Back room storage damp issue

[J C]

Adam has discovered his tools shoving signs of rust after being left in the back room for a month. 

So looks like we have a damp issue. Solutions? 

[Christopher Stanton]

Has the source of the damp been identified ?

Penetrating or merely condensation?

On 27 Dec 2016 17:58, "J C" <jap...@gmail.com> wrote:

Adam has discovered his tools shoving signs of rust after being left in the back room for a month. 

So looks like we have a damp issue. Solutions? 

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[J C]

At the moment we only have evidence of the results - rusty tools

[Daniel F]

1. Check for obvious damp on walls, roof and floor

2. Possibly rig up a humidity meter? 

I wonder if this is one of the roof leaks that has already been fixed - but then the roofer should have known about that... 

[Stephen Rowley]

That room is very sealed I suspect that it may take time to dry out.

[onlyha...@gmail.com]

It's unheated... it's likely to be condensation when due point is reached. Unless you heat the building throughout you are going to get damp in a building this age.

[Andy51055]

There were at least a couple of leaks in there before the roofer sealed the edge of the vertical next to it, so hopefully there is no more water getting in. As it was soaking into the carpet and there is no heating in there it will take some time to dry out. But it would be a good idea to feel the carpet (where it is exposed) to see if/where it is still damp. And maybe give it an hour or so with fan/heater/fan heater.

It would be silly to put in the new shelving if it's still getting damp coming in.

[Stanto]

Okay, I'm aware it was leaking in there previously, and this was noted on the drawn map (which I think you have a copy of) for the roofers to fix.

Whether or not they've fixed it, is unknown, however as others have said, the room will still be damp.

What it needs to counter this, is mainly extraction ventilation, regardless of whether or not the room is heated (proper lighting in there and regular footfall may add to this anyway). It probably wouldn't hurt the hackspace as a whole for somewhere to have extraction to help encourage air egress and prevent damp, mould, etc. In mabgate we had mould growing on the ceiling from condensation, and we certainly have air coming in from the front doors (which is good) but it needs encouragement to blow through the Hackspace (especially since the toilet windows are now sealed from what I can tell, temporarily or otherwise).

If there's a door or window on that room (if I recall there's a door to outside there) perhaps that could be used to have a fan installed on it, in fact, you can get fans which have humidity sensors built into them (these were installed in the last house I rented to counter act this exact problem). However, this is of course, ideal scenario, these fans were designed to run constantly at a low speed to provide constant airflow, and then speed up when humidity increased (even though I don't have links to these right now, at least this may be increasing awareness of this type of thing for everyone reading this, and at least it's a note to myself).

Of course we could buy/hire/whatever dehumidifiers, I personally don't like the idea of running a huge machine to purely collect water that has to be thrown out, I'm not convinced that's a workable solution, but if the humidity's really high in there at present and the source has been eliminated then it may help initially.

On Tuesday, 27 December 2016 18:06:45 UTC, Japoteg wrote:

At the moment we only have evidence of the results - rusty tools

On 27 Dec 2016 18:05, "Christopher Stanton" <sta...@gmail.com> wrote:

Has the source of the damp been identified ?

Penetrating or merely condensation?

On 27 Dec 2016 17:58, "J C" <jap...@gmail.com> wrote:

Adam has discovered his tools shoving signs of rust after being left in the back room for a month. 

So looks like we have a damp issue. Solutions? 

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[J C]

I do have a dehumidifier that would do the job. Its not huge but left in there for a bit should make done improvement. It certainly did at my last house. Needs somone with electronic skills to take a look to give is some tlc though. Think its safely switch is dead. If somone keen to prod it i can bring it in this weekend. 

Joe

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[Stephen Rowley]

dehumidifiers so tend to quite power hungry, but to get the room dried out it may not be a bad idea. I spoke to the roofer day after leak was discovered and showed him it. So finger crossed.

[timpin .]

Important to get the moisture out. Thereafter Stanto’s right - air circulation should be a priority. Am I right in thinking that end wall adjoins the washer area in Enterprise’s garage?

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[Andy51055]

With this building it's impossible to tell for certain, but it does look like it.
However there is no evidence of damp coming in through the end wall/door, so we should be ok there.

Would it be a good idea to do the same thing with the outer door as we did with the workshop one and chop the top off, put in a board and mount an extractor fan? Bathroom extractor fans now mostly come with an adjustable humidity detector that triggers them automatically. And they're quite cheap.

[Stanto]

That's what I was thinking, though the other door, not the inner, and not the one going out to enterprise. If possible.

[Stephen Rowley]

I wouldn't reduce the height of the door opening out there due to it big the main access route to the roof. Maybe attaching a fan to the door with appropriate strain relief.