I have a drying setup in a bedroom. The branches go into a cupboard that has even ventilation. A carbon filter setup draws air into the cupboard and vents out a port at the top. It pulls air from the bedroom and uses it kind of like a lung room. I have a humidifier, dehumidifier, cooler and heater in the bedroom. The problem is that during the evening I need the room to be 24C while i sleep to prevent physical issues. My question for all you guys and gals is:
Am I better off keeping the room at 24C all the time or have the temperature fluctuate each day from around 18C in the day to 24C in the evenings? Are the fluctuations better or worse than the extra temp during the day?
Ta!
The Temp fluctuation should be fine. The range is within good drying temps so as long as you have good air movement, which it sounds like you do, you should dry just fine.
The day temps of 18C should actually help slow down the dry a little bit which I believe is good for the initial curing process When I am drying I like to shoot for 7-10 days of drying to get them dry enough to go into jars for some more curing an burping.
Yeah i am actually having to cool the room to 18C during the day as i figured it would help drying to slow down. I currently can only get my dry times down to about 7 days at best as I cant take the room temps down as low as i would like to during the evenings while i sleep.
Yeah this is what i was wanting to do however humidity doesn’t affect my health directly but if the room is too humid i sweat. I feel warm and pull the covers down to my waste while I am sleeping. Then my back is exposed and the sweat cools the muscles in my back and I then cant get out of bed in the morning as my back has seized up . It took me ages to find the perfect conditions for sleeping where i dont over heat and sweat and I dont get too cold. So I now sleep in a bedroom that is 24C and 50% RH or less at night. Not the ideal conditions for setting up a drying cabinet but my house is pretty small .
Actually @Shadey or anyone else who knows, how humid can the space be? I have RH meters all over the drying cabinet so i can check for micro climates while i dial in the cabinet. I also have an inkbird meter hanging right in the middle of the cabinet where it would get the least circulation and I am not letting the humidity go above 70% during the entire drying process. Can I go higher if the temps are around 20 to 24C or is that too risky?
I wouldn’t say it was risky, it’s just not the optimum, optimum is around 60f with around 60% humidity I believe, if the humidity climbed with the heat that would slow the drying but humidity usually drops as heat rises and vice versa.
I just judge my weed by how it feels before jarring it up, when it’s hot my weed dries faster, so I paper bag it to slow it down a bit, and jar earlier to preserve the moisture, when drying in winter the process slows as my basement is near perfect conditions and I can just hang the whole plant until I feel it’s ready to jar.
I understand the struggle @BudSy after building my drying box, the smoke has become so much smoother. Is it at all possible to make a larger drying box , that you can make self contained for its own parameters? If not, I still think you are absolutely fine with what you are doing.
For example, I dry in a closet with no ventilation and only a fan for circulation. With bud in the room the humidity rises to 65 and stays there, going down slowly. They are sufficiently dry when the RH reads 58-60. No humidifier required. This only works in the summertime where ambient is ~50%
You could buy an ink bird, and set a fan to come on at 60-65 or so. Or if your humidity is low you could set a humidifier go on below 60.
Lots of possibilities but all this being said, 24C should be fine.
I did not think temperature matters much compared to humidity? My garage is 17F at night and gets up to 67% humidity. During the day temp gets to 24F and humidity drops to as low as 50%. My concern is more about my 67% humidity than anything. I don’t think it will mold but it seems like quality is affected a little bit by swinging from 50% to 67% humidity every day. Related to your question, I’m a bit curious how much temp affects drying. I assume there is some curve where 67% humidity isn’t as bad with lower temps as higher, but could be totally wrong.
Thanks to all, you have given me more to think about.
I also use the inkbirds. I just bought a inkbird temp and RH remote meter. It uses batteries and is monitor only. Uses Bluetooth to your phone and keeps a log and shows graphs. Very cool. I have it in my drying cabinet.
Of course you dont worry about temperature with maximums of 24F Unless your worrying about your buds freezing
But yeah, the temperature does not matter to a degree as long as you have the RH dialed in to suit it. The fluctuations I was worried about but it seems as you said, the fluctuating humidity might affect it. I will keep this in mind.
I keep a RH meter right in the densest part where all the drying branches are. The cabinet pulls air through the branches very slowly. I adjust the rooms humidity so that the final RH in the densest part inside the cabinet is between 65 and 70 RH. So fairly stable.
if you raise it during the time it’s at 24c , it will slow the drying process.
. It took me ages to find the perfect conditions for sleeping where i dont over heat and sweat and I dont get too cold. So I now sleep in a bedroom that is 24C and 50% RH or less at night. Not the ideal conditions for setting up a drying cabinet but my house is pretty small .
Unless your worrying about your buds freezing 