Salt of the earth...

[Bobbybass]

I've been working at a caravan site for a few months and now it's shutting down. 

I've been draining them down...and in most of the vans the owners have put down dishes of salt... I presume to absorb moisture ?

I'm just about to go and winterise my boat and wonder if this method is effective ?

 

What do you all reckon ?

[Tumshie]

7 minutes ago, Bobbybass said:

I've been working at a caravan site for a few months and now it's shutting down. 

I've been draining them down...and in most of the vans the owners have put down dishes of salt... I presume to absorb moisture ?

I'm just about to go and winterise my boat and wonder if this method is effective ?

 

What do you all reckon ?

I've used it and it's not bad. I buy cheap disposable plastic cups to put the salt in and then they go in tighter spots and smaller cupboards but I use Ecozone dehumidifiers (they don't use any  unnecessary chemicals) where I think I may need a bit more welly so to speak. The salt is fine and it's cheap but I wouldn't use it instead of the dehumidifier.

 

https://www.biggreensmile.com/products/ecozone-room-dehumidifier/zonedehumidroom.aspx?productid=zonedehumidroom

https://www.biggreensmile.com/products/ecozone-dehumidifier-universal-refill-pouch/zonedehumidrefill.aspx?productid=zonedehumidrefill

[LadyG]

Sometimes pound shops sell little tubs of stuff for this purpose, with some sort of stuff like kitty litter, ventilation helps.

[Sea Dog]

Hmm, the interior space inside a narrowboat is probably something like 2000 cu ft.  Is a dish of salt or a pound shop dessicant really going to affect such a volume?

[Machpoint005]

31 minutes ago, Sea Dog said:

Hmm, the interior space inside a narrowboat is probably something like 2000 cu ft.  Is a dish of salt or a pound shop dessicant really going to affect such a volume?

I seriously doubt it. Seems more akin to faith healing than science, IMO.

 

(I had to work out that 2000 cuft is about 55 m3 first, though)

[Athy]

9 hours ago, Sea Dog said:

Hmm, the interior space inside a narrowboat is probably something like 2000 cu ft.  Is a dish of salt or a pound shop dessicant really going to affect such a volume?

If singular, perhaps not - in the same way as one bar of an electric fire won't heat a large room very much. We have oval plastic dessicants (thank you for that word, Mr. Dog) filled with what may be "kitty litter"on Trojan, but we have four of them, spaced out. When we return to the boat in spring, each one is half full of water, so they're obviously doing their job. I don't think they're from a pound shop but they are from one of those home bargains-type shops.

[Sea Dog]

2 minutes ago, Athy said:

When we return to the boat in spring, each one is half full of water, so they're obviously doing their job. 

Well they are clearly doing their job up to the point of saturation when they stop, but whether the amount of moisture they remove from the atmosphere in the boat is significant is the key.  I don't know the answer to that.

 

If you do go the dehumidification route, you should really block all ventilation to preserve the dry atmosphere, otherwise you're trying to dry the outside world.

[mark99]

Yer but...... in the salt cellar people put grains of rices to dry out the salt so it flows.

[Clodi]

If you use a dehumidifier I assume you must have shore power but how do you go about emptying the actual unit, how soon does one fill up?.

I have one in the bathroom (at home) and when its running it drains out quite a significant volume of moisture even when there's no 'steam'.

[Alan de Enfield]

18 minutes ago, Clodi said:

If you use a dehumidifier I assume you must have shore power but how do you go about emptying the actual unit,

Most units have an option of a 'drain' or using the tank.

Stand it in the galley (work top) and let the drain run straight down the plug-ole.

No worrying about emptying it.

[Clodi]

10 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

Most units have an option of a 'drain' or using the tank.

Stand it in the galley (work top) and let the drain run straight down the plug-ole.

No worrying about emptying it.

Brilliant, I had visions of it standing on the floor?

[Momac]

I think a mains powered dehumidifier will make water in pretty much all circumstances especially at this time of year. I put my dehumidifier on and leave it to switch itself off when the integral tank is full.  I expect that is within 24 hours for a volume that I am guessing is about 3 litres.

It then sits there waiting for me to visit the boat and empty the water which may be a few days.

 

I did see one dehumidifier that had been left to drain into a galley sink but frost caused the sink drain pipe to freeze up and the water overflowed the sink and damaged the galley cupboard . I live close enough to get to the boat promptly to disconnect the dehumidifier if severe frost threatens. I risk losing the dehumidifier but not the galley.

 

I have used moisture traps  - which use calcium chloride salt rather than sodium chloride table salt. They do work but I found then less successful on my 33ft boat compared to my previous boat which was 25ft.

[MtB]

22 hours ago, Machpoint005 said:

I seriously doubt it. Seems more akin to faith healing than science, IMO.

 

(I had to work out that 2000 cuft is about 55 m3 first, though)

 

Ahem.... 

 

The way the little pot of salt works is really clever. It doesn't need emptying of water because the captured water evaporates and disperses from the mesh of salt grains in the pot, up and away into the atmosphere.

 

See? I told you it was clever!!!

[rusty69]

Salt is hygroscopic innit.