humidor won't rise above 50, how do i fix that?

[rus]

recently bought a used table top style glass top 100 stick humidor off an acquaintance. it had been seasoned and is perfect condition. i tested the hygrometer with the salt test, read as perfect. it came with a couple triangle shaped bars full of water activated gel beads as well as the standard green foam 'block' that mounts inside the case....

my issue, as stated in the title, is that no matter what i do, i can not get the humidity to rise above 50. i tried a gel bead bar, 50. got some 'cigar juice' solution, soaked the foam bar, 50. set a bowl of distilled water inside. 50. put it in a very warm, dark closet, 50. set it on a table away from windows, 50. originally i only had about 10 sticks in it, added another 30, still reads 50. nothing i seem to do raises or lowers it any. only thing i have not tried is using both bars and the block, but that seems excessive.

any suggestions on things i could try or possible causes?

thank you, appreciate the advice.

[ggiese]

recently bought a used table top style glass top 100 stick humidor off an acquaintance. it had been seasoned and is perfect condition. i tested the hygrometer with the salt test, read as perfect. it came with a couple triangle shaped bars full of water activated gel beads as well as the standard green foam 'block' that mounts inside the case....
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my issue, as stated in the title, is that no matter what i do, i can not get the humidity to rise above 50. i tried a gel bead bar, 50. got some 'cigar juice' solution, soaked the foam bar, 50. set a bowl of distilled water inside. 50. put it in a very warm, dark closet, 50. set it on a table away from windows, 50. originally i only had about 10 sticks in it, added another 30, still reads 50. nothing i seem to do raises or lowers it any. only thing i have not tried is using both bars and the block, but that seems excessive.

any suggestions on things i could try or possible causes?

thank you, appreciate the advice.

here - read through this....

http://www.cigarsmokers.com/threads/...storage-primer

[rus]

read it. interesting, but didn't really answer my question.
i realize i could get gel beads that are 'set' at a specific %, but it doesn't explain why my humidor is far less humid than it should be. i want to understand why it's happening as much as i want to fix it.

[badwhale]

read it. interesting, but didn't really answer my question.
i realize i could get gel beads that are 'set' at a specific %, but it doesn't explain why my humidor is far less humid than it should be. i want to understand why it's happening as much as i want to fix it.

Fix your shift key, and we'll answer your questions.

[CoventryCat86]

rust, is the "Shift" key broken on your computer keyboard or are you just too damn lazy to use it? If you can't make posts on this board like an adult then get the fuck out of here.

I have some advice for you about what you should do to solve your humidor problem but I need you to study this photo and get back to us, okay rust?

[rus]

Shift key?
Are you saying that since I have not been capitalizing each new sentence I am not speaking like an adult and should 'get the fuck out'? I suspect you then feel that your response is somehow 'mature' but my lack of capitalization is juvenile? Is this some sort of joke? Is there something else I'm missing?

[CoventryCat86]

There is currently a lot of controversy about rus' blanket statements, and I know that any discussion on the subject will almost certainly cause someone to keep a close eye on those who look like they might think an unapproved thought. Still, beer-guzzling, quarrelsome rabble-rousers like rus tend to conveniently ignore the key issues of this or any other situation. The key point of the following exposition is that rus takes things out of context, twists them around, and then neglects to provide decent referencing so the reader can check up on him. He also ignores all of the evidence that doesn't support (or in many cases directly contradicts) his position. He doesn't simply want people to believe that the Universe belongs to him by right. He wants this belief drummed into people's heads from birth. He wants it to be accepted as an axiom, an assumed part of the nature of reality. Only then will rus truly be able to get away with creating a kind of psychic pain at the very root of the modern mind.

While rus is out gumming up what were once great ideas, the general public is shouldering the bill. Sadly, this is a bill of shattered minds, broken hearts and homes, depression and all its attendant miseries, and a despondency about rus' attempts to establish tacit boundaries and ground rules for the permissible spectrum of opinion. Let me move now from the abstract to the concrete. That is, let me give you a (mercifully) few examples of Rus's outrageous ineptitude. For starters, his cause is not glorious. It is not wonderful. It is not good.

To say that taxpayers are a magic purse that never runs out of gold is batty nonsense and untrue to boot. To rus' mind, arriving at a true state of comprehension is too difficult and/or time-consuming. So that means that people don't mind having their communities turned into war zones, right? No, not right. The truth is that I suggest that we expose rus' malversation. This right and truthful proposition, practically established, will help us inculcate in the reader an inquisitive spirit and a skepticism about beliefs that rus' janissaries take for granted.

Rus just reported that he has no answers for anything. Do you think that that's merely sloppy reporting on rus' part? I don't. I think that it's a deliberate attempt to propitiate the most slimy troglodytes I've ever seen for later eventualities.

We should note, of course, that what I've written about rus doesn't prove anything in itself. It's only suggestive, but it does make a good point that there are some simple truths in this world. First, rus never seems to listen to anyone else's positions and reasoning. Second, vandalism, death threats, and slander are typical tactics used by rus' hangers-on. And finally, the time has come to choose between freedom or slavery, revolt or submission, and liberty or rus' particularly insufferable form of teetotalism. It's clear what rus wants us to choose, but it is hardly surprising that he wants to move increasingly towards the establishment of a totalitarian Earth. After all, this is the same bookish, self-satisfied fussbudget whose worthless prattle informed us that "metanarratives" are the root of tyranny, lawlessness, overpopulation, racial hatred, world hunger, disease, and rank stupidity.

It does not take much perspicacity to see that obscurantism is the last refuge of the incompetent. Surely, rus is not too disloyal to realize that. Of course, I'm generalizing a little here. But that's only because his true goal is to draw young children into his illiberal way of life. All the statements that his helots make to justify or downplay that goal are only apologetics; they do nothing to take off the kid gloves and vent some real anger at rus. Either he has no real conception of the sweep of history, or he is merely intent on winning some debating pin by trying to pierce a hole in my logic with "facts" that are taken out of context.

Insensitive mountebanks like rus always lie. Even an occasional truth is intended only to cover up a bigger falsification and is therefore, itself, a deliberate untruth. From a purely technical point of view, he seems to be involved in a number of illegal or borderline-illegal activities. For rus and his lieutenants, tax evasion and financial chicanery are scarcely outside the norm. Even financial fraud and thievery seem to be okay. What's next? Changing the course of history? I can say only that you don't need to be a rocket scientist to detect the subtext of this letter. But just in case it's too subliminal for some, let me thrust it into your face right here: Many, many people have been hurt by Rus for daring to get him off our backs. In fact, there are so many such people that even listing their names would take more space than I can afford in this letter. In their honor, though, I will say that rus believes that a richly evocative description of a problem automatically implies the correct solution to that problem. Sorry, but I have to call foul on that one.

This march into bestial, bloody-minded snobbism is not happening by mere chance. It is not, as many addlepated bludgers insist, the result of the natural, inevitable course of things. It is happening as a direct result of Rus's treasonous warnings. I was pleased to learn that countless muckrakers have already exposed the evils of Rus's cynical allocutions. There are several logical contradictions in his position on this matter. For example, I'm willing to accept that rus will flip his lid when he learns that I've been dealing stiffly with the worst kinds of poxy self-proclaimed arbiters of taste and standards I've ever seen who form the association in the public's mind between any prank phone calls he disagrees with and the ideas of hate and violence and illegality. I'm even willing to accept that his animadversions represent the most sex-crazed form of moral turpitude conceivable. But as our society continues to unravel, more and more people will be grasping for straws, grasping for something to hold onto, grasping for something that promises to give them the sense of security and certainty that they so desperately need. These are the classes of people Rus preys upon.

Maybe some day, rus will finally stop trying to distract people from making a serious analysis of the situation. Don't hold your breath, though. His politics will have consequences, intended and otherwise, which is another way of saying that he indubitably believes that the Queen of England heads up the international drug cartel. Unfortunately for him, that's all in his imagination. Rus needs to get out of that fictional world and get back to reality, where people can see that he is firmly convinced that his opinions represent the opinions of the majority—or even a plurality. His belief is controverted, however, by the weight of the evidence indicating that this will become even more obvious in the years just ahead. But the problems with rus' personal attacks don't end there.

rus should get a life and stay out of mine. That proves that unless rus provides unequivocal evidence to the contrary, I will continue to maintain that we live together, you and I, in a dark time when someone like him can create a world without history, without philosophy, without science, without reason—a world without beauty of any kind, without art, without literature, without culture. Sadly, lack of space prevents me from elaborating further. You should check out some of the things he's saying about lexiphanicism. The litany of inaccuracies, half-truths, made-up "facts", and downright falsehoods will shock you. And I won't even bother mentioning that rus' faithfuls like to say, "It's inappropriate to teach children right from wrong." Such frothy eloquence neither convinces nor satisfies me. If someone wants me to believe something odious like that, that person will have to show me some concrete evidence. Meanwhile, I intend to show you that rus and his minions are humorless perjurers. This is not set down in complaint against them but merely as analysis. Finally, it is not at all unlikely that in this letter I have said some things to which many of my readers may take exception. It has not been any part of my purpose either to please or to displease anybody but simply to tell the truth and to say, so far as I have given expression to my views, precisely what I think. And what I think is this: rus' favorite activities include cheating, lying, and tricking people into believing that sensationalism is the key to world peace.

[rus]

I can't even get upset at this, I just feel like I'm in the twilight zone. As if I accidentally clicked on some sort of joke forum that pretends to be about cigars, but in actuality is just designed to try and confuse me.

[craig]

The humidor is leaking.

[Mangyrat]

Your hydrometer is crap, get a digital one and calibrate it.
Yes i saw the part where you said you tested yours but if the flipping thing always reads 50 its broken.

[CoventryCat86]

I had a voltmeter once, every time I plugged it in to one of my outlets, it said I only had 50VAC but my lights were working fine. Hey rust, any idea what my problem was?

[CoventryCat86]

Hey rust, can you give the name of the episode in which this character appeared? If you come up with the correct answer by 8:00 pm AST, I'll send you a free cigar.

[ggiese]

read it. interesting, but didn't really answer my question.
i realize i could get gel beads that are 'set' at a specific %, but it doesn't explain why my humidor is far less humid than it should be. i want to understand why it's happening as much as i want to fix it.

With so many things it could possibly be, i'm 'stumped without further information. To be fair and get a good handle on the situation so we can solve this mystery, I'm going to have to drop by your house and get a look at your set up. This week looks a bit booked, but I think I might be able to pencil you in for next week. What days look good for you? Also - if you're not in the Chicago area, I'm going to need to get on looking for flights? What airport are you near?

BTW - pay no mind to CoventryCat - he's a bit odd (if you know what I mean...). And I'd sincerely appreciate it if you kept that between the two of us.

[CoventryCat86]

Well rust, you missed the deadline, the episode was called "To Serve Man." I was going to send you a nice Añejo 60 from my special stash where unlike you, I'm able to keep my cigars at 65% RH.

I see ggiese posted in this thread. I have him on "ignore" so I can't see what he said.

Today, 07:56 PM
ggiese
Whipping Snappers!
This message is hidden because ggiese is on your ignore list.
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Did he say anything bad about me? If so don't listen to him, he's locked up in a psychiatric institution somewhere in Illinois and I think they only give him internet privileges for a couple of hours after supper.

[ashauler]

The humidor is leaking.

This.

Try the dollar bill and flashlight tests. FYI, capital letters, proper punctuation and relatively good grammar are appreciated around here. Feel free to use profanity as well, just be sure to spell your profanity correctly to avoid any misunderstandings.

[Paddy]

Your hydrometer is crap, get a digital one and calibrate it.
Yes i saw the part where you said you tested yours but if the flipping thing always reads 50 its broken.

This --------
Analog Hygros are a piece of crap.

[ggiese]

Ok - let's please slow down. Everyone is speculating at this point. I think we need to get eyes on the situation so we can have a better sense of what's going on. Then we can talk about what we need to do to remediate the situation.

Ashauler - I'll be sure to tuck a dollar bill in my wallet.

Paddy/MangyRat - I'll be sure to check his manual hygrometer for accuracy, ensure it's a quality instrument and that it is working properly.

I also intend to bring equipment along to ensure his water source is truly free of any free radicals. You know what not having he proper water does to humidification devices.

Buzz - you up for a mission? I know you have some incredible equipment available to test atmospheric condition - that could be very useful in this situation. If you're able to break free, I assure you there will be some quality cigars and scotch on the back end of the project,

And I sincerely hope CoventryCat does not volunteer to go on this trip. The last trip with him was quite a fiasco...

[buzz]

Buzz - you up for a mission? I know you have some incredible equipment available to test atmospheric condition - that could be very useful in this situation. If you're able to break free, I assure you there will be some quality cigars and scotch on the back end of the project,

You had me at "mission"

[ggiese]

You had me at "mission"

excellent! Let's get the equipment packed up and ready to go. As soon as we hear from Rus, we can get the ball rolling!

Listen - I was thinking... Perhaps we should invite the wives along. I know your wife was bummed when the London humidor fell through. We could make it up to them by doing a scientific AND social event all rolled into one. You game?

[badwhale]

excellent! Let's get the equipment packed up and ready to go. As soon as we hear from Rus, we can get the ball rolling!

Listen - I was thinking... Perhaps we should invite the wives along. I know your wife was bummed when the London humidor fell through. We could make it up to them by doing a scientific AND social event all rolled into one. You game?

You guys could take the Yugo...oh, wait. Sorry...