Drying in a fridge

How does the moisture escape in a sealed fridge?

harrychilds said:

How does the moisture escape in a sealed fridge?

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When the compressor cycles it cools the fridge at which point moisture in the air condenses on the back and runs down into that little drain most modern frost free fridges have, when the compressor kicks off the fridge warms back up which allows the Vapor pressure deficit between the bud and the air to equalise, stripping moisture away from the bud and into the air, then the compressor kicks back on and the water in the air condenses on the back and drains away again

edit: not all fridges have the drain but all of the frost free fridge freezers I’ve ever seen have it

It’s kind of the same process as happens in a freeze dryer however there is no vacuum so water doesn’t subliminate (turn from solid to gas with no liquid stage) but changes from liquid in the bud to gas in the air

Blue brother said:

It’s kind of the same process as happens in a freeze dryer however there is no vacuum so water doesn’t subliminate (turn from solid to gas with no liquid stage) but changes from liquid in the bud to gas in the air

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Edit, there are a lot of differences between freeze dryer and fridge but I was just trying to better explain the process

Blue brother said:

Interesting, are you relying on the porous nature of the paper bag to allow the Vapor pressure to equalise at a slow rate, or are you opening the bag to let out moisture periodically?

glad you popped by

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Totally rely on the bag and exposed stem ends. I place damp-rid desiccant units in the fridge to capture the vapor. Its modified from a method I used in tents during guerrilla ops when babysitting your dry and cure wasn't really an option.

Slight correction, they are "drying cells" to be accurate, then curing takes place in jars. Since all drying and sweating is done by the time they get there, it's really low maintenance. Burp every few days and they're on point. Nice thing about this approach is the bags give you a security net against large swings of RH and near total prohibition of mold growth. In combo with the stable cold temp and super low RH, its fairly bulletproof with fantastic drying results and buds perfectly prepared for cure.

Cannaclysmic Events said:

Totally rely on the bag and exposed stem ends. I place damp-rid desiccant units in the fridge to capture the vapor. Its modified from a method I used in tents during guerrilla ops when babysitting your dry and cure wasn't really an option.

Slight correction, they are "drying cells" to be accurate, then curing takes place in jars. Since all drying and sweating is done by the time they get there, it's really low maintenance. Burp every few days and they're on point. Nice thing about this approach is the bags give you a security net against large swings of RH and near total prohibition of mold growth. In combo with the stable cold temp and super low RH, its fairly bulletproof with fantastic drying results and buds perfectly prepared for cure.

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You're being sarcastic right?

Cannaclysmic Events said:

Totally rely on the bag and exposed stem ends. I place damp-rid desiccant units in the fridge to capture the vapor. Its modified from a method I used in tents during guerrilla ops when babysitting your dry and cure wasn't really an option.

Slight correction, they are "drying cells" to be accurate, then curing takes place in jars. Since all drying and sweating is done by the time they get there, it's really low maintenance. Burp every few days and they're on point. Nice thing about this approach is the bags give you a security net against large swings of RH and near total prohibition of mold growth. In combo with the stable cold temp and super low RH, its fairly bulletproof with fantastic drying results and buds perfectly prepared for cure.

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You’re just a riot dude

I'm on day 3 of using a wine cooler / with inkbird humidity controller / Dehumidifier / And Ac Infinity PC Fan

Temps have stayed between 55 - 60f with RH between 55 - 60 %

I'm not going to open the fridge for another week and a half and just let it do it's thing and see what happens.

Gotta say I'm liking using a wine cooler and dehumidifier for drying. I haven't cut it a place to mount dehumidifier, it's just the deconstructed unit sitting on the bottom.

keifcake said:

Gotta say I'm liking using a wine cooler and dehumidifier for drying. I haven't cut it a place to mount dehumidifier, it's just the deconstructed unit sitting on the bottom.

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What’s not to love haha. Perfect conditions, low temp, precise humidity control, low turbulence, less volatilisation of your precious terpenes resulting in a much nicer experience. I’ve just popped some gmo x platinum and I’m excited to see how the garlic terps hang around for the smoke considering how strong the air dried samples of other peoples tasted.

I live in a subtropical climate, humidity is always high, so drying is always inconsistent. I had to pull some out after about a week and put in a jar because I needed the room for a couple more being harvested, and they smell pretty good, pretty close to the live plant. I'll be ready to try the smoke myself.
I grow a lot of indoor tropical sativas, this thing is going to be really sweet on the loose airy sativas that always dry out waaay too fast.

@Blue brother - hi, you have already given me advice.. I would really appreciate your help one more time.
I have tried 1frost free fridge dry - it failed.I hanged the buds in free air, and in 10-14 days they were EXTREMELY dry.

You gave a answer to why that happened.
Quote "I think what you are referring to is a fridge that uses a compressor, yeah those will dry the weed out quick snap if u can’t find a way of partially shielding the buds from the air in the fridge. But you can use jars with screen lids or even just jars or bags that you periodically burp the excess moisture out of and into the fridge. yes the compressor in the fridge will work tirelessly to strip away the moisture from your bud, by constantly allowing the space to warm and cool and draining the condensate each time. This is negated by using containers ( either almost airtight or porous)"


My question - the forum threads for this method are full of people just hanging their harvest in the fridge without any barrier (jar, paper bag, pizza box etc).HOW DO THEY GET GOOD RESULTS ?

What you wrote makes sense and I saw the results in my own fridge dry. So how do other people succeed by just hanging? (without adding any humidifiers/fan/dehumidifiers in the fridge)

Thanks!

kreikrei said:

@Blue brother - hi, you have already given me advice.. I would really appreciate your help one more time.
I have tried 1frost free fridge dry - it failed.I hanged the buds in free air, and in 10-14 days they were EXTREMELY dry.

You gave a answer to why that happened.
Quote "I think what you are referring to is a fridge that uses a compressor, yeah those will dry the weed out quick snap if u can’t find a way of partially shielding the buds from the air in the fridge. But you can use jars with screen lids or even just jars or bags that you periodically burp the excess moisture out of and into the fridge. yes the compressor in the fridge will work tirelessly to strip away the moisture from your bud, by constantly allowing the space to warm and cool and draining the condensate each time. This is negated by using containers ( either almost airtight or porous)"


My question - the forum threads for this method are full of people just hanging their harvest in the fridge without any barrier (jar, paper bag, pizza box etc).HOW DO THEY GET GOOD RESULTS ?

What you wrote makes sense and I saw the results in my own fridge dry. So how do other people succeed by just hanging? (without adding any humidifiers/fan/dehumidifiers in the fridge)

Thanks!

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I’m not sure how those people succeed because my understanding of the science of drying and the process of dehumidification that happens in a fridge doesn’t correlate with those results.

check out what @Cannaclysmic Events did, a few posts back, he uses paper bags around the buds tied tight around the stem, the bag will breathe, and so will that exposed stem but still provide some sort of shielding to slow down the process.

im still yet to try a grove bag in a fridge, but I do believe that’s an experiment worth trying.

im sorry your run failed, my only advice would be to take the advice I allready gave and use some sort of shield, barring that the only way I can see it working is with controllers and a humidifier to combat the huge dip in humidity as the compressor cycles.

best of luck mate!

edit: I have seen people putting loose buds in the salad crisper area of the fridge as this is designed to shield salad from the drying nature of the air. But I haven’t done this and won’t reccomend it. All I can do is give advice based on my understanding of the processes at play.

I have no fridge experience but would guess that how packed the fridge is has a huge influence on final result and time to dry. An almost full fridge would seem smartest but again no actual experience

ComfortCreator said:

I have no fridge experience but would guess that how packed the fridge is has a huge influence on final result and time to dry. An almost full fridge would seem smartest but again no actual experience

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You are right mate, hypothetically yes the more the merrier in terms of dragging out the timescale, there is a finite volume of air, the amount of water is a variable

From my July harvest.

The fridge had lower RH but took longer to dry because of the lower temperature. I wasn't able to tell the difference when I did a smoke test.

Pretty interesting video so far.

1ManGrow said:

Pretty interesting video so far.

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i spent so long looking for something like this, nearly everything I eventually put into practise was the result of research on subjects far from the matter at hand, wish I’d of seen this 2year ago

DrOgkush said:

Look. This is what your doing.

You placing 70 oz of wet salad in a fridge expecting it to dry out.

my small bags of salad doesn’t even dry out in the fridge. I can’t wait to see your results. Cause if it works. I’ll bite. If it fails. I’ll know. I’ll be watching for sure.
But That’s my point. It seems like your putting wet weed in a sealed jar and because it’s cold. It will work better. Lol. You still have to comply with humidity

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It's simply a matter of suspending the material in appropriate sized portions, and setting a trap for released moisture. If you spread that Salad out so it sees air on all sides as much as possible it will dry to a crisp in that same fridge. Add calcium chloride to the mix and you have a perfect environment for moving water through the material and trapping it.

Cannaclysmic Events said:

It's simply a matter of suspending the material in appropriate sized portions, and setting a trap for released moisture. If you spread that Salad out so it sees air on all sides as much as possible it will dry to a crisp in that same fridge. Add calcium chloride to the mix and you have a perfect environment for moving water through the material and trapping it.

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Hats off to @DrOgkush he actually tried it with a bud in his fridge and the bud did dry, however he didn’t use a porous barrier to slow down the drying, so he didn’t like the results.