has anyone tried using dessecant silicon in ebay panels?

[picmacmillan]

i read a post recently where someone had there ebay panels put together at a local window shop...they use dessicant in the frames i believe....

 this sounds to me like something worth trying...does anyone know where you could buy some of this dessecant or whatever? silicon?.....

 i believe this is the stuff they put in your power tools box when you buy them...or even your taps and dies box....

 i do not know the properties of this stuff, but would be interested to here what everyone thinks...someone says it may have a saturation point, but that doesn't concern me at this point...even if it did have a saturation point, it could be manipulated or at the very least you could remove the old and put in some new if this were the case.....

 i would like to know if there is a relation to the amount of dessicant and the area it will keep moisture free..i would suspect there would be...a good starting point would be to find a source for this stuff and research from there...any comments would be appreciated...might be worth a try....pickster

[ibedonc]

crystal cat litter

[ghurd]

Hey Pickster,

That stuff is like a sponge.  It gets full.  It will only help for a short time if the unit 'leaks'.

Factory made windows don't leak. It will take care of what is in there to begin with, but not much more.

Used stuff is probably  about full.

If you decide you need some, I have brand new 1 gram Uline packs ("Protects 6.1"^3").

I get them in 5 gallon sealed pails, then I heat seal the packs into small bags, twice, with a pack in the outer bag just in case.  Then they go back in the sealed pail so they will surely stay fresh.

Offer to pay the shipping. USPS (US Mail).  Not bad prices to Canada if no money is changing hands.

G-

[picmacmillan]

ya thanks ghurd.i will take you up on that...give me a day or so to get your addy...email me at rmacmill@sympatico.ca and i will talk to you from there..

 what i am hoping is that there may be an arrangement of these packets, say stuff the dessicant ino a straw or tube on the outer edges of the panel...have the tube sliced as to allow the stuff to do it's work, and closed off every few inches so the dessicant will be dispersed over  the distance of the glass in the confines of this straw...maybe the tubes can have an end that opens to either put new stuff in, or to release the trapped moisture...not too sure yet....

 are you saying this dessicant will absorb moisture, but won't release it?, so in effect it has a moisture limit?..

 i believe as an example,if you put sugar in water, the water will absorb the sugar up until about a 16% saturation point, then it no longer will change it's state and you will see the sugar accumulate...

 as an experiment,i wondered if you trapped the moisture,in a straw or tube, if the heat generated by the panel from normal operation would remove the water in these straws of dessicant...just a thought.. i would be interested in your synopsis on this idea...and is it in fact a type of cat litter?.

 you see i think we are all trying to keep the moisture out, but if we just let it take it's course because of the temperature changes,and manipulate where the moisture collects ie. at the outer edges of the panel in some dessicant filled straws or tubes?,and not on the cells themselves, this may be the answer to our problems.......anyhow, just a thought...now off to an AAA hockey game...thanks guys....pickster

[FishbonzWV]

Pickster,

Try your local chemical supplier. You can buy it by the pound and it's colored like litmus paper. When it's blue it's still viable...when it turns pink pop it in the oven on low and dry it out. I also found some that was packaged for use in a large gun safe.

Lots of sources for it.

Bonz

[ghurd]

The stuff releases it, but slower than it absorbs it. (I think)

Opening an end will let in outside moisture to saturate the stuff.

I don't see any advantage to having slits at the outside edge.

With adding stuff, you have to take stuff out, too.

I don't believe it is a very good solution unless the PV is totally sealed, like at a glass shop. Been wrong before. Twice now that I can recall! lol

G-

[pyrocasto]

Is this stuff like the silica packs that come in many product boxes? I'll have to try the cat litter thing, or see if I can find some place to buy silica packs.

[picmacmillan]

i believe it is the same as silica or it is silica...i have a silica pack kicking around in my truck...must have fallen out of whatever box it was in....my panels are already sealed...i will try and do as suggested and get it locally if possible from the chemical store....when litmus paper was mentioned...my moose hunting buddies thought i was the best fisherman in the world....every year we all put 20 bucks in a pot, and the guy who caught the first fish won the money...after about 7 years of winning steady, i finally had to tell the boys that before i fished anywhere(we were in the north), i always checked the water with litmus paper....i would watch these guys fish dead lakes for days on end....kinda cruel, but it was funny as he$# at the time...some lakes were too acidic to hold fish but they didn't know that.....hee heeee!:D..try this one, you will be a fishing tournament winner all the time at moose camp!...pickster

[wooferhound]

If you can make your Dessicant replaceable, then you could just keep drying it out in a oven like this  . . .    

http://clippings.circumtech.com/nikon/highhumidityandsilica

Dessacant can be recharged an infinate number of times, according to my Google searches

[pyrocasto]

How does that work? I would love to know where to and not to fish. Also, are you talking about ice fishing?

[ghurd]

I think cat litter would be half saturated when you buy it.  In a paper bag it just absorbs as much as it can from the air.  Like Wooferhound said, you could bake it a while before sealing it in the PV.

G-

[picmacmillan]

how it works is fish need a certain amount of oxygen in the water to live..in the north sometimes the water is too acidic , .....when you put the litmus paper in the water, it will turn a certain color depending on the acidic(or lack of), level of the water....it will read from 0-14... it goes from acid to base.....i forget the optimum number for fish to live in but i think it was 4...when the paper turns the color represented by the 4, then you know there is a good chance there are fish there....if it is too acidic for fish to live, then you pass this lake by and let your buddies fish there....there is a couple such lakes right by where we camped while hunting...my freinds would fish there and i knew there wasn't a fish alive in there.... pickster