Outside humidity too high

[mm12]

Where I live, it's been abnormally wet/rainy for the past month and a half. The humidity in my cabinet has crept up to 68% and all of my cigars are pretty much unsmokable. I pulled out a connie 3 from consitantly great box this afternoon and it was totally dull. Same for the last few cigars I have tried to smoke. Even with the AC on, I can't seem to get the ambient relative humidity in the house anywhere below the mid 70's.

I've only smoked 5-6 cigars in the past month and they've all been pretty bad/overhumidified.

Anybody have any idea how to rig up some kind of dry-boxing system in an overly humid environment? My cabinet is full, so it's probably going to take a good while to get everything back to 62% even after the weather dries out. I'm hoping to figure out a way to get some cigars back to smokable condition before winter hits.

[markmurase]

In Brisbane, we often have high humidity. I suggest the following:

1. Place your humidor in an air-conditioned room. The air-conditioner will ensure the humidity in the room is well below 65%. You will need a good humidifier in your humidor such as Cigar Oasis, humidity beads, etc. You may find that you have to top up the water in your humidifier regularly because the air conditioner will dry it out.

or:

2. Use humidity beads (from Mark Neff at cigarmony.com) in your humidor. Humidity beads are great. If you're in a period of high humidity, don't wet the beads much before placing them in your humidor (ie: they should be mostly white). If they become saturated (ie: all clear as glass) dry them out with a hairdryer. In dryer seasons use more water, so about 50% of the beads are clear and 50% are white. If it's very dry, use even more water, so perhaps 75% are clear.

I also recommend having at least 2 digital hygrometers which measure current humidity (and temperature) as well as recording max. & min. I have 1 in my humidor and 1 outside it. That way I know what the ambient humidity is, and how much the humidity has varied in my humidor.

Hope this helps.

[Dbone]

I as well use beads to help control humidity ups and downs.. I go a bit overboard, have 4lbs in my cabinet humidor.

[Diamondog]

Maybe throw in some 60% beads...I have 65% beads in my cooler (2 lbs) and there is about 20 boxes in that cooler, my humidity sits at 67% - 68% but what I am smoking out of it with age are smoking great....

[TonyV]

If you choose to go with the air conditioned room,use a ac unit with a thermostat or sensor,it will go on and off at your specified temp,saving you money. i'm pretty sure you won't need the electric humidifier,the beads will be good enough,just double up on the beads,and don't humidify them initially.I have my humidor in my basement.The basement in the summer time is around 75 rh. the room with my humidor is a constant 65-65-temp/rh. I only use my Hydra electric humidifier in the winter time.,when the heat brings down the rh to around 50

in the basement. One other thing i use is a wireless hygrometer and temperature unit, the display unit is good to monitor up to about 75 feet from the humidor

[PigFish]

This is the graph of the adsorption ability of a dry desiccant in a powered silo. It is for your edification only, but should give you the idea.

While I will be selling products to help people like you, you don't have to wait for that or pay the money. What I am doing here actually is plotting sorption isotherms for my product and testing their adsorption ability and capacity. Just to give you an idea... A small box of my desiccant in a powered silo can hold about 100 ml of water at 70 deg. F and at an ERH of about 50.

It is best to find a high quality dry desiccant but low density chips like crystal cat litter will likely do.

Try a lot of them and bake them in the oven for an hour or so at 200 deg. F. I don't use crystal cat litter so I am guessing some here! You might want to do this in a mason jar. Let it cool a bit and take the jar and seal it while hot as if you would if you were canning. After they cool put them in your humidor. For kicks you may want to drop you hygrometer in the jar for a day first to see just how dry you got them. Bake them more if need be to get them dryer.

You will need to let your humidor likely drop 20 points or more to dry the boxes that your cigars are in. Unfortunately this process could take months, with you cycling dry desiccant in and wet desiccant out.

You can experiment with a few cigar and leave them exposed to the dryer environment of a week or two and try smoking them. That may not be enough to dry the filler but it is worth a try.

I hope this helps. -The Pig