Advice on the preventing condensation inside the boat
- Thread starter wlieppe
- Start date
Season to season in different locations are different as well.. two winters ago i had to swap out the bags 2 times as they filled up. this year it wasn't as bad and i only went through one set. on the whole, one set lasts us here.
Nice! We can go pretty much year round as well. Our buddies on the northeast and northwest would be sunbathing in our winter weather, but I'm not really enjoying it as much below about 50 F. My last trip was Thanksgiving last year, but not due to weather. My first trip was last Thursday, but there were a lot of good days missed in between due to other issues.
My Damp Rid Story: I was regularly using a damp rid catch container with the DR bag inside. Would place it ‘securely’ on inside starboard storage rail at about 12” above the waterline. Would change the baggy every few weeks in the Summer. After about 18-mos, I pulled the settee cushion to gain access to the underneath storage. Whoa! I spotted water droplets all over the wood top (under the vinyl cushion).
OMG! I must have a leak from a portlight above?? So, I dried the wood, replaced the DR baggy, left a fan on overnight to completely dry, and placed some blue paper towels below the portlights in the hope of marking where the rain was coming in.
Came back a few days later after a big rain. Paper towels were bone dry, fan was still running, but the wood was wet with beaded droplets on top. Hmmm??
That’s when I noticed the DR baggy was empty and the DR container was too... Uh-oh: the DR container had sprung a leak and basically soaked in to my settee wood top.
How to fix? I had to take wood top home; spray water mist on top to draw the DR out of the wood. Did this for a week. Then used penetrating epoxy to seal it up.
Lesson of the story: no more Damp Rid on the boat! Shannon
OMG! I must have a leak from a portlight above?? So, I dried the wood, replaced the DR baggy, left a fan on overnight to completely dry, and placed some blue paper towels below the portlights in the hope of marking where the rain was coming in.
Came back a few days later after a big rain. Paper towels were bone dry, fan was still running, but the wood was wet with beaded droplets on top. Hmmm??
That’s when I noticed the DR baggy was empty and the DR container was too... Uh-oh: the DR container had sprung a leak and basically soaked in to my settee wood top.
How to fix? I had to take wood top home; spray water mist on top to draw the DR out of the wood. Did this for a week. Then used penetrating epoxy to seal it up.
Lesson of the story: no more Damp Rid on the boat! Shannon
@mnmpizza,
Sorry you had that experience. Dessicants are fine if you live in a place that doesn't have much of a humidity problem. Where you and I live, non-regenerative desiccant won't cut it unless you've got a lot of it and change it quite often. Sounds like you figured it out before major damage occurred, though.
Sorry you had that experience. Dessicants are fine if you live in a place that doesn't have much of a humidity problem. Where you and I live, non-regenerative desiccant won't cut it unless you've got a lot of it and change it quite often. Sounds like you figured it out before major damage occurred, though.
I have a 1984 Oday 28 in humid NC with no ventilation. I use Damp Rid but that hardly helps as it moisturizes so fast. Thinking of of the Beckson Vent-o-mate you recommend. I hate to cut holes in the boat. Guess I could put it in the forward hatch. How much weight would it add? Or cut a hole topsides somewhere. If you cut a hole how do you seal the core that is exposed? Epoxy or fiberglass I guess plus silicon sealer as the final ingredient?
I keep my boat in the water. We had issues with condensation as well. To prevent condensation forming on the inside of the boat is keep the temperature inside the boat higher than the outside. I kept two 100W bulbs burning and that worked. When 100W bulbs were outlawed I bought one of the round heater fans that worked real well too. I also have a day night exhaust fan running in the hatch up in the vberth. That combination solved our condensation issues.
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I see clear ones and fancy ones that sell for several dollars each but I have not seen the four packs of the plain old bulbs in a long time. In fact the selection of incandescent bulbs is getting smaller and smaller.
Not quite true, I actually bought three boxes at a Goodwill store a month a ago just to add to my stash.
Please do not cut any holes in the topsides - hull thickness is just not that significant on your model.
Our "Vent-O-Mate" ventilators are on either side of the aft part of the housetop. Different boats will have different areas available for this. Some folks drill a 4 inch (approx) hole in their plexiglass hatch lens, but I would not.
Yes we undercut the hole surface and filled it in with thickened epoxy. Same for all of the screws.
(Our vent locations were selected to help the aft head on one side and the aft cabin on the other. Your head area is forward, so I would guess that you would want to add ventilation on the house top in that area.)