Wineador


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I seal it. The only drawback to doing that is that if condensation builds up on the bottom, it won't have a way to get out; I've never had condensation build up, in 5 years.

The advantage to sealing it, is that your humidor is *sealed* the way a humidor should be. It will hold moisture in a separate pocket from the ambient room it's in, and it'll have an easier time maintaining lower temps when the outside world heats up, which can extend the life of your cooling unit.

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My take on this is if you run the cooling, you should leave the drain open. There’s going to be condensate and it needs some way of getting out. Unfortunately this usually also allows a small amount of outside air getting in, which destabilizes your ability to fully control RH. This is the big drawback to running the cooling system of the average wine cooler IMO.

 

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I plug in the winter and unplug in the summer. Lately seems like sticks are arriving wet and my 65 boveda is having a hard time sucking up all the extra moisture. I usually don’t run the cooling unit.


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I only run it during about 3 months of summer, and have never plugged. I use them more for storage than I do temperature regulation (but like the 3 months of temp regulation over a cooler). I would MUCH rather have have a hard time keeping humidity high, than to have a puddle of water at the bottom of my wineador. And even at that, my rH is +/- 2% year round. 

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Condensation inside the unit is the biggest problem. There are others far more knowledgeable than me so correct me if I'm wrong, but I think when your ambient temperature is so much higher than the temp inside the wineador, condensation is almost inevitable whether you have drain plugged or not.  Any build up of excess moisture is going to be a problem. 

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On 6/23/2019 at 1:13 AM, Psiman said:

I run 62% Bovedas in my Wineador and they work better than the 65% for stability . I am in L.A. and I don't get condensation ever ,just like Senor Perfecto. All I have to do is throw in a large Boveda and that's it. No maintaining of anything else. I wouldn't like residing in a humid place and here it's trouble free

What size wineador do you have. I’m looking at the newair cc300 and trying to decide on HF beads, HCM beads, Boveda’s or Xikar jars. I see various opinions and people complaining about one and others praising the same thing. I’m in LA too so I’m thinking what works for you will probably work for me as well.  

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I just bought this Whynter 251 for Father's Day. I have a 320g Boveda pack and a large Heatfeld bead. Plus, I have the little tray filled 3/4 in the bottom. 65/65 and no issues. And I'm in Texas.

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Well I decided to go with a 320/65% boveda pack in the wineador . The wineador is at 66 degrees with about 25 sticks in it now. It is a small 12 bottle size one and after 12hours has only went from 72% to 70%. Does it take this long to drop level? Should I open the door and get it down to 65 % then  close it up and see where it goes. I live in Vegas where our humidity is low. Thanks

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  • 6 months later...

Hey guys,

I realize this thread is a little old, but hoping someone is still reading. I live in Los Angeles and just purchased a 400 count wineador with a heating feature a couple days ago. It arrived on Tuesday and I went through the day long process of cleaning and airing it out. Yesterday evening I started seasoning the shelves it came with using both 84% Boveda packs and wiping the shelves with distilled water as they went in. A little over 24 hours later and my (calibrated) Boveda Butler is reading 70% and slowly climbing. The drain hole is currently covered and I plan on installing a fan today when it arrives. I am still debating on whether or not to plug the drain permanently. 

 

Two (related) questions: 

1) I feel like the "shock seasoning" was effective as the RH is past my target range and still climbing. This happened super fast though and I am worried I did something wrong. Would it be wise to allow the RH to continue climbing well past my target of 65% or is it safe to start introducing sticks ? Seems like more work on the back end of the process which I don't really want...

2) I have a bundle of 65% beads due to arrive tomorrow which I plan on using for ongoing humidification. IF I start slowly introducing sticks now, should I remove the 84% packs and introduce the beads ASAP? Or would it be better to wait a few days until the RH is at like 80%?

 

Any and all help/insight is appreciated!

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On one of my old wineador’s I used the drain hole to route out the wiring for a circulation fan. So unless you have a better plan for wiring I wouldn’t plug it permanently. I just used electrical tape for a seal after getting the wires through. 
 

How many cigars are you putting in and are they properly seasoned? If you are putting 300 cigars in there and they are all at 65% I wouldn’t worry about bringing up your RH an further. 
 

It’s going to be trial and error to get the thing dialed in. Don’t sweat it too much, just take your time. Everything you learn now will help you troubleshoot in the future. 

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I've had mine about a year and a half and I remember using a sponge and distilled water to season it.  The humidity spiked past my target to about 78% then I removed the sponge and put in 65% beads and bevedas and it settled to my target within several days.  No major fluctuations since.

I keep mine unplugged and drain unplugged.  I live in Mass so I only need to worry about cooling in the summer, the room is air conditioned.  Never had an issue with condensation.  

50 minutes ago, PrairieSmoke said:

On one of my old wineador’s I used the drain hole to route out the wiring for a circulation fan. So unless you have a better plan for wiring I wouldn’t plug it permanently. I just used electrical tape for a seal after getting the wires through. 
 

 

Just got my fan today and also plan to run it through the drain hole.  

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13 hours ago, PrairieSmoke said:

On one of my old wineador’s I used the drain hole to route out the wiring for a circulation fan. So unless you have a better plan for wiring I wouldn’t plug it permanently. I just used electrical tape for a seal after getting the wires through. 
 

How many cigars are you putting in and are they properly seasoned? If you are putting 300 cigars in there and they are all at 65% I wouldn’t worry about bringing up your RH an further. 
 

It’s going to be trial and error to get the thing dialed in. Don’t sweat it too much, just take your time. Everything you learn now will help you troubleshoot in the future. 

I wish I had 300 cigars to put in there! As it stand now I only have about 50, half of which arrived a couple days ago. They are all in an acrylic desktop humidor for the moment and properly seasoned. I bought the wineador with intentions of "aggressive expansion" so its likely that we will see capacity in the next couple months. 

 

12 hours ago, renos said:

I've had mine about a year and a half and I remember using a sponge and distilled water to season it.  The humidity spiked past my target to about 78% then I removed the sponge and put in 65% beads and bevedas and it settled to my target within several days.  No major fluctuations since.

I keep mine unplugged and drain unplugged.  I live in Mass so I only need to worry about cooling in the summer, the room is air conditioned.  Never had an issue with condensation.  

Just got my fan today and also plan to run it through the drain hole.  

The room my wineador lives in will see pretty dramatic temp swings (10-20 degrees) daily during summer months and is not air conditioned. Even in the winter, there are fairly moderate swings (5-10 degrees) so I'm just plugging it in now and monitoring the RH pretty closely. I got a new hygrometer kit that will give me readings across three points in the unit so I can make adjustments as necessary.     

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