Tool storage in damp garage

I've kept tools in ordinary steel cabinets for 20 years in a 90%+ humidity cellar. Also gardening power and hand tools in a garden outbuilding. No obvious rust or harm. That may be in part because the spaces stay above dew point. Not sure, never checked.

Maybe try a couple of sacrificial items - see what happens?

I used to store tools in a dampish cellar with no real problems when I lived in Oxfordshire. Trouble is, we're now a bit over a mile from the sea and usually downwind. The garage has some very rusty shelving left by the previous owners, though we have now replaced the rusted and 'well ventilated' corrugated roof.

Can you run a dehumidifier in the garage (with drain hose attached)? John

Storing non-electrical items wrapped in oily rags should help, but they would be best placed where condensation can't accumulate (drips from the roofing for example).

I doubt if even generous helpings of calcium cloride could dehumidify an 'room' of the size described.

Keep your tools, etc, in plastic crates with clip-down lids, using a passive dehumidifier in each crate. It’s simple, requires no maintenance, and will be cheaper than running an active dehumidifier.

Beware of desiccant-wheel dehumidifiers, they have been known to catch fire when the wheel stops while in use.

It's not clear to me whether the OP wants to store and leave the these tools or whether they are going to be in regular use but stored in this place in between sessions. I second the oily rag approach. If the tools are in regular use, wipe them down with an oily rag after each use; if only in intermittent use or no use at all, wrap them in that oily rag after wiping them down with it anyway.

When I worked at the music school we suddenly had a client school return two sets of musical steel pans which they didn't want to use any more. We didn't have the room for them in the instrument store but could leave them in the damp/wet cellar. We got some large, heavy duty polythene bags and sealed the steel pans inside with an industrial half kilo pack of silica gel in each. A bit belt and braces and we never really knew whether it was the polythene or the silica gel which preserved them but the pans remained in good condition for years.

Nick

No one has mentioned salt mist that compounds the problem.

Oil spray might be an alternative to oily rag.

I might consider a cabinet with a dehumidifier.

I'm doing that with 3d printer filament in plastic 'cereal' containers with colour-changing silica gel in, and £2 humidity meters from Aliexpress.

RH in the garage about 68%, RH in the boxes 19% and 25%.

When the silica gel has changed colour (is full of moisture), a quick blast of the microwave drives off the water and recharges it.

Theo

I used this sort of stuff umpteen years ago. It worked well:

Mother nature is not all that cooperative to such projects. Despite your best efforts, damp air is going to get at the tools. It would be a shame, to spend a lot of money on this project, and not get a result.

This is an example of what humans can do, when they set their minds to it. That box can achieve a good representative vacuum inside, once the door is closed and the pump starts.

You need a domestic space which is heated and dry, and an occasional wipe of a steel tool, with an oiled cloth would not hurt. Even when a space is heated and dry.

Summary: You could store your supply of damp air, in the garage. And not much else.

The gasket on chest freezers is not always tight, and that's where the frost comes from. The chest freezer "looks pretty", but is not necessarily hermetic.

A pressure cooker has a seal on it, and the seal works because the surfaces are true and they are strong. Pressure can be applied to the bits, without the materials "deflecting" and allowing air to leak. And the gasket has sufficient support so it can't escape. A chest freezer has little in the way of retention force (just door weight versus counter-spring). Some chest freezers have a slide-lock to keep the door closed.

Paul