Members KATMAN Posted March 1, 2009 Members Share Posted March 1, 2009 How can you tell if it's the proper humidity level? I have two small ones going,or is one plenty? Do you need to have the humidiers going every day or as it needs a little moisture in the air? Also,would it better if the guitar is on a stand or a wall hanger? I'm new at this and don't understand the concepts of it all. How do you all do it? I'm not worried about the electrics or the laminate guitar,but I'm concerned about the solid wood acoustic. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Melodeous Posted March 1, 2009 Members Share Posted March 1, 2009 Hygrometer. You can over-moisturize so get a hygrometer to monitor the relative humidity (RH) in your room. A few percentage points either side of 47% is the target range. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members moctzal Posted March 1, 2009 Members Share Posted March 1, 2009 Yes, get a hygrometer. 45-50% is target. Just like Cripes said. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Brokepick Posted March 1, 2009 Members Share Posted March 1, 2009 All good advice so far. Digital hygrometers can be found in the household section at Walmart along with the digital thermometers. I paid about $6 or $7 for the last ones I got, and they were all accurate within about five or six RH percentage points.If not Wally World, there's plenty of mail order outfits and hardware stores that sell them, although they will probably cost a little more. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members KATMAN Posted March 1, 2009 Author Members Share Posted March 1, 2009 Thanks guys for the help. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Freeman Keller Posted March 1, 2009 Members Share Posted March 1, 2009 The important thing to remember is that the guitar was built at about 40 or 45 percent after the wood was (hopefully) dried and stored at that RH. What you are trying to do is maintain that humidity for all of its life. If it gets a whole lot moister glues can soften and the wood will swell. If it gets less (and stays less) the wood will dry and shrink, may crack and certainly the geometry will change. So what you want to do is keep it happy at that level. If you can do that with the RH of the air in your house, so much the better, and you can safely keep it out. Where I live, I can't - I have a little room humidifier in my music room, it goes thru a gallon of water a day and the RH is still 30 or so (less if the humidifier isn't running). Therefore I simply keep my guitars in their cases with a little sponge/baggie humidifier in each case. I can tell that they are properly humidified because the action stays the same, there are no cracks in the finish or sharp fret ends. There is a great article about humidity at Larrivee's website - it is linked in the Links section of the Annex Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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