Worth noting, for anyone that keeps their bay in a garage. Buy a dehumidifier if you haven’t got one Keep it below 60%RH and say goodbye to your ginger friend. You can also dry your Y-fronts in there in the winter
... then you can dehumidify the whole world a pint at a time via your garage while adding to global warming running it 24/7 Ventilation is the key, ask anyone who lives on a narrowboat.
The idea is that your garage is pretty much air tight - modern door etc. it’s a fairly small room and closed a lot in winter so pretty efficient for drying If you’ve got a leaky barn door and a dodgy roof, yes I wouldn’t bother
Thee AA once did a test and the best conditions for keeping a vehicle dry was a car port. I can see that if you had a sealed modern garage it could be a problem, but surely adding ventilation is the answer? I tried a dehumidifier in the boat but it was no help despite sucking lots of water out of the atmosphere - I gave it away recently.
If you can easily reach 50%RH in your garage then it won’t rust ( or only very minimally ). Simple electrochemistry. It’s why cars don’t rust in low humidity parts of the Mediterranean dehumidifying a barge may be different as it’s your living space- leaks, opening doors all the time, leaking windows… a vented UK space in winter will help but never match a dehumidifier- again if the place can be reasonably sealed, or yes, you’ll be attempting to dry the world
Indeed Having worked pretty much my life With static caravan’s I would agree I would always advise leave all curtains open to allow winter sun in cover any soft furnishings with sheets , And let convection do it’s thing, People who shut everything up and put in them moisture trap things that would fill up in no time having drawn in moisture through the all air vent’s doing the opposite of what they wanted to achieve
I’d agree, I’d never seal anything without controlling the environment. If your not controlling the environment, air passage is best
I tried running a dehumidifier in my garage. It made absolutely no difference to the relative humidity. Too much ventilation to dehumidify the space, not enough to stop water condensing on cold metal.
A good coat of wax and open the van windows a little for some airflow in the garage and mine seems to avoid rust - garage is a little breezy and that seems to work well - ventilation and airflow in my opinion
I’m sure that’s pretty good, but rain (actual water on the metal ) and water absorbed in the air Relative Humidity, is what makes the rust. The best you’re going to get when its95%RH outside in the winter is maybe 85% RH in the garage with the air flow method. And that’s a significant help, when you look at the graph above. If it’s possible in a certain situation, and if is for me, 50%RH is a lot better on the graph. Had mine in the garage in the winter and no rust in 6 years. Situation now…
I don’t fancy your electric bill running that dehumidifier 24/7 be cheaper to do the rust on the van every few years - or just drive it regularly
Because it’s a fairly tight seal in the garage only costs £60 for the 6 damp months, £10 a month. I’m happy with that.
I used to work in all sorts of building type things, roof, building, insulation etc etc. There was a formula imprinted in our minds from several sources and it was called H.I.V.E. Heating versus insulation versus ventilation versus excess moisture. Now that was a slightly different way of wording what’s been said above. The only issue with it is there’s way too many variables in this country, easily managed in the summer but our weather extremes make me cringe sometimes. Add to this the different construction techniques for some extreme variances , like certain concrete builds are more / less dense, anything with amounts of steel, underfloor sub structures etc etc. I would use a moisture collector of some description in my old Zafira and in the camper, usually a roundy one with a toilet block type thing in it. If I get most of the moisture out, I don’t have issues on an early morning start with internal misting and occasionally internal freezing up, if I don’t get most of the moisture out then ^^^ that’s what I get first thing every cold morning. My camper van in the garage mists up on the glass if I don’t keep the moisture level down . Garage is well ventilated or draughty as some would call it.. This last winter, I didn’t get any on the van or any in the car and I didn’t use any moisture trap devices. Is that because we had such a hot dry summer that most of the excess moisture was totally dried out making my old beasties as dry as a modern new car ? Don’t know is my answer, but I have noticed the older a car gets, the more it seems to suffer these issues. Be interesting to see what happens this winter as we have a more regular and damp summer. Ozziedog,,,,,,,,, I used to have ALL the answers, now I don’t remember the question
My neighbour set up his garage to be well sealed with an insulated door and then heated it for his Triumph TR3. A dehumidifier can also be regarded as a 300 watt heater with benefits..
Mine sits outside all year round in a car park. In the worst of the winter the screen mists up inside, but the other windows don't, I don't know why.
Bit left and right here, but interesting points. My very simple point is - if you can easily, with use of a dehumidifier, get your camper to less than 60% RH, the science says it won’t rust
