HELP dripping wet tools!

[Charles McKinley]

Hi All,

It has been in the 40s- 50s here and raining the last few days and every piece of iron in my shop is covered in condensation.

Will a fan help reduce or eliminate this?

Would a 100 watt light bulb left on under the lathe, and under the table of the TS and BS help?

The shop is not climate controlled and will not be until at least next summer. A dehumidifier will not work as the shop is not sealed around the doors and soffit vents.

Thanks,

[Larry Crim]

Charles I feel your pain, my wife left the garage door open the other day and it rained with a heavy wind. Needless to say all the iron in the shop got wet and the entire floor was wet. I immeadiatly dried off the tools and later when I got off work I spent about 5 hours cleaning the rust off and waxing the ts, jointer and lathe, since there was so much moisture in the shop I ran a kerosine heater all day and most of the night to help dry things out I also ran it all day the second day and it still has not dried out completly but it was a big help.
Larry

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

every piece of iron in my shop is covered in condensation.
Will a fan help reduce or eliminate this?
Fans - not unless you can vent it.

I'd get a rag and coat every bit of iron with Fuel Oil or Kerosene they both drive water off. and prevent re-adhesion of water.
Use a spritzer for those hard to access areas.
This works, I know it works , I have done it for the same reason you must.

Of course cleaning it up is no walk in the park either.

In theory you could use WD 40 but I don't trust the stuff that much.

[Jim Becker]

Interestingly enough, when I woke up this morning, the windows in my shop were fogged, but there was no moisture on any tools. For some reason, I've never had that issue...

'Just clean 'em up and get a protective coating on them if you don't already have one applied. I use simple paste wax, but some folks prefer other products.

[Greg Stanford]

I live in south mississippi & winter here is pretty much as you discribed. Paste wax.

g

[Mike Cutler]

Same story here Charles.

I use a combination of WD-40, Kroil and LPS to clean the tops. Then I apply a Marine Paste wax,and keep the machines covered when not in use.

The WD-40 is fine to use to clean tops, just don't get it into any parts that need to stay lubricated. It's a degreaser, as well as a water displacer.

Wax your machines and keep them covered. It's about all that you can do at this point.

[Clint Winterhalter]

Ditto to paste wax..

[Todd Solomon]

What about adding a thermostatically controlled heater? I've been looking at adding one of these to my shop, more for heating than condensation:

Either this small model...
http://www.northerntool.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_6970_595_595

Or this bigger one, depending on your shop size...
http://www.northerntool.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_6970_200316377_200316377

Todd

[Steven Wilson]

I get that situation every spring. The only thing I've found that keeps my machines from rusting is to coat the uncoated steel with a thick coat of Boeshield and then use the HTC tool covers. Eventually the condensation disapears and everything is fine.

[Jeff Weight]

Bioshield and HTC machine covers have been a God send in my shop.

[Charles McKinley]

Thanks guys,

I guess I'll have to get some tool covers. The tops have good coat of boeshield and paste wax on top of that. every scratch through it will need cleaned up though. I'll strip the whole works and start over.

What are the HTC covers made from? Where did you order them?

Thanks again,

[Michael Adelong]

Maybe I can help. I took flying lessons, and weather was a large part of the written exam.

The condensation happens when the air temperature falls below the "dew point". Warm air, for various reasons, has more "room" between the molecules than cooler air does. A given volume of warm air can carry more water vapor in it than the same volume of cooler air can. That is why there is very low humidity in the winter. The "dew point" is the temperature to which air needs to be cooled to become saturated by the water vapor already present in the air. If the temperature falls below the dew point, the water vapor will be released as condensation, fog, or rain depending on the temperatures and dew points aloft (it takes a thick layer of very humid air cooling below the dew point to make rain).

Temperature is the result of things at ground level absorbing energy from the sun. (Jim's window). In an enclosed shop where the sun doesn't hit anything, the temperature of everything is a result of absorbing & releasing heat to and from the surrounding air.

Say for example that the outside temperature is 43 degrees and falling (evening), the dewpoint is 38, and the ambient air temperature in your shop is about the same as the outside air. All of the metal tools and surfaces in your shop will absorb and release faster than the wood, plastic, cloth, and other materials will. As the air temperature falls, the metals release heat. When the temperature of the metal is at or below the dew point, condensation will form on them. The other materials will be warmer than the metals because they release heat more slowly, and there won't be any condensation forming on them when the air temp and dew point are equal. (If both the temperature and dew point are below freezing, you will get frost instead of water.) By the time the wood cools to the dew point, the water vapor will already have been "squeezed out" of the air (molecules getting closer together as the air cools).

A couple of ways to prevent this.

Keep the temperature in your shop above the dew point at all times.

Keep the temperature of your metals above the dew point at all times.

Insulate your shop, even if it is not climate controlled. The idea is to make your entire shop warm and cool more slowly than the rest of the world. Let the condensation / frost form on the things that change temperature faster than your shop. If the temperature in your shop passes through the dew point temperature after the rest of the world does, there won't be enough water vapor left to form surface moisture. Plants warm & cool the fastest (because of their high water content). That's why dew forms on plants, metal, and glass (Jim's window again) in the morning, but not on concrete, which warms and cools much slower.

Cover your tools to prevent moist air from coming into contact with the metal. A towel or blanket would work. If it is humid enough in your part of the world to saturate the towel, go with plastic instead (or in addition to the towel).

Michael

[Brad Noble]

Excellant advise Michael. Thanks. My shop is insulated and so far I haven't had any concerns with moisture on my tools. I also have a heater out there but do not let it run when I'm not in the shop. I'm just funny that way. Heck, I even turn off the battery recharge station for my cordless tools when I leave the shop.

Brad

[Tom Andersen]

IMHO, your best shot is to install a couple of electric radiation heaters of the type that glow in the dark under the ceiling. They will not heat the air but radiate to the steel and tools beneath. To avoid condensation, you want to make sure that your tools and machines are not colder than the air and that's what you will achieve in this way. Hard on the electricity bill though!

[Matt Meiser]

I had a similar problem in my old shop. A dehumidifier worked wonders despite the fact that the shop wasn't really that well sealed. The 2x4 walls were insulated but the ceiling was just 1" styrofoam panels and it had old garage doors.

[Bill Esposito]

I deal with this problem spring, summer and fall every year and I've got plenty of rust spotted machines and hand tools. For the machines the only thing that works in my shop is T9, a towel and a fan circulating air. I can sometimes get away without the cover but if I forget the fan, unless I left a very thick coating of T9 on the surface (not wiped off) I'll get rust.

I tried Top Cote and Paste Wax and the only combination that works reliably is what I've stated above.

Some folks can get away with just paste wax...doesn't work here.

[Peter West]

I had similar problems here in the UK, where we experience very diverse changes in the weather all year round. My workshop is a 30ft x 20ft timber and concrete block structure with a roller door and no insulation to speak of. I use a propane heater to heat it in the cold weather.

What I do is cover my machines with metal parts (planer, thicknesser, sander, Mitre Saw and the router table with the fixed router) with machine covers (like the HTC ones I guess), and all my hand tools and power tools I put in a large cupboard at night. The cupboard is made from MFC which is sealed with Johnsons water seal, and the cupboard doors are sealed with 'draught excluder'.

The doors are on springs so I can't leave them open by mistake, and inside the cupbord I have a couple of small condensation boxes (6" x 3") like those used in green houses etc. These have a tray on which you put the same crystals you see in small bags in power tool boxes, TV's and the like and I bought them from a local General Household Goods Store. The crystals absorb any moisture from the air in the cupboard and the water drips from the crystals into the tray below. I empty them about once a week.

This all sounds a bit 'Mickey Mouse', but it works and after 2 winters I don't have any rust on any of my tooling although rust has formed on other metal in the workshop that is exposed and un-protected - such as brackets and wall plates.

[Steven Wilson]

Keep the temperature in your shop above the dew point at all times.

Keep the temperature of your metals above the dew point at all times.



Michael, that works just fine if you live in an area with mild winters or you don't mind spending large sums of money to heat your shop all winter. My shop is in a three car garage and is well insulated. The problem I have is that the slab floor didn't have a plastic underlayment before it was pored and garage doors aren't very well insulated (or sealed). To keep it well heated would cost $500-$600 during the heating season. So, every year in the spring as the ground thaws (the 3' that freezes) and my machines warm up, condensation returns for about 2 weeks. When I work in my shop during the winter I keep my shop below 50F to avoid condensation problems, and just warm up the materials when needed. I find that a heavy coat of Boeshield that is left to dry (you can't use the machine surface if you do this) and machine covers prevent rust. For my hand tools I keep them in wooden cabinets (instead of metal ones) and my planes stay in plane socks. All metal is covered with light machine oil - no rust problems here either.