Replies

1. 
   SawdustSteve | Sep 20, 2004 03:28am | #1

   Hi Sam...

   Look on the good side... no rust on your tools. Forced Hot Air is probably the worst invention anyone could come up with. It goes along with the (im)famous combination hairbrush-toothbrush-toiletbowl brush. Find a heating contractor who is familiar with INDUSTRIAL applications. There are several styles of humidifiers that can be retrofitted to your system. Some blow the heated air past (through) a 'wet sponge' and others spray a fine mist of water into the heated air before it is sent down the pipes and out the registers. Home heating guys are nice but most can not handle your industrial size spaces or requirements. SawdustSteve

1. 
   stairboy | Sep 20, 2004 05:24am | #4

   thanks Steve.

   Sam

2. 
   WayneL5 | Sep 20, 2004 04:50am | #2

   The size of the unit needed to humidify a space isn't dependent on the size of the space, but on the permeability of the envelope and the number of air changes.  If your shop has a good vapor barrier installed, and the heating system does not use shop air for combustion, a good sized household system might be fine.

   I'd contact a good HVAC guy.  Perhaps a small local outfit that does commercial engineering and design of HVAC systems.

1. 
   stairboy | Sep 20, 2004 05:22am | #3

   Thanks for that Wayne

3. 
   JohnWW | Sep 20, 2004 04:36pm | #5

   Sam:,

   Two points worth considering:

   1.  All of the several hundred gallons of water you add over the course of the winter with a humidifier will have to go somewhere eventually.  Some of it will be exhausted to the outdoors as water vapor but most of it will be condensing some where in or on the coldest surfaces of your shop.  Unless you have very good glazing on the windows, and thick insulation in the walls, sealed with an effective vapor barrier, you may find that you will be dealing with serious condensation, mold, and rot problems by spring.

   2.  Desert dry air is a fact of life in northern climes (I'm a Vermonter), no matter what level of humidity you maintain in your shop, any piece of furniture, and the wood it is made out of, will still have to be designed for dealing with fairly extreme winter shrinkage once it is delivered to your clients.  Keeping your shop humidified won't change this.  At least when you build furniture in a low humidity environment you know that all future wood movement will be expansion, so there's no need to break out the moisture meter by the time you reach mid December.

   John W.

   
   

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   Edited 9/20/2004 3:55 pm ET by JohnW

4. 
   AlbionWood | Sep 21, 2004 06:41pm | #6

   I'm with John W. on this one - why is dryness a problem?  Seems to me that the high humidity of summer would be a greater problem, as your furniture is sure to shrink in your customers' homes in winter.  I worry a lot more about the damage caused by shrinkage than the effects of swelling (except for knockdown joinery).

   "Everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler."  A. Einstein

   http://www.albionworks.net