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Posted

Ok I've been racking my brain over the past few days going over old threads, other websites, and  Youtube videos ( CigarClimatology great info btw ) about building a Wineador and the pro and cons of various storage ex. wineador, air seal tubber, cabinet. I've come to a intellectual impasse of information and will throw it out to the forum now. 

That being said I've build 2 thermoelectric wineador's in the past and they have worked great, a few days ago one of my wineador's kicked the bucket R.I.P. so now I find myself reassessing my storage methods. Once again I never had problems with the wineador ( I had it pluged in at 18C and drain hole sealed and it kept a decent 65% ) .....it wasn't always the most steadfast stable atmosphere it had swings but it got the job done and most important the cigars smoked fine.

Now the kicker and the question that I know will spawn various opinions and responses LOL

1. Should I just leave my cigars in my wineador and keep RH steady and not worry to much about high temps going into summer? Sooooo then in that case maybe I should now invest in a large cabinet humidor instead of buying a even larger wine cooler fridge? (Because like all of us the collection is in constant growth)

I wonder if a consistent temp is as important as RH.... I've walked into many cigar shop humidors and don't feel a difference in temp most the time its not at the "Ideal" 18C. I keep my cigars at 65% RH and worry about higher temps in summer time will cause crazy fluctuations and high temps will begin the process of drying out some of the oils in my cigars. What to do What to do....

Thanks!!! ?

 

Posted

  I mean, as a rough statement without knowing individual extreme climates etc, if you freeze, there's no real need to actively cool your unit as long as it's sealed and has passive beads. That's what I've done for a decade

Posted

I have a wineador and had some water dripping from the fan area of the unit. I found many cigars were wet and somewhat moldy. I threw up a post here in a panic and essentially pigfish told me to turn the unit off. 
 

two years later and the unit is still off and I haven’t had any issues with mold. I have lowered my rh to between 62-65 and temps in the summer reach up to 75F. Still no mold problems as of now. 
 

my recommendation is turn it off and keep RH at the lower end. 

  • Like 3
Posted

I feel stable humidity levels are more important than absolutely stable temperature. If you have a good 2-way humidity system and the temperature doesn't swing too much in the short term, I don't think it's a big issue. I have coolers with boveda and humidity stays stable over an incredible range of temperature, and the cigars smoke fine.

Temperature may affect aging, but that's really all guess work as no one has done the science.

Posted

I've been trying to age my cigars so I've always kept those cigars at 65RH 65, once again seems like that is the magical number for aging. I'm just talking a stab in the dark but I'm assuming that 65/65 helps keep the oils longer?

Posted

I bought my wineador because the wife wanted the house at 76/78f and I wanted my cigars at 70 max, preferably 65. I have been told to never put boxes on the bottom due to drippage. We have a little one now so our house sits at 70 and i'm thinking of unplugging.

That being said, i think I also need to out fans in it for circulation.

Sent from my SM-G930P using Tapatalk

Posted

  The issue is if you have a fridge/cooler turned on, creating cold air also means moisture inside a sealed unit because  outside of the unit is warmer. Unless you have a system to actively remove that moisture you're constantly creating (beads eventually fill up etc) then you can run into mould, pooling, rotting etc

  There's variables which mean this will or won't apply to different extents, but it's an issue you'll run into if your home/area is hot compared to the cooler.

  There's a lot of detail and there's a lot of people far more versed in this than me. It comes down to cost/energy/time/stress to what you want to do.

  I didn't want to dedicate so much time or energy into making a dedicated active system. So I went for freeze and beads. Freeze for the beetles, beads for mould. It meets what I'm prepared to do and works for me, but obviously everyone has their own wants out of their storage.

Posted
3 minutes ago, CaptainQuintero said:

  The issue is if you have a fridge/cooler turned on, creating cold air also means moisture inside a sealed unit because  outside of the unit is warmer. Unless you have a system to actively remove that moisture you're constantly creating (beads eventually fill up etc) then you can run into mould, pooling, rotting etc

  There's variables which mean this will or won't apply to different extents, but it's an issue you'll run into if your home/area is hot compared to the cooler.

Interesting I do believe that I ran into excess moisture over the years due to trying to keep the cigars at that 18C. I recently found a place in Toronto that cuts and sells Spanish cedar so maybe even making a cab might be better to hold growing collection or just keep fridge line it with cedar and keep in a cool spot. ?

Posted
24 minutes ago, Jason55555 said:

Interesting I do believe that I ran into excess moisture over the years due to trying to keep the cigars at that 18C. I recently found a place in Toronto that cuts and sells Spanish cedar so maybe even making a cab might be better to hold growing collection or just keep fridge line it with cedar and keep in a cool spot. ?

  I mean a cooler is a sealed unit if you plug the drain with blutac etc, that all I've done. You can fancy it up if you want it to look nicer though!

  The main issues with cigars are beetles and mould. If you freeze then you won't get beetles no matter what the temp, if you use beads to keep the humidity down below 70% you won't get mould. That was my main concerns sorted. You can add in other options like fans to make it more stable if you wish, but again it's what degree of control that you want. I put a lb of beads on each shelf to try to negate that and again keep it as passive as possible

Piggy's stuff is amazing, it's the Ferrari of cigar storage, you've got both ends and everything in between depending how you want to go

Posted

I love wineadors...as long as they’re not running? 

They're very handy, look classy, and once sealed properly and lined with Spanish Cedar, I just keep ‘em at the right humidity with Boveda packs, and I keep them at a constant 70 degrees F in a small air conditioned room. Super simple, and effective enough.

I’ve converted 3 so far, from inoperable units I get from work, like this:

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021645DD-D9CA-4BD1-BDB4-343C887F2EAD.jpeg.2da1df029bb3348907b67c2070f1310d.jpeg

B516181E-862E-468F-A5B5-82B7C2702B6E.jpeg.333aab46bac6331a891c630fdcb0aaf7.jpeg

80E99909-FD52-4C93-AF5E-5CDCACAF09DB.jpeg.d987f26e45e3d6c07becf88c2ad15c93.jpeg

  • Like 3
Posted

I'm at a similar situation. I have a New Air AW-281E with cabinets from Wineadors.com. I have a 500ct foot locker humidor that I no longer use and an Rtic cooler (Simalar to Yeti). Now the dilema. I've been on an ordering spree the last month with currently 20 boxes in transit that I have no room for. I currently keep the house 69 in the summer and 72 in the winter and if I put my wineador below 60, the compressor will start to sweat inside. Above 62 and it's fine. For aging cigars it's generally accepted that cooler temps helps slow fermentation for a slower more controlled aging. I'm in a temperate enough place where I could run a coolidor without worrying about the temp getting higher than what I would find acceptable. Added benefit is it's easier to play tetris and remove/add boxes laying horizontally. However, I like to have a cooler available for recreation and resting meat from my smoker and it's not like they don't take up space. I was simply going to order another identical New Air but found they don't make them anymore. It would have been nice if or when my current one fails I could simply transfer the cabinets into a working unit. But realistically in my climate I don't need it on, but like someone said they look good and My wineador has a similar footprint as my Rtic but with more storage so I would need 2 coolers for what 1 wineador will store. So, which wineador to buy?

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