Dessicant question

Doesnt absorb much water compared to desicants. Can get wet, disolve and when salt water contacts metal....bad shit happens.

Gunner

Rule #35 "That which does not kill you, has made a huge tactical error"

Aside from the solubility issue, (yikes) your comment about the amount of water that can be picked up is right on point also. Some of those are so-called 'silica gell' which is an odd animal called a "sol-gel" which is basically a really porous glass. In the same way activated charcoal can adsorb chemicals, this stuff can pick up a lot of water vapor and bind it for release later, and then be returned back to its original state with some heat.

There are also some that are (I think) calcium sulfate, which hydrates, or binds with water. In some sense the calcium sulfate is indeed a "salt" in the general sense, even though it's not table salt.

Jim

Yeah, salt doesn' do much. Calcium chloride is the ingredient that works. Just buy some DampRid from SprawlMart. It collects moisture until the chrystals are gone. Bugs

THANKS!!! everybody for your thoughtful answers. I sure learn a lot from this group.

Ivan Vegvary

Calcium chloride sucks up moisture but is corrosive.

Yup, just about any chloride+moisture combined with metal is bad news. There's a lot of dessicants that are used in the lab that wouldn't be suitable for general use. Typically, these are chemicals that have a lot of water of crystalization, drive this off with heat and you've got dessicant. Gypsum works, it isn't the best, but it would work.

Silca gel has the property of being nontoxic, so if the yard apes have a habit of putting stuff in their mouths, it won't hurt them. It's one of the better dessicants, as well.

Stan

They don't use the chloride. Dri-Rite is calcium sulfate I think.

Sol-gels are strange stuff. I watched a man synthesizing them when I worked for GTE. They were basically trying to create castable fiber-optic connectors I think.

Jim