Weāre just emerging from this 2 week cold snap, humidity had hovered around 16-20% in most of my house (hygrometers in three rooms), except in the guitar room because I humidified that one. Outside, its slowing climbing back up to 50ās here, but accompanied by rain and intense fog, as is a happening to a good portion of the central US. With the fog, outside hum is increasing, so the hum in my house is, too. Itās 30% in most of the house now, which is closer to typical for a normal winter in my city.
Wanted to share my experience with humidifying my guitar room. I went with room humidifiers versus the case ones, mainly because I already owned them, so it was cheaper, and I wanted the guitars out and in sight, especially since I just got a new one.
TL,DR: With humidifing, the guitar room didnāt keep consistent humidity from one side to the other, or from the low space to high space, very easily. I increased from one humidifier to two in the coldest part of the weeks to keep hum at 35% or higher. They needed refilling about every 8 to 10 hours. Itās cheaper, if you already own the humidifiers, than it is to buy humidity packs for multiple guitars, but it is definitely more work. Basically, I need a humidifier sitting near or under each guitar(s) to keep that small part of the room humidified for enough time that allows me to not have to fill them every 4 hours.
The details:
I started out with one ultrasonic humidifier set on the highest setting in the middle of the room, and that did an okay job when outside hum was still around 40%. Inside it was around 30% and this machine was able to bring hum up to 50% (hold this thought).
Once the cold temps set in (below 0 and with -20 degree windchills), that single humidifier did nothing to bring up the moisture- this is just one medium sized bedroom, with the door shut at all times. Hum stayed at 20%. I brought in a second humidifier, an evaporative one. Itās larger, holds more water, has a more powerful high setting. On the turbo setting, it could prob bring the humidity to 60% by itself, but would need to be filled every 4 hours. I canāt babysit a humidifier, I have to go to work every day. So it stayed on medium, and one fill could last about 10 hours. The ultrasonic one I kept on the high output setting and it needed filling every 12 hours. I finally got on a decent schedule of filling them both before bed, before I went to work, and when I got home from work.
With both humidifiers on med/high, the room seemed to stay about 30-35%. Still too low, technically. And when the heat kicked on, all through those cold days and nights, Iām sure it was replacing all the nice humid air with dry hot air.
I have one acoustic hanging high on the wall, and one sitting in a stand on the floor, opposite sides of the room, as well as two electrics on the wall and one on the ground. I brought in a 2nd hygrometer, sat one literally on each acoustic, to see if the moisture was going to the ground or able to get to the upper parts of the space, or both, or neither. What I found that the air was not the same humidity in the different spaces in the room. Sigh.
The ultrasonically produced steam was heavy enough for some to fall to the low area, but the evaporated air was blowing upwards (prob due to the design of that humidifier). So I moved the ultrasonic to be near the guitars on the ground and the evaporator to be near the ones hanging on the wall. That seems to be working to get both sides of the room in about the 40-45% range. But it took about a week to figure all this out, and to determine the best output settings to optimize refilling to my schedule. By now the outside humidity is rising, so Iām not sure if the humidifiers are doing it on their own or not. All I know is I did NOT want to get the room hum up too high (at 50% the room felt very moist and uncomfortable). I was able to keep the room around a modest 35% overnight/during the weekdays, and in the 45% range during the evenings/weekends when I can monitor everything.
The evaporative humidifier is a pain because it has a filter, and white mineral buildup accumulated on it (despite having a whole house water softener) and so that filter needed cleaning every day. It can output more air faster, but needs more filling and cleaning, whereas the smaller ultrasonic can put out high moisture steam on a less powerful output, but only in a small area.
I would love a humidifier with a function to set a desired humidity range and the device self-adjust output to keep a room at that range with no adjustments needed from me. I know they make them, but theyāre quite expensive, big, and require high effort to keep clean.
Ah the joys of the season.
