A humidity level of lets say 60% means that the air contains 60% of the humidity that it can contain at the max with this temperature. The warmer the air, the more moisture it can hold. So this does not mean the air contains 60% moisture. It just contains 60% of the maximum amount of moisture with that temperature
For your brand new roll filament test, I don't think you were getting a good gauge of how much humidity is in the roll. When you put the new roll in a bag filled with the air from your shop, you are capturing the humidity in the air as it was in that moment. Then you are gauging how much the pack of desiccant can pull out of the air in the bag, not to much how much moisture your filament can pull out of the air, not how dry the filament was. CNC Kitchen did a video recently demonstrating that of the desiccant packets we get out of new spools have been partially if not completely used up. It short I don't think your new previously unopened filament was at 41% humidity, rather that's how low the air you trapped in the bag got due to the partially used desiccant packet and the filament pulling what moisture it could out of the air in the short time you had the meter in the bag.
Oh no, sorry that happened. What I do for my non-PLA or silk PLA is use reusable desiccant (I had the blue but now use orange due to safety) and it color changes. To hold the desiccant I use mesh filter media bags. Having a lot of desiccant in one spot does not help, from other people who tested this, smaller bags in multiple spots work better than the AMS (for the X1C) inserts. And I use air-tight cereal containers. Another issue is that it only "drys" the first few layer wraps. This is typically fine if you have high humidity and a newish material opened, it takes a while to go into the inner layers I find. If your material is thoroughly soaked you need a way to heat and vent. Much like that dehydrator you showed. Although, don't mess up like I did, I put loose desiccant and it embedded into my spool, which went to the machine. Not a fun time.
I worked in the temperature control industry for 40 years. If you want to dry your space out you need to warm the air up manically and then return it to the AC unit to dry it out. Warm air holds more moisture than cold air. So put a space heater 74 and your AC at 65 and that will wring the water out of the air. You might want to invest in a whole house dehumidifier for your space.
The desiccant packs you have you should dry them out from time to time to reuse them, and you should put some foam or other type of seal at the boxes you have. PLA is quite forgiving on moisture and this is hopefully one-off situation. You don't need to go to extreme measures, if we are talking about Nylon or other similar type of filaments that's another story, but PLA is not too critical.
I would get a 2nd maybe a 3rd dehumidifier. Also, put a PLASTIC Sheet across the printer end of the shop, to seal it off. Cut a slit so you can get through to service the machines, and have a couple of dehumidifiers in there while the rest of the shop dries out. CNC Kitchen just did a show on drying desiccant pouches with a cheap microwave using dehumidifier cycle. Please check it out. He got great results. It can also be used with bulk desiccant.
When you put the dehumidifier inside the bag you are measuring the humidity of the air, not the filament. The fact that the humidity didn't went down means that the desiccant wasn't working properly (saturated). Recently I made a drybox and added new desiccant and the humidity went from 50% to 20% (where I live 45% is a "dry" day...LOL). Maybe that can help you.
Sam, it seems like you are going to be needing a second dehumidifier in the shop and run both constantly 😳🫣. You also may need to put the water jet machine into your older shop. Last but not least you should think about replacing the flooring as it's definitely seen better days 😳🤔. Sam I would also suggest that you use a moisture meter to test how much moisture you still have in the flooring boards as the moisture will remain higher in areas of anything that is standing on the floor, i.e the underneath of racking and cabinets etc!!! As always buddy 💯% 👍 🇬🇧.
Hey Sam. Thanks for this video. Can't imagine how frustrating the humidity must be. My experience with dessicant bags from filament manufacturers are that they are generally a bit wet for my liking. Consequently, the bags are playing a game of who is more hygroscopic with the filament it's stored with. I save a bunch of these bags and cut them open when I have a bunch. I reactivate (dry) the silica inside and use that for storage. Speaking from a research chemistry lab, even purchased silica containers which has never been opened need reactivation before first use. If you put them in the oven at 120°C for around 8 hours, then seal them and let them cool to room temperature, you will find they absorb a lot more moisture a lot quicker than straight out of the bottle/bag. Those storage crates are also a relatively large volume of air compared to the dessicant you have in them. I would definitely look into maybe getting at least some rubber sticky strips to put on the edges of the container to act as a gasket. I know the bambu lab pla filament is pretty good; however, I would also consider drying it before use (once your shop is at a lower humidity too). I still got a lot out of your video and it was interesting to see how you take on this problem.
I recently had a water damage like yours, but with way less water. We had to take out all the wooden floorboards since it’s practically impossible to dehumidify quickly enough to dry out the water that had gone below the floorboards. The floorboards are also working as spunges. I believe you will have to remove your plywood floorboards and keep drying out for a couple of weeks before replacing them.
I live in sub tropical Queensland. Humidity in my workshop is 70+ on a good day but inside my AMS I get 25%. I use 25 ltr sealable pales for storage of open rolls and can get it to 20%. I use multiple humidity meters don't rely on one. I have a large oven for powder coating which is controlled by a PID I use that for drying with the fan on.
I found the easiest way to hold desiccant was a delicates laundry bag from the dollar store. The ones I got have a fine screen on them and can hold a lot, and don't need to be dried back out for years. Just get indicating desiccant.
Hey Sam! I use the Midea Cube Dehumidifiers in my studio to keep my printers/filament dryer. I use the big one because they pull a ton of water out of the air and also hold 4 gallons in the reservoir if you don't have a hose connection. Then i dont uave to empty them multiple times a day. In the summer it's about every day tonday and a half that inhave to empty.
I don't remember which YTer I saw do a test on desiccant that comes with the rolls, but the general gist of the video was that those packs that come with the rolls are more often than not already spent, and may actually increase your humidity in your storage. I found some reusable desiccant packs online that have changing color beads (mine are yellow/orange when good and turn green, then darker green when fully spent). You microwave them to dry them back out, and reuse them. I also have a filament dryer that works great when my filament becomes brittle. FYI, I am ALWAYS fighting humidity, it's not uncommon in my shop (and my house) to be above 80% humidity with the AC unit running full blast. Humid states are fun, not, LOL! Anyhow, good luck Sam, hope you get it sorted out.
Sam, the moisture inside the filament and the moisture in the air within the box with the spools are different. The moisture inside the filament should be higher. The silica gel bags that come with the spools are already saturated with moisture. You can renew them by placing them on a plate, out of their bag, inside the microwave for 2 to 3 minutes. There are plenty of silica gel boxes available on sharing platforms. I don’t recommend using zip bags for filament storage, as moisture still manages to get in for some reason. That’s just a waste of money. Here’s my working method: First, get a filament dryer. The 11:11 discount is coming up soon. Maybe a couple of SUNLU 4-spool dryers would work well for your setup. Industrial food dryers are sometimes not very accurate with temperature, which can affect the filament (diameter consistency and shape are crucial), so I prefer dedicated filament dryers. Dry the spools until they reach 25% moisture (you want your filament that dry), then store them in a dry box. A cereal box with a foam rubber gasket can do the job on a budget. Buy at least 100g of silica gel for each dry box and renew it frequently. Most silica gel changes color when it's full of moisture, so it’s easy to tell. Personally, I don’t do multicolour prints, so I’ve set up my dry boxes with a tight PTFE tube and rollers to allow the spool to rotate. I have a bunch of these on the shelf above the printers, feeding each printer with the required color. I'll leave it to you to assess the usefulness of multicolor printing. Personally, I've determined that the filament waste and extended print times are not at all cost-effective, especially since it's very easy to add inserts of a different color, printed simultaneously on another machine, if needed. The rough texture is a sign of over-extrusion, which can be caused by moisture. Stringing is also a symptom of moisture in the filament, as are the popping sounds when extruding PETG, ASA, or ABS. Good luck! Sorry about your floor. Maybe a coat or two of protection would’ve been useful.
One thing to remember as well is humidity more is an effect over time for PLA. It will become brittle on the spool but takes months. It will string a touch more, but again, not immediately.. Ive had PLA that was drenched and have never had issues outside of stringing that was not more than just whisping vs not when they were freshly opened. The brittleness on the spool usually becomes the biggest issue as it risks breaking during printing. Normally you can notice that almost immediately though since it will shatter during handing even just loading the filament into the extrusion system. For reference I've been in the space for almost a decade and had a small print farm in the same space as also breeding fish in aquariums, so the battle of humidity was a fun one. I still managed to print pla, petg, nylon, abs and asa fine though. Just for the last 3 would be printed direct from drybox. Another person already mentioned CNCKitchens desicent video, 100% check it out. Its very good info on how you can quickly refresh the old packs, carefully.
I use MAXSafe gun safe dehumidying rods (currently $14 on amazon). I put a 12" in each plastic drybox, passing the cable through a small hole in the back of the box with a rubber grommet. I also have a container of desiccant in each box. The heating rods do not get hot enough to melt the filament but enough to raise the temperature in the box to about 77-80F. The humidity stays close to 25% when plugged in. I also put a small cheap hygrometer in each box to monitor it. Unplug the rods when the humidity is where you want it. If it gets close to 40% plug it back in. I don't know how much you spent on that dehydrator, but I'm assuming it is more than a handful of these rods. Good luck with your humidity issue.
Been using a food dehydrator for the last 6 years. A little time consuming, works great. My plastic boxes hold 6 rolls, a meter inside each one, and containers of desiccant(that are periodically dried out in an oven) Average 17-18% humidity all year round. I have about 15 rolls at any given time. Prusa MK4 and XL and print almost daily things for the shop or the grand kids. Checked out your shop. Nice selection of custom tools. I use my printers for guides an tools most of the time.
Building on a few comments - in the short term, to help, raise the temp of the room, for example turn the heat on and bring it up to 75 or 80 degrees, this should coax anything wet in your room to evaporate into the air which can hold more moisture. Then with the warmer temp and with more humidity in the air the dehumidifier and AC units can work more efficiently to pull it out of the air. You can also rent a commercial dehumidifier which would be much more effective at wicking the moisture out (also check your dehumidifier to make sure it isn't creating an ice block - letting it warm up will make sure any ice melts and water drips down). Good luck!
You are right , the little bags are not a good idea as you dont know how used up they are. Get the rechargeable descant that changes colour ( the orange stuff as the blue is more toxic). Heat is important but you dont have to get things as hot as you would think. What you need is heat and airflow!
I am very thankful you asked this! I had not thought about using my business insurance until this comment. :) I have the process started towards a claim to see if it's worthwhile and/or what hoops they need me to jump through. A rough estimate is about $1,800 in damaged filament -- much more than the $500 deductible on my coverage. Thanks!!
The process of making the filament cools it in a water tank as it's extruded, so even fresh new upopened filament will be "wet" hence they have the dessicant inside the packaging. Dessicant, filament dryers etc, even just gaskets on your boxes will help. In scotland i can keep my bambu filament down just under 20% using these methods and it deos make a huge difference to print quality! If you are printing a lot the length of time a reel is exposed will shorten, which will help, Good luck!
That's quite the print farm! Look, I work in research and all the big industrial machines use pellets, which are dried per manufacturer's suggested time & temps. The same applies to the small scale and filament based machines. Storage is important but so is drying before use and keeping dry while printing. I really like the EIBOS Cyclopes filament dryer since it has an upgrade to let me use a 3kg spool. I have that on a few machines. I also have Polymaker Polyboxes, which is a sealed drybox. If your material isn't super fussy and already dry, those work great and keep the humidity super low. For drying multiple spools, or a 3-5kg spool, the PrintDry Pro is the way to go. I have 23 machines in my home lab and they are all enclosed, air filtration and fire safety device equipped. I use Octoprint and Obico to do the prints and video monitor them. If you can control the quality of the material condition going into the 3D printer, you've just eliminated some factors that could be real time killers to sort out - strings, hairs, things that resemble retraction issues but are probably just damp material! Print smart and safe!
I use a small food dehyadrator, only fits 2 rolls, but it works well. Our humidity here is always high, often above 60% so I converted an ikea cabinet into dry storage. sealed the gaps with caulk, painted the inside with leftover bathroom paint and put window foam strip sealer on the inside of the doors to seal it up. used drawer runners and dowl with some printed parts to make drawers for the fillament to sit on and put a tiny dehumidifier inside. I can store lots of fillament in there over 3 shelves, 2 rows deep and the drawers make it so i can easily access and see whats on the row behind do i dont have to move rolls around to get to whats in the back.
I'm really sorry about the water in your shop. I hate to say it, but your disaster was a learning experience for all of us. I am now in the know thanks to you. Been watching for quite some time and I do enjoy every video you put out.
Sam…love your content and watch your shop related stuff regularly. I have a p1s and bought a huge craftsman tote with locking lid for storage. I then added black weatherstripping on the tote between the tote and lid. It is working great. I also have a digital hydrometer synced to my phone and for safety will be printing desiccant storage this weekend.
Sam. Great video, very educational. Had a thought about your test with the new filament; when you transferred it to your ziplock, you pulled in shop-air. I would repeat the test once your humidity in your shop is under control. Just a thought. Love the videos, keep it up.
Crystal Kitty (no fragrance version!) litter is a desiccant (I use in humidor and in my PLA storage bags) Dry, it brings the humidity down to around 40%. Sitting in a bit of water puts it at ~68%. Hope it helps.
You need air tight boxes to keep any sort of outside air or moisture out of the "dry box" as you call it. Anything that has a gasket is going to be a way beeter solution.
Let the temperature rise in the room and stop cooling the room and then check the humidity reading. I live next to the sea and I noticed after running air-conditioning for a while relative humidity reads 70% after switching off AC it goes down to 40s. The reading is relative humidity not absolute humidity. It's about how much moisture the air can hold at that temperature. Warm air can hold more water thus lowering relative humidity
Hey Sam! Govee has some really nice hygrometers that you can link to your phone that’ll give you an alert when your humidity hits a certain level. I’ve been using them and they’ve very helpful with letting you know when your filament might be in a humid environment.
Consumer dehumidifiers can dry out a small room relatively fast. For your case, renting an industrial big boy would have been a much better option. Not only they rent at a very low price for 1-2 days, but their efficiency coef. is also very high. As for the actual filament rolls being moist, if you have a big oven you can dry 6-8 at a time x4h means you can dry all your rolls in 2 days.
Sorry to hear of your woes. To get a baseline for your filament since you seem to use all the same stuff, is weigh an new role and use that as the base line. If the next new one, or one your are unsure of weights more, it has moisture. Not sure if it will work, but if you have a sub gram sale you could weight a sample of say 1 meter, and use that as the base. Would be easier to measure partial roles. You could then come up with an acceptable weight. FWIW, I live in Western PA and our summers can be quite humid. Not deep south humid, but humid. I keep my open filament in a tote that I seal the opening with weather stipping. They survive the summer just fine.
I'd heard about using a food dehydrator to dry filament, I hadn't used my printer in a while so I threw some rolls in our dehydrator for a bunch of hours and the prints seemed to go well. Don't know if you're in to home automation, but could rig up something that turns off the water valve under a few conditions, like machine is off, or no print job. Open valve back up when machine is on.
don't sweat it too much. mold growth is your number 1 problem followed by the damage to the subfloor. the PLA will be fine. dial down your active printers, and store the spools until things improve.
Hi Sam. Saw your video! Ouch about the water! I have a single unit filament dryer and it takes about 6 hours to get down to about 40-45% when it was just in the open year for at least 6 months. I hope the food dehydration unit solves your moisture issues.
Hi Sam love your videos, why not close of your print room of with another wall? Scale down the print farm area. Less space to control the temp, humidity, dust and other contaminants etc. Just a thought?
Take your desiccant pack and put them in a low oven for a few hours to dry them out fully. If they have been in there for a long while they are spent and need to be dried out before they are any use to you.
I have the same brand of dehumidifier. I ordered mine with an interior pump and ran the hose down a sink drain. I have COPD, a lung disease, and have to keep the humidity low, but not so low as to cause sparks due to dryness, as I'm on oxygen. It will pull the moisture out fast.
It all boils down to "dry enough for long enough". You could experiment with one of those tent-like enclosures with a frame and zipper front and keep desicant in there with the printer. You'll get the added bonus of possibly being able to rig up a venting system as well. At some price/effort point for that though I'd think that switching to the enclosed P1S models makes sense. I have just a couple of both and I think as I (hopefully) grow I'm going to stick with the P1S. The printed desicant containers easily keep the enclosed AMS at sub 30% humidity, only needing to bake the desicant about once a month. I'd say my outdoor humidity is pretty close to yours as well. Sounds snarky but at some point - move west??
Did I understand you correctly that you use the desiccant from the spools you open in your drying rack? You should reconsider and use new desiccant. Used desiccant already contains moisture and just like a sponge can also give moisture to the air if the humidity is lower. Thus you might raise the humidity inside your drying boxes by adding desiccant which is already of higher moisture content
Sam, Sorry to see your woes. Might I suggest you go see Joshua De Lisle's site and look at a review (or two) of a small cheap diesel heater with a blower that might provide enough heat that could assist in drying out those spools. Ken's Karpentry just installed one and several others have used them effectively. One place in Alaska uses it to heat their chicken house coupled with a dehumidifier to reduce the moisture while heating the coop. Thinking along the lines of drying wood, I have seen a couple using these with blowers in insulated boxes and fans blah blah... You get the point. At about $100 you get a great little heater that uses little power or fuel to do what you want and you can isolate them or use them to supplement heat in the shop.
I don't remember from your shop build but did you put plastic under your floor and what insulation did you use? Plastic will keep moisture in and fiberglass will soak up water making it very hard to dry out. As for the dehumidifier my suggestion would be to rent a commercial model. They real pull a lot of water out very fast. The store biught ones are good but not meant for that much mousture. But be cognizant of the ability of the commercial ones. Once they pull all the humidity they will start to pull moisture out of other things like rubber and silicone. So use it just till you hit you target and stop. Then just let yours maintain the level you want. My stepmom worked for a large restoration company the did fire and flood repairs and she had the big dehumidifier in her company van. It had a tube that you ran outside or into a drain because they pulled so much liquid even 5 gallon buckets would overflow through the night.
Those are non-gasketed totes, they are sucking more water into the box from the outside than they are pulling from your filament. They will NEVER work, even when your shop is “dry”, unless you live in the desert. Also, a lot of desiccant and desiccant packs come without having been baked out. They intend for you to bake them in an electric oven (doesn’t generate moisture like burning g gas does). You need a real filament dryer. The kind that are essentially a modified food dehydrator are best. Or just buy a food dehydrator and modify it yourself. Your zip-baggies are probably the best storage for the money, just be sure to toss any that develop holes. Sterlite makes a gasketed tote that holds 4 rolls, but the lid doesn’t seal as well since it is only clamped from the ends of the lid and not all the way around, I printed clips to go around the lid of mine and it will hold,d 10% humidity for months... You do need to recharge the desiccant at least every 6 months though. Another option might be a plastic 30 or 55 gallon drum, a bunch of dry desiccant and a gasketed lid if you need a lot of storage. TLDR; I have been here, a proper filament dryer and proper storage is worth the money.
The 40% on the new roll actually doesn’t surprise me very much. Bambu says that you MUST dry their Petg HF before use. So I am guessing they know their filament is a bit moist to begin with
Adam Savage from the youtube channel Tested built a filament storage rack which sealed and had a dehumidifier inside it. Maybe something to look at as a future project for the shop?
Sam, Sorry to see the flooded shop. Sure hope you are able to get the moisture out of the air and your flooring will lay down and not have to be replaced. If I were closer than middle Tennessee I would offer to come and help you. just a long way for an old man to travel for the day.
New At buyer, and just got filaments in today, and was talking about moister where I am. What brand and type of current de-humidifier do you have running and are you happy with it.
Why not buy some gasket material and seal up those boxes?I don’t have a bambu machine or a multi filament system. But I’m printing directly out of one of those cereal containers with a custom circle insert I designed. The humidity has stayed on the hydrometer in the 20-30%.
Until you get the plywood floors dried out you could have high humidity for months. Move your boxed filaments to a drier room, maybe in the house. at least then they won't get ruined. Did you put heaters in to try and dry it out.
You should get yourself some of these. Put one in each storage box to indocate the moisture levels in each constantly. Dry & Dry Premium Humidity Indicator Cards (12 Cards) - 10-60% 6 Spot(Reusable)
Running a print farm, your best bet is a climate controlled shop. As long as the AMS units are not enclosed, the filament is absorbing moisture. Seal the shop up as much as possible, run your dehumidifier constantly and maybe get a second one. Keep the inside of the shop under 40% and Bob's your uncle. Any drying you do to the filament will be negated somewhat in storage and definitely while sitting on the open AMS. You've got a small fortune invested in printers, keeping the whole shop dry will help you get the most out of them. Good luck.
I'm new to this 3D printing, was thinking about getting box/ old refrigerator would be perfect and add a 110v gun safe dehumidifier rod, or 60w light bulb, has anybody tried this, and what were the results?
I use IP67 waterproof totes, with cheap meters in each box, and they sit on 15-25% which I am happy with. Cost me $12 per tote for 4 spools. I also use colour coded dessicant so you can see when it hits 50% used.
looks like even with the machine propperly working you probably need to put the waterjet in a seperate room , when the machine is working it blasts water through the material releasing a lot of vapor intoo the room . maibe just add some sort of outdoor toilet type of structure for the waterjet , it doesnt need mush but any problems will be in that space only (maibe adding a shower tub under the machine ad maibe even a shower curtain around the machine would work too for any floodings in the old days of stick welding you needed youre weldingrods to be dry too . one way to do that was storing them in an old fridge with a 100 watt lightbulb inside , the insulation of the fridge and the lightbulb kept the inside nice and toasty and dry as for gaskets in the existing storage boxes , not sure if you can get two pack foam sealant material that you can pour , from wat i can see you can probably pour some of the stif in the groove of the lid cover it with kitchenwrap and set the box over it upside down to let the foam form while the box it fitted to the lid , might need to trim the foam some once it stopped expanding but i think it will seal good eough allso i watched another channel where the guy used a truck style air dehumidifier and he mentioned that once the stuff stops working you can put it on a baking tray and cook it slowly in the oven to evaporate the water it collected and have the stuff become active again might be worth a try 100 reworked packs trown in a container would draw in water a lot faster than 10 new ones
With the water leak you had that would have shot the level of the humidity through the roof So you may well and truely have done your tests at the wrong time .Your humidity will not be going down very fast with the weather being dry
The test that you make on the new roll of filament can't be the good because the hydrometer is humid from the ambiant humidity and when you put it into the bag with the new roll , you introduce humidity into the bag All of it just to say that the new roll is ok When you receive your dehydrator , dont forget to put your desicant bag in for a session And maybe the water jet cutter is in the wrong environnement only because you have insulation inside the floor where the umidity will stay for a long time and can create big probleme like ( mold ) Good video !
I suppose it would, but nothing compared to the flooding that happened. There was probably several hundreds of gallons of water dumped in there at least.
@ I disagree the water laser uses high pressure high pressure which atomizes water, that water vapor has to go into the air increasing the humidity. I will wager it affects the humidity far more than a puddle of water on the floor. Now if you heat that puddle of water and make steam then I agree but natural evaporation is not going to raise humidity as much as a water laser. No way!
Also if the filaments are that sensitive to humidity anything that brings water into the area will be bad. If you had one accident or spillage you have to agree another accident may happen again. You need to create a humidity controlled environment for your printers and filament storage. I think your test of using new filament at the correct humidity proves you need to operate them in a humitidy controlled environment, and anything that brings water into that environment must be removed.
eeehhhhh I have 22 of these exact boxes: I do'nt use them anymore, I implore anyone considering these to print one, fill them, close them, and then try to OPEN them again, without spilling desiccant EVERYWHERE. They are nearly impossible to open once closed, get a butter knife or a putty knife and ve VERY VERY careful. I prefer the 'spillproof' kind
Not all seals work. Moisture still gets in. Especially if you notice the vacuum seal is loose. I just opened a fresh roll and the seal was loose. There was literally water drops inside the sealed bag. 😂
Ass some one else says. Look up CNC kitchen. And a nother trick. You can Dry filament on your build plate. Just put a box over it. And warm up the plate. But be ware that the box and filament don't melt.😊
It seems like you're overcomplicating the issue. I have the enclosure and it's really not that difficult to use. Someone on RUclips timed a spool change and it was under 1 minute. You can always redesign the enclosure to improve speed. Remember that the spool rod does not feed the printer. The mechanism that pushes the filament is in the feeder. If I were you, the AMS would not even be at the top with the printer. The feeder would be at the side, and I would relocate my own spool holders in the front of the shelves. I think you are fighting an uphill battle trying to dehumidify the entire room.
A humidity level of lets say 60% means that the air contains 60% of the humidity that it can contain at the max with this temperature. The warmer the air, the more moisture it can hold. So this does not mean the air contains 60% moisture. It just contains 60% of the maximum amount of moisture with that temperature
For your brand new roll filament test, I don't think you were getting a good gauge of how much humidity is in the roll. When you put the new roll in a bag filled with the air from your shop, you are capturing the humidity in the air as it was in that moment. Then you are gauging how much the pack of desiccant can pull out of the air in the bag, not to much how much moisture your filament can pull out of the air, not how dry the filament was. CNC Kitchen did a video recently demonstrating that of the desiccant packets we get out of new spools have been partially if not completely used up.
It short I don't think your new previously unopened filament was at 41% humidity, rather that's how low the air you trapped in the bag got due to the partially used desiccant packet and the filament pulling what moisture it could out of the air in the short time you had the meter in the bag.
Oh no, sorry that happened.
What I do for my non-PLA or silk PLA is use reusable desiccant (I had the blue but now use orange due to safety) and it color changes. To hold the desiccant I use mesh filter media bags. Having a lot of desiccant in one spot does not help, from other people who tested this, smaller bags in multiple spots work better than the AMS (for the X1C) inserts. And I use air-tight cereal containers.
Another issue is that it only "drys" the first few layer wraps. This is typically fine if you have high humidity and a newish material opened, it takes a while to go into the inner layers I find. If your material is thoroughly soaked you need a way to heat and vent. Much like that dehydrator you showed.
Although, don't mess up like I did, I put loose desiccant and it embedded into my spool, which went to the machine. Not a fun time.
I worked in the temperature control industry for 40 years. If you want to dry your space out you need to warm the air up manically and then return it to the AC unit to dry it out. Warm air holds more moisture than cold air. So put a space heater 74 and your AC at 65 and that will wring the water out of the air. You might want to invest in a whole house dehumidifier for your space.
The desiccant packs you have you should dry them out from time to time to reuse them, and you should put some foam or other type of seal at the boxes you have. PLA is quite forgiving on moisture and this is hopefully one-off situation. You don't need to go to extreme measures, if we are talking about Nylon or other similar type of filaments that's another story, but PLA is not too critical.
I would get a 2nd maybe a 3rd dehumidifier. Also, put a PLASTIC Sheet across the printer end of the shop, to seal it off. Cut a slit so you can get through to service the machines, and have a couple of dehumidifiers in there while the rest of the shop dries out.
CNC Kitchen just did a show on drying desiccant pouches with a cheap microwave using dehumidifier cycle. Please check it out. He got great results. It can also be used with bulk desiccant.
When you put the dehumidifier inside the bag you are measuring the humidity of the air, not the filament. The fact that the humidity didn't went down means that the desiccant wasn't working properly (saturated).
Recently I made a drybox and added new desiccant and the humidity went from 50% to 20% (where I live 45% is a "dry" day...LOL). Maybe that can help you.
CNCKitchen did a video recently on those packets. Might be worth a watch.
Just so you know, the spool enclosure works with the top mount as well. The directions tell you how to adjust for that.
Sam, it seems like you are going to be needing a second dehumidifier in the shop and run both constantly 😳🫣. You also may need to put the water jet machine into your older shop. Last but not least you should think about replacing the flooring as it's definitely seen better days 😳🤔.
Sam I would also suggest that you use a moisture meter to test how much moisture you still have in the flooring boards as the moisture will remain higher in areas of anything that is standing on the floor, i.e the underneath of racking and cabinets etc!!! As always buddy 💯% 👍 🇬🇧.
Hey Sam. Thanks for this video. Can't imagine how frustrating the humidity must be.
My experience with dessicant bags from filament manufacturers are that they are generally a bit wet for my liking. Consequently, the bags are playing a game of who is more hygroscopic with the filament it's stored with.
I save a bunch of these bags and cut them open when I have a bunch. I reactivate (dry) the silica inside and use that for storage.
Speaking from a research chemistry lab, even purchased silica containers which has never been opened need reactivation before first use.
If you put them in the oven at 120°C for around 8 hours, then seal them and let them cool to room temperature, you will find they absorb a lot more moisture a lot quicker than straight out of the bottle/bag.
Those storage crates are also a relatively large volume of air compared to the dessicant you have in them. I would definitely look into maybe getting at least some rubber sticky strips to put on the edges of the container to act as a gasket.
I know the bambu lab pla filament is pretty good; however, I would also consider drying it before use (once your shop is at a lower humidity too).
I still got a lot out of your video and it was interesting to see how you take on this problem.
I recently had a water damage like yours, but with way less water. We had to take out all the wooden floorboards since it’s practically impossible to dehumidify quickly enough to dry out the water that had gone below the floorboards. The floorboards are also working as spunges. I believe you will have to remove your plywood floorboards and keep drying out for a couple of weeks before replacing them.
I live in sub tropical Queensland. Humidity in my workshop is 70+ on a good day but inside my AMS I get 25%. I use 25 ltr sealable pales for storage of open rolls and can get it to 20%. I use multiple humidity meters don't rely on one. I have a large oven for powder coating which is controlled by a PID I use that for drying with the fan on.
Queensland's a biXch. 35's the lowest I can get without making a freezer room.
Holy Crap! Sam! Your farm has grown quite a bit. Great Job!
14:40 im Bambu Studio you can also allow auto rotation when auto placing, so then more objects can fit onto your plate.
I found the easiest way to hold desiccant was a delicates laundry bag from the dollar store. The ones I got have a fine screen on them and can hold a lot, and don't need to be dried back out for years. Just get indicating desiccant.
Great test on humidity! Thanks for doing this research.
Hey Sam! I use the Midea Cube Dehumidifiers in my studio to keep my printers/filament dryer. I use the big one because they pull a ton of water out of the air and also hold 4 gallons in the reservoir if you don't have a hose connection. Then i dont uave to empty them multiple times a day. In the summer it's about every day tonday and a half that inhave to empty.
I don't remember which YTer I saw do a test on desiccant that comes with the rolls, but the general gist of the video was that those packs that come with the rolls are more often than not already spent, and may actually increase your humidity in your storage.
I found some reusable desiccant packs online that have changing color beads (mine are yellow/orange when good and turn green, then darker green when fully spent). You microwave them to dry them back out, and reuse them. I also have a filament dryer that works great when my filament becomes brittle. FYI, I am ALWAYS fighting humidity, it's not uncommon in my shop (and my house) to be above 80% humidity with the AC unit running full blast. Humid states are fun, not, LOL!
Anyhow, good luck Sam, hope you get it sorted out.
Sam, the moisture inside the filament and the moisture in the air within the box with the spools are different. The moisture inside the filament should be higher. The silica gel bags that come with the spools are already saturated with moisture. You can renew them by placing them on a plate, out of their bag, inside the microwave for 2 to 3 minutes. There are plenty of silica gel boxes available on sharing platforms. I don’t recommend using zip bags for filament storage, as moisture still manages to get in for some reason. That’s just a waste of money.
Here’s my working method: First, get a filament dryer. The 11:11 discount is coming up soon. Maybe a couple of SUNLU 4-spool dryers would work well for your setup. Industrial food dryers are sometimes not very accurate with temperature, which can affect the filament (diameter consistency and shape are crucial), so I prefer dedicated filament dryers. Dry the spools until they reach 25% moisture (you want your filament that dry), then store them in a dry box. A cereal box with a foam rubber gasket can do the job on a budget. Buy at least 100g of silica gel for each dry box and renew it frequently. Most silica gel changes color when it's full of moisture, so it’s easy to tell. Personally, I don’t do multicolour prints, so I’ve set up my dry boxes with a tight PTFE tube and rollers to allow the spool to rotate. I have a bunch of these on the shelf above the printers, feeding each printer with the required color. I'll leave it to you to assess the usefulness of multicolor printing. Personally, I've determined that the filament waste and extended print times are not at all cost-effective, especially since it's very easy to add inserts of a different color, printed simultaneously on another machine, if needed.
The rough texture is a sign of over-extrusion, which can be caused by moisture. Stringing is also a symptom of moisture in the filament, as are the popping sounds when extruding PETG, ASA, or ABS. Good luck! Sorry about your floor. Maybe a coat or two of protection would’ve been useful.
Just watched the video with your heaters. Turn the temperature up in the shop to help Dry the moisture.
One thing to remember as well is humidity more is an effect over time for PLA. It will become brittle on the spool but takes months. It will string a touch more, but again, not immediately.. Ive had PLA that was drenched and have never had issues outside of stringing that was not more than just whisping vs not when they were freshly opened. The brittleness on the spool usually becomes the biggest issue as it risks breaking during printing. Normally you can notice that almost immediately though since it will shatter during handing even just loading the filament into the extrusion system.
For reference I've been in the space for almost a decade and had a small print farm in the same space as also breeding fish in aquariums, so the battle of humidity was a fun one. I still managed to print pla, petg, nylon, abs and asa fine though. Just for the last 3 would be printed direct from drybox.
Another person already mentioned CNCKitchens desicent video, 100% check it out. Its very good info on how you can quickly refresh the old packs, carefully.
I use MAXSafe gun safe dehumidying rods (currently $14 on amazon). I put a 12" in each plastic drybox, passing the cable through a small hole in the back of the box with a rubber grommet. I also have a container of desiccant in each box. The heating rods do not get hot enough to melt the filament but enough to raise the temperature in the box to about 77-80F. The humidity stays close to 25% when plugged in. I also put a small cheap hygrometer in each box to monitor it. Unplug the rods when the humidity is where you want it. If it gets close to 40% plug it back in. I don't know how much you spent on that dehydrator, but I'm assuming it is more than a handful of these rods. Good luck with your humidity issue.
Been using a food dehydrator for the last 6 years. A little time consuming, works great. My plastic boxes hold 6 rolls, a meter inside each one, and containers of desiccant(that are periodically dried out in an oven) Average 17-18% humidity all year round. I have about 15 rolls at any given time. Prusa MK4 and XL and print almost daily things for the shop or the grand kids. Checked out your shop. Nice selection of custom tools. I use my printers for guides an tools most of the time.
Building on a few comments - in the short term, to help, raise the temp of the room, for example turn the heat on and bring it up to 75 or 80 degrees, this should coax anything wet in your room to evaporate into the air which can hold more moisture. Then with the warmer temp and with more humidity in the air the dehumidifier and AC units can work more efficiently to pull it out of the air. You can also rent a commercial dehumidifier which would be much more effective at wicking the moisture out (also check your dehumidifier to make sure it isn't creating an ice block - letting it warm up will make sure any ice melts and water drips down). Good luck!
You are right , the little bags are not a good idea as you dont know how used up they are. Get the rechargeable descant that changes colour ( the orange stuff as the blue is more toxic). Heat is important but you dont have to get things as hot as you would think. What you need is heat and airflow!
I use 5 gallon buckets with lids. Those seal pretty well. I also use rechargeable desiccant.
Farm looks Great ! Informative information. Thanks
Hey , what totes are you using ? I definitely need some for my filament .
Will your Home/business insurance cover replacing the open filament? Even with the deductable with that many spools you should come off ahead.
I am very thankful you asked this! I had not thought about using my business insurance until this comment. :) I have the process started towards a claim to see if it's worthwhile and/or what hoops they need me to jump through. A rough estimate is about $1,800 in damaged filament -- much more than the $500 deductible on my coverage. Thanks!!
The process of making the filament cools it in a water tank as it's extruded, so even fresh new upopened filament will be "wet" hence they have the dessicant inside the packaging. Dessicant, filament dryers etc, even just gaskets on your boxes will help. In scotland i can keep my bambu filament down just under 20% using these methods and it deos make a huge difference to print quality! If you are printing a lot the length of time a reel is exposed will shorten, which will help, Good luck!
That's quite the print farm! Look, I work in research and all the big industrial machines use pellets, which are dried per manufacturer's suggested time & temps. The same applies to the small scale and filament based machines. Storage is important but so is drying before use and keeping dry while printing. I really like the EIBOS Cyclopes filament dryer since it has an upgrade to let me use a 3kg spool. I have that on a few machines. I also have Polymaker Polyboxes, which is a sealed drybox. If your material isn't super fussy and already dry, those work great and keep the humidity super low. For drying multiple spools, or a 3-5kg spool, the PrintDry Pro is the way to go. I have 23 machines in my home lab and they are all enclosed, air filtration and fire safety device equipped. I use Octoprint and Obico to do the prints and video monitor them. If you can control the quality of the material condition going into the 3D printer, you've just eliminated some factors that could be real time killers to sort out - strings, hairs, things that resemble retraction issues but are probably just damp material! Print smart and safe!
I use a small food dehyadrator, only fits 2 rolls, but it works well. Our humidity here is always high, often above 60% so I converted an ikea cabinet into dry storage. sealed the gaps with caulk, painted the inside with leftover bathroom paint and put window foam strip sealer on the inside of the doors to seal it up. used drawer runners and dowl with some printed parts to make drawers for the fillament to sit on and put a tiny dehumidifier inside. I can store lots of fillament in there over 3 shelves, 2 rows deep and the drawers make it so i can easily access and see whats on the row behind do i dont have to move rolls around to get to whats in the back.
I'm really sorry about the water in your shop. I hate to say it, but your disaster was a learning experience for all of us. I am now in the know thanks to you. Been watching for quite some time and I do enjoy every video you put out.
I'm glad you learned something from the experience, and thanks for watching!
Sam…love your content and watch your shop related stuff regularly. I have a p1s and bought a huge craftsman tote with locking lid for storage. I then added black weatherstripping on the tote between the tote and lid. It is working great. I also have a digital hydrometer synced to my phone and for safety will be printing desiccant storage this weekend.
Sam. Great video, very educational. Had a thought about your test with the new filament; when you transferred it to your ziplock, you pulled in shop-air. I would repeat the test once your humidity in your shop is under control. Just a thought. Love the videos, keep it up.
Crystal Kitty (no fragrance version!) litter is a desiccant (I use in humidor and in my PLA storage bags) Dry, it brings the humidity down to around 40%. Sitting in a bit of water puts it at ~68%. Hope it helps.
You need air tight boxes to keep any sort of outside air or moisture out of the "dry box" as you call it. Anything that has a gasket is going to be a way beeter solution.
Let the temperature rise in the room and stop cooling the room and then check the humidity reading. I live next to the sea and I noticed after running air-conditioning for a while relative humidity reads 70% after switching off AC it goes down to 40s. The reading is relative humidity not absolute humidity. It's about how much moisture the air can hold at that temperature. Warm air can hold more water thus lowering relative humidity
Hey Sam! Govee has some really nice hygrometers that you can link to your phone that’ll give you an alert when your humidity hits a certain level. I’ve been using them and they’ve very helpful with letting you know when your filament might be in a humid environment.
Consumer dehumidifiers can dry out a small room relatively fast. For your case, renting an industrial big boy would have been a much better option. Not only they rent at a very low price for 1-2 days, but their efficiency coef. is also very high. As for the actual filament rolls being moist, if you have a big oven you can dry 6-8 at a time x4h means you can dry all your rolls in 2 days.
Sorry to hear of your woes. To get a baseline for your filament since you seem to use all the same stuff, is weigh an new role and use that as the base line. If the next new one, or one your are unsure of weights more, it has moisture. Not sure if it will work, but if you have a sub gram sale you could weight a sample of say 1 meter, and use that as the base. Would be easier to measure partial roles. You could then come up with an acceptable weight.
FWIW, I live in Western PA and our summers can be quite humid. Not deep south humid, but humid. I keep my open filament in a tote that I seal the opening with weather stipping. They survive the summer just fine.
I'd heard about using a food dehydrator to dry filament, I hadn't used my printer in a while so I threw some rolls in our dehydrator for a bunch of hours and the prints seemed to go well.
Don't know if you're in to home automation, but could rig up something that turns off the water valve under a few conditions, like machine is off, or no print job. Open valve back up when machine is on.
don't sweat it too much. mold growth is your number 1 problem followed by the damage to the subfloor. the PLA will be fine. dial down your active printers, and store the spools until things improve.
Just increase the temperature and humidity will automatically drop since the air can hold more moisture
Hi Sam. Saw your video! Ouch about the water! I have a single unit filament dryer and it takes about 6 hours to get down to about 40-45% when it was just in the open year for at least 6 months. I hope the food dehydration unit solves your moisture issues.
Hi Sam love your videos, why not close of your print room of with another wall? Scale down the print farm area. Less space to control the temp, humidity, dust and other contaminants etc. Just a thought?
Have you tried the packs that you put in gun safes that you can get at ACADEMY SPORTS?
Take your desiccant pack and put them in a low oven for a few hours to dry them out fully. If they have been in there for a long while they are spent and need to be dried out before they are any use to you.
I have the same brand of dehumidifier. I ordered mine with an interior pump and ran the hose down a sink drain. I have COPD, a lung disease, and have to keep the humidity low, but not so low as to cause sparks due to dryness, as I'm on oxygen. It will pull the moisture out fast.
It all boils down to "dry enough for long enough". You could experiment with one of those tent-like enclosures with a frame and zipper front and keep desicant in there with the printer. You'll get the added bonus of possibly being able to rig up a venting system as well. At some price/effort point for that though I'd think that switching to the enclosed P1S models makes sense. I have just a couple of both and I think as I (hopefully) grow I'm going to stick with the P1S. The printed desicant containers easily keep the enclosed AMS at sub 30% humidity, only needing to bake the desicant about once a month. I'd say my outdoor humidity is pretty close to yours as well. Sounds snarky but at some point - move west??
I hope the Water jet does not cause a perpetual problem with this. You may add a second dehumidifier also.
Sam have you ever tried Damp Rid in your shop.
Did I understand you correctly that you use the desiccant from the spools you open in your drying rack?
You should reconsider and use new desiccant. Used desiccant already contains moisture and just like a sponge can also give moisture to the air if the humidity is lower.
Thus you might raise the humidity inside your drying boxes by adding desiccant which is already of higher moisture content
Sam, Sorry to see your woes. Might I suggest you go see Joshua De Lisle's site and look at a review (or two) of a small cheap diesel heater with a blower that might provide enough heat that could assist in drying out those spools. Ken's Karpentry just installed one and several others have used them effectively. One place in Alaska uses it to heat their chicken house coupled with a dehumidifier to reduce the moisture while heating the coop. Thinking along the lines of drying wood, I have seen a couple using these with blowers in insulated boxes and fans blah blah... You get the point. At about $100 you get a great little heater that uses little power or fuel to do what you want and you can isolate them or use them to supplement heat in the shop.
I don't remember from your shop build but did you put plastic under your floor and what insulation did you use? Plastic will keep moisture in and fiberglass will soak up water making it very hard to dry out. As for the dehumidifier my suggestion would be to rent a commercial model. They real pull a lot of water out very fast. The store biught ones are good but not meant for that much mousture. But be cognizant of the ability of the commercial ones. Once they pull all the humidity they will start to pull moisture out of other things like rubber and silicone. So use it just till you hit you target and stop. Then just let yours maintain the level you want. My stepmom worked for a large restoration company the did fire and flood repairs and she had the big dehumidifier in her company van. It had a tube that you ran outside or into a drain because they pulled so much liquid even 5 gallon buckets would overflow through the night.
Those are non-gasketed totes, they are sucking more water into the box from the outside than they are pulling from your filament. They will NEVER work, even when your shop is “dry”, unless you live in the desert. Also, a lot of desiccant and desiccant packs come without having been baked out. They intend for you to bake them in an electric oven (doesn’t generate moisture like burning g gas does). You need a real filament dryer. The kind that are essentially a modified food dehydrator are best. Or just buy a food dehydrator and modify it yourself. Your zip-baggies are probably the best storage for the money, just be sure to toss any that develop holes. Sterlite makes a gasketed tote that holds 4 rolls, but the lid doesn’t seal as well since it is only clamped from the ends of the lid and not all the way around, I printed clips to go around the lid of mine and it will hold,d 10% humidity for months... You do need to recharge the desiccant at least every 6 months though. Another option might be a plastic 30 or 55 gallon drum, a bunch of dry desiccant and a gasketed lid if you need a lot of storage. TLDR; I have been here, a proper filament dryer and proper storage is worth the money.
Merci pour toutes les informations utiles
When you show humidifier, where can I same one
did you ever dry out the desiccant packs - microwave for 1 minute wait 5 minutes - do it a few times
The 40% on the new roll actually doesn’t surprise me very much. Bambu says that you MUST dry their Petg HF before use. So I am guessing they know their filament is a bit moist to begin with
Adam Savage from the youtube channel Tested built a filament storage rack which sealed and had a dehumidifier inside it. Maybe something to look at as a future project for the shop?
Good luck. I hope all your issues are fixed soon.
Sam, Sorry to see the flooded shop. Sure hope you are able to get the moisture out of the air and your flooring will lay down and not have to be replaced. If I were closer than middle Tennessee I would offer to come and help you. just a long way for an old man to travel for the day.
New At buyer, and just got filaments in today, and was talking about moister where I am. What brand and type of current de-humidifier do you have running and are you happy with it.
Sorry went back and listened again.
Why not buy some gasket material and seal up those boxes?I don’t have a bambu machine or a multi filament system. But I’m printing directly out of one of those cereal containers with a custom circle insert I designed. The humidity has stayed on the hydrometer in the 20-30%.
If your floor is a raised floor you might also have water under it, also the plywood looks like it absorbed a lot of water.
Sam can you buy some draft excluder and put it between your existing boxes and their lids?
Until you get the plywood floors dried out you could have high humidity for months. Move your boxed filaments to a drier room, maybe in the house. at least then they won't get ruined.
Did you put heaters in to try and dry it out.
Have you also looked into the reusable desiccant? I guess you microwave it to recharge it.
You should get yourself some of these. Put one in each storage box to indocate the moisture levels in each constantly.
Dry & Dry Premium Humidity Indicator Cards (12 Cards) - 10-60% 6 Spot(Reusable)
Is your hygrometer accurate?
Why are all the floors made out of wood instead of concrete? Is this structurally sound to add machinery on top of?
What if you turn on the heater in your shop? Wouldn't that get rid of some moisture?
it would, but honestly I didn't think of that until other viewers commented too. I learn a lot from the comments!
Maybe a bad humidity sensor?
Running a print farm, your best bet is a climate controlled shop. As long as the AMS units are not enclosed, the filament is absorbing moisture. Seal the shop up as much as possible, run your dehumidifier constantly and maybe get a second one. Keep the inside of the shop under 40% and Bob's your uncle. Any drying you do to the filament will be negated somewhat in storage and definitely while sitting on the open AMS. You've got a small fortune invested in printers, keeping the whole shop dry will help you get the most out of them. Good luck.
I'm new to this 3D printing, was thinking about getting box/ old refrigerator would be perfect and add a 110v gun safe dehumidifier rod, or 60w light bulb, has anybody tried this, and what were the results?
I use IP67 waterproof totes, with cheap meters in each box, and they sit on 15-25% which I am happy with. Cost me $12 per tote for 4 spools. I also use colour coded dessicant so you can see when it hits 50% used.
looks like even with the machine propperly working you probably need to put the waterjet in a seperate room , when the machine is working it blasts water through the material releasing a lot of vapor intoo the room . maibe just add some sort of outdoor toilet type of structure for the waterjet , it doesnt need mush but any problems will be in that space only (maibe adding a shower tub under the machine ad maibe even a shower curtain around the machine would work too for any floodings
in the old days of stick welding you needed youre weldingrods to be dry too . one way to do that was storing them in an old fridge with a 100 watt lightbulb inside , the insulation of the fridge and the lightbulb kept the inside nice and toasty and dry
as for gaskets in the existing storage boxes , not sure if you can get two pack foam sealant material that you can pour , from wat i can see you can probably pour some of the stif in the groove of the lid cover it with kitchenwrap and set the box over it upside down to let the foam form while the box it fitted to the lid , might need to trim the foam some once it stopped expanding but i think it will seal good eough
allso i watched another channel where the guy used a truck style air dehumidifier and he mentioned that once the stuff stops working you can put it on a baking tray and cook it slowly in the oven to evaporate the water it collected and have the stuff become active again
might be worth a try 100 reworked packs trown in a container would draw in water a lot faster than 10 new ones
With the water leak you had that would have shot the level of the humidity through the roof So you may well and truely have done your tests at the wrong time .Your humidity will not be going down very fast with the weather being dry
Dessicant can only hold so much moisture, you have to regularly dry it back out. Microwave it
The test that you make on the new roll of filament
can't be the good because the hydrometer is humid
from the ambiant humidity and when you put it into the bag
with the new roll , you introduce humidity into the bag
All of it just to say that the new roll is ok
When you receive your dehydrator , dont forget to put your desicant bag in for a session
And maybe the water jet cutter is in the wrong environnement only because you have insulation inside the floor
where the umidity will stay for a long time and can create big probleme like ( mold )
Good video !
Will not the water cutter by nature raise the humidity? I think you need to get it out out from the filament printers.
I suppose it would, but nothing compared to the flooding that happened. There was probably several hundreds of gallons of water dumped in there at least.
@ I disagree the water laser uses high pressure high pressure which atomizes water, that water vapor has to go into the air increasing the humidity. I will wager it affects the humidity far more than a puddle of water on the floor. Now if you heat that puddle of water and make steam then I agree but natural evaporation is not going to raise humidity as much as a water laser. No way!
Also if the filaments are that sensitive to humidity anything that brings water into the area will be bad. If you had one accident or spillage you have to agree another accident may happen again. You need to create a humidity controlled environment for your printers and filament storage. I think your test of using new filament at the correct humidity proves you need to operate them in a humitidy controlled environment, and anything that brings water into that environment must be removed.
Maybe don’t print the box with PLA that holds moisture to hold the desiccant.
If you have cement floors it will hold moisture as I'm sure you know.
Silicone on totes to seal. Gallon Ziploc with stand up bottom. Spools won't fit in regular gallon bags.
Did you have to tear up any subfloor?
I will have to, yes. About 1-1/2 sheets worth.
eeehhhhh I have 22 of these exact boxes: I do'nt use them anymore, I implore anyone considering these to print one, fill them, close them, and then try to OPEN them again, without spilling desiccant EVERYWHERE. They are nearly impossible to open once closed, get a butter knife or a putty knife and ve VERY VERY careful. I prefer the 'spillproof' kind
Would use the AMS vesa mount and attach to the front of the rack.
I'll have to look into this... I've not heard of that one!
Not all seals work. Moisture still gets in. Especially if you notice the vacuum seal is loose. I just opened a fresh roll and the seal was loose. There was literally water drops inside the sealed bag. 😂
So sorry for this! ❤
It’s a good job it’s wide screen.
Those boxes don’t appear to be sealed at the top. THat might be a problem
Get the totes that have a built in gasket
Thank u for info
Cereal containers off of amazon. Is what we use.
in europe we have bricks, concrete, floor vynil... to build our houses
Go get some damp rid that should help get the moisture out of the air also
55% is high? Holy smokes, I have 65-70. I need to work on that!!!
Greetings from Germany
Ass some one else says. Look up CNC kitchen. And a nother trick. You can Dry filament on your build plate. Just put a box over it. And warm up the plate. But be ware that the box and filament don't melt.😊
It seems like you're overcomplicating the issue. I have the enclosure and it's really not that difficult to use. Someone on RUclips timed a spool change and it was under 1 minute. You can always redesign the enclosure to improve speed. Remember that the spool rod does not feed the printer. The mechanism that pushes the filament is in the feeder.
If I were you, the AMS would not even be at the top with the printer. The feeder would be at the side, and I would relocate my own spool holders in the front of the shelves.
I think you are fighting an uphill battle trying to dehumidify the entire room.