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De-humidifying Guitar


Twang Gang

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I just bought D'Addarios two way humidification system, and a hygrometer to measure humidity in my acoustic cases.  Living in South Carolina where we're about 20 inches over average rainfall this year it has been very humid (above 90% most of the time for several months).  Of course it is not that humid inside my house or my guitar cases, but I find that the humidity reading inside the guitar cases is about 65% which is higher than I would like.  As the weather gets colder and I turn the heat on I'm sure indoor humidity will drop, but may not do that for another month or so.

So what is recommended to remove some humidity from the guitars?  I put some "dryrite" packets in each case.  I assume they are silica gel.  It brought the humidity down a little, but it is still higher than I would like.  The packets I used were old and have been sitting in the room where I keep my guitars absorbing moisture for a long time.  

Any ideas other than silica gel packs or bamboo charcoal?  I did read one guy who said you blow your hair dryer in there, but that didn't sound like such a good idea.

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4 hours ago, Dave F said:

They (Diaddario) also make case conditioning packs that will dry out the case before you start using it for the standard packs. 

No I don't think so.  Their conditioning packs are for a guitar that you know is too dry, they will add humidity to the case faster to get it up to 45% or so, then you put in the maintenance packs.  I am looking for a way to dry it out first before using the maintenance system.

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32 minutes ago, Twang Gang said:

No I don't think so.  Their conditioning packs are for a guitar that you know is too dry, they will add humidity to the case faster to get it up to 45% or so, then you put in the maintenance packs.  I am looking for a way to dry it out first before using the maintenance system.

I assumed the wrong way when they said condition a case.

They do have 32% packs for reeds but I don't know how that would work.

https://bovedainc.com/store/music-wood-instruments/boveda-woodwind-reeds/?rh=32

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Clip a few of these onto the strings inside the case. I pretty much follow the placement suggestions on the d'addario packs and put one beside the neck and another in the headstock area if I'm dealing with a very humid situation. If it's just been been a little bit humid for a short period of time, I'll stick to just 2-3 clipped to the strings. My D-41's been out during this most recent stretch and I can tell it's been a bit much for it when I played earlier today. My Maple guitar comes out next, so I'm waiting another day. before I switch

https://www.amazon.com/Dry-Premium-Packets-Desiccant-Dehumidifiers/dp/B00DYKTS9C 

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I forgot to mention above, that if the guitar is particularly "wet", I will change the gel packs out after a few days. I've just gotten a feel for it over the years. I had another brand's Maple that got "wet" a few years back when we had that record rain year. I started slowly with one pack at a time and it took me a month or two to get it back right. If the was to happen these days, maybe 2-3 iterations of what I described above would have got me there.

One other thing. The bag of packs I bought most recently didn't change color much. I weighed them before and after to make sure they wee indeed working, which was more to validate what I was feeling and hearing.

 

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