outdoor thermometer, a wick of polypropylene
cord, and a 2-ounce bottle for wet-bulb/dry-bulb measurements. At room
temperature, each degree of depression is about 4% down from 100%. It's
most accurate using a fan and an aluminum-foil shield to keep infrared
from warming the wet bulb.