Let’s see the dryers all the DIY team have come up with and how well are they working out for you? I know some hate the idea of wet trimming ect. I am in a very dry climate most of the year with the summer months heating up to 100 degrees or more. My drys were always weather dependent or taking up valuable grow space. The Canatroll machine is great I’m sure but the cost is out of hand . Here is my wine fridge dryer. I got the fridge on clearance at Best Buy for 220 dallars. I was originally looking for a single zone fridge with a Peltier style cooling system as they keep the preferred temps. The Peltier style cooling system has an ambient operating range that basically requires you keep it in your living space just a note for those looking to build something. If you’re looking to do something in more dynamic environments you will need to look into more of a traditional style refrigeration systnd this will change your recipe for success. So I got the dual zone because it w and cheaper than any single zone I could find at the time. I got the ink bird controller for the small compact dehumidifier. I actually got 2 because I was having concerns about only having one zone with a dehumidifier in it. I took apart the dehumidifier’s down to guts put the fins of the dehumidifier touching the back wall of the fsondensation will fall to the drain inside the fridge. In hind sight the dehumidifier really only gets the fridge cycles to turn on more or less times per hour. Most likely only needed one dehumidifier even in a dual zone as the fridge cycles bolth zones simultaneously anyway. The fridge has allowed me to slow down drying as long as I want. 3 week dry times were never possible with out this set up. Also makes curing easier and more controlled. The fridge also makes long term storage way better aswell. I find after curing as desired in the fridge. Then going to grove bags or similar bags for 4 to 6 weeks in fridge then glass jars is best for my situation. Here is my set up to kick things off. Let’s see how you guys are doing your wine fridge or any drying machine you made !!!
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Looks nice!
What is your motive for the grove bags and sealed jars in the unit? (Vs. paper bags or open jars)
hell yeah this is killer
I go to the grove bags after curing to help even out the moisture and continue a refined cure without burping. The grove bags vent a little moisture by design. When I am happy with the moisture level and concerned about over drying they go to jars. This has been great to perpare for longer term jar storage with out burping. By the time I go to jars it’s very stable.
And did the de humidifier bits all work good and fridge drains etc
Any pics of that ?
To be fair for transparency I did not come up with any of these ideas . Many DIY guys have been down this road before me . Here is a pic of the dehumidifier I took apart same thing this unit was recommended for this I did not come up with this idea but it works perfectly. The fridge has a condensation collection system on the back wall inside the fridge. All the condensation from the unit working collects on that wall and drips down to a collection tray inside the fridge. I put the dehumidifier all striped down with condensation fins touching the back wall. So any condensation generated by the dehumidifier drips into the condensation collection tray for the fridge. My fridge is dual zone so I put one in the top and one on the bottom. The ink, bird controller runs bolth dehumidifiers with a split plug.
I did not know of anyone running a dual zone fridge when I was building mine so I put 2 dehumidifiers. One in each zone. After running the fridge and playing with cycles ect. I realized you only need 1 dehumidifier even in a dual zone as long as the cooling system activates bolth zones simultaneously. I think this is standard for most dual zones.
Great details thankyou
Is there any circulation of air ?
Or do the fans of dehumidifier do that job too ?
The fridge does absolutely all the work. It draws in fresh air that is chilled through the Pelteir cooling system. That air is dry coming out of the Peltier cooling system. It does all the drying. The dehumidifier creates heat That causes the Peltier system to come on and cool the fridge ever so slightly drying every time it comes on. When the humidity gets above your preset number, let’s call at 60% the dehumidifier kicks on causing heat in roughly a minute or so then the Peltier system kicks on cooling the fridge. Refrigerator has temperature settings. Most say 60 degrees is as low as you should go. I found the fridges are not accurate . And most dual zones will stay roughly the same temperature on both zones even if the fridge states a temperature difference . I trust my goove environment monitor more than the fridge temp probe Lol . You can play with your controller For different humidity level Presets. This allows you to increase your drying time or decrease your drying time. You can also increase or decrease the temperatures on your fridge to create different recipes. You want to try.
The general rule with the INKBIRD control is fill the fridge and set to kind of a high number to set a starting point on RH . Fresh filled with all racks I set the RH to 73 or 74 percent. This all allows for some downtime on the dehumidifier. If you set the RH Too low during the first 48 hours it will cause the fridge to run constantly. Drying things too fast. Then the general rule is to drop 1 percent per day until you to 67 percent then drop .5 percent per day . This is the general basic slow dry. All these things are up to you and you can make different recipes with different adjustments. The first couple of days dropping 1% is to get out of the danger zone quickly. 68 percent and under generally safe. Do not want to stay above that number too many days consecutively. High RH and low air flow grow mold and or rot.
Ill be lurking in here for tips
Ive been collecting parts for one of these dry box fridges for a while(thrift stores, not new from a store.)
Im on the fence on which controller to get.
-Jayy
Ink bird RH controller is the one most people go for. Very accurate and inexpensive. I think they have a Bluetooth version if your into tech options.
This seems pretty cool. I’d love to have something for getting a slow dry in FL without spending a ridiculous amount of money. Thanks for sharing!!
Ive been using this thread in reddit for reference,
They use an AC infinity 67 controller
https://www.reddit.com/r/GrowBuddy/comments/1cc3hfp/diy_cannatrol/
Hmmmm
Decisions decisions…
Either will work well. I definitely read through those many times as well. I kind of stole a little piece from everybody out there doing it.
Thanks!! I didn’t know you needed an app to read Reddit these days. Jeez. Haha
I take everything on Reddit with a grain of salt. Plenty of good information plenty of bad.
Koolatron 20, Temp/Humidity control from 'bay (only using RH side; stock temp control works well), gutted dehumi in bottom. Haven’t had a fresh crop to test drying/curing with it yet, just using it for storage at 60F/60%.
I use firefox mobile, and open the PC page. Fuck apps for normal websites
The reddit app is shite
Yeah, I’ve never really even been on Reddit. Just use to come up in Google searches, but I don’t remember needing the app to read stuff. I’m not super tech savvy though so… Haha