Possible Condensation Solution?

This maybe a bit extreme, but I have a couple of magnetic block heaters laying around. Stick one on the table of the jointer, one on the table saw. Easily removed when the time to make wood chips arrives. Greg

I use a polythene sheet, with small magnets gaffer-taped on top of it to hold it down. Most of my trouble is with condensation on the uninsulated clear roof, which then drips down.

If you place a plastic sheet over the saw, then you trap whatever moisture is underneath and this will condense out overnight _if_ the dew point is reached. In my workshop, I don't have this trouble - it doesn't get that cold at night, except at roof level. I'd suggest some experimentation before ruling out the plastic sheet approach entirely.

For the truly obsessive and slightly geeky, Dallas iButtons are an excellent and cheap way of logging temperatures overnight. Well worth looking at. Condensation _is_ predictable, if you have knowledge of temperature over night and the initial humidity.

My hand tools now live in a heated steel cupboard. This is just a cupboard, with the anti-condensation heater from an old photocopier mounted in the base. This is 25W, in something the size of a small eardrobe, and is currently giving me about 10°C of extra temperature. (15°C vs 5°C in the workshop).

I'd be a little wary of heating machines. Damp green sawdust and a source of heat might start to ferment and start its own fire. OTOH, my saw has DC by pile and shovel - maybe yours has efficient vacuum.

-- Die Gotterspammerung - Junkmail of the Gods

Am C Em Em

Am C The autumn rain is falling

G D falling down on me.

Am C As I stand forlorn and dripping

Em 'neath the orange and crimson trees.

Am C The canopy above me

G D will soon lie at my feet

Am C as another summer passes on

Em in sorrowful retreat.

CHORUS: G D Whyyyyyy must

Am C the light wend away?

G D Whyyyyyy must

Em the darkness...

Em descend?

CHORDS SIMILE: The autumn rain is falling falling through these trees. A deep and wrenching sorrow brings me to my knees.

Here within the forest here I think I'll lie; lie upon these mossy rocks and plants about to die.

CHORUS

(Music Copyright (c) 1996, Lyrics Copyright (c) 1999 D. Michael McIntyre)

reasonable. paper ignites at 451 F.

Not sure how/where you come up with that number, but it doesn't seem unreasonable.

Something opaque, and particularly if it's a darker color than the frosted glass, will likely get considerably hotter.

Enough to ignite? "I dunno". not a risk I'd care to take.

Now, just sticking something like a trouble-light in, when the saw is in 'cold storage' -- that eliminates all the vibration and/or crud-collecting problems.

I had a similar problem with the tools in my Snapon box rusting in the shop. That little seedling mat in the bottom drawer cured the problem and when the temperature is warm enough, it never comes on. I have been thinking about adding a small solar panel for some cathodic protection too...

... and if the bulb is covered with sawdust it's thermally insulated from the outside, so it will get considerably hotter, especially as the sawdust absobrs the light and infrared radiation, so ignition temperature can be definitly reached. Old tube-equpped TV sets caught fire usually because all the heat-generating parts inside were covered in dust, run hotter and got the dust to burn....

Silvan responds:

You been in those mountains too long. They're turning you somber.

Charlie Self

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers." Thomas J. Watson

You might say I don't like autumn rain...

Or winter. :(

Gotta survive it another year to get to the other side though. My mood shifts dramatically in late Februaryish when it becomes "spring" to me.

Oddly, there's no happy counterpart to "Autumn Rain" though. I only write songs when I'm depressed I guess.