Hello everyone!

Does anyone use a fogger to increase moisture level?
Does that work?
I`m planning to cober the top and three sides of my wood shelves unit with
clear plastic.
My fluorescent will generate enough heat I think, but I was thinking to get
one small fogger to increase humidity instead of using my house humidifier.
I have problem maintaining humidity higher that 40 % mainly because it`s so
freezing cold outside I have no choice of overheat my house to feel
comfortable but heat decrease humidity!!!
See my point !

So, what do you, all specialist, think about my idea?

Thanks

Claude

I wound up going back to my cool mist humidifier. All the fogger did was
make a puddle under the bowl! I didnt' notice it raised the humidity that
much, unless it was in the fishtank with my masds..wich interestingly enough
kept them too wet and they all died....I'm no expert here mind you, but
that's the experience I had with it. IF you want to fiddle with one..try
mainlandmart.com they have foggers for $25 you supply the bowl.

--

Hugs,
Molli


"Claude" wrote in message
s.com...
Hello everyone!

Does anyone use a fogger to increase moisture level?
Does that work?
I`m planning to cober the top and three sides of my wood shelves unit with
clear plastic.
My fluorescent will generate enough heat I think, but I was thinking to
get
one small fogger to increase humidity instead of using my house
humidifier.
I have problem maintaining humidity higher that 40 % mainly because it`s
so
freezing cold outside I have no choice of overheat my house to feel
comfortable but heat decrease humidity!!!
See my point !

So, what do you, all specialist, think about my idea?

Thanks

Claude

I wound up going back to my cool mist humidifier. All the fogger did was
make a puddle under the bowl! I didnt' notice it raised the humidity that
much, unless it was in the fishtank with my masds..wich interestingly enough
kept them too wet and they all died....I'm no expert here mind you, but
that's the experience I had with it. IF you want to fiddle with one..try
mainlandmart.com they have foggers for $25 you supply the bowl.

--

Hugs,
Molli


"Claude" wrote in message
s.com...
Hello everyone!

Does anyone use a fogger to increase moisture level?
Does that work?
I`m planning to cober the top and three sides of my wood shelves unit with
clear plastic.
My fluorescent will generate enough heat I think, but I was thinking to
get
one small fogger to increase humidity instead of using my house
humidifier.
I have problem maintaining humidity higher that 40 % mainly because it`s
so
freezing cold outside I have no choice of overheat my house to feel
comfortable but heat decrease humidity!!!
See my point !

So, what do you, all specialist, think about my idea?

Thanks

Claude

I'm interested in this as I've found home humidifiers to be problematic.
I'm growing in an upstairs 6x10 foot room using a ceiling fan and 2 oscillating
tabletop fans on the floor. Also a ceramic heater in the winter to maintain a
daytime 79/81°F temp.

I've found the cool mist wicks dry out too fast and end up doing no wiking.

The warm mist ones are better but I think add to the heat problem (has got to
95+, I think the Coryanthes like that but others don't) in the summer and
deteriorate as they're only made to be on a couple of hours a day and not 12.
As I've got the windows open in the summer and dry heat in the winter I really
need to humidify in both those seasons. Less so in the spring and fall as
ambient temps with the hid on are kinder.

So I've considered this solution. Would use their (mainlandmart) 5 mister unit
in a tub with the floatation device to maintain water depth over the mister.
This one's suppose to do .5 litre per hour. This isn't a lot. The other 5 mister
unit at 1.5 may be too much. I was wondering if the mist would make it out of
the tub as the water level sank. Perhaps the ceiling fan would blow it out. Also
really don't need pooling water indoors. Hoping the fans would help with this
too. It is quite breezy in there.

Doug Bolton

On Fri, 30 Jan 2004 13:52:37 -0700, "molli" wrote:

I wound up going back to my cool mist humidifier. All the fogger did was
make a puddle under the bowl! I didnt' notice it raised the humidity that
much, unless it was in the fishtank with my masds..wich interestingly enough
kept them too wet and they all died....I'm no expert here mind you, but
that's the experience I had with it. IF you want to fiddle with one..try
mainlandmart.com they have foggers for $25 you supply the bowl.

I'm interested in this as I've found home humidifiers to be problematic.
I'm growing in an upstairs 6x10 foot room using a ceiling fan and 2 oscillating
tabletop fans on the floor. Also a ceramic heater in the winter to maintain a
daytime 79/81°F temp.

I've found the cool mist wicks dry out too fast and end up doing no wiking.

The warm mist ones are better but I think add to the heat problem (has got to
95+, I think the Coryanthes like that but others don't) in the summer and
deteriorate as they're only made to be on a couple of hours a day and not 12.
As I've got the windows open in the summer and dry heat in the winter I really
need to humidify in both those seasons. Less so in the spring and fall as
ambient temps with the hid on are kinder.

So I've considered this solution. Would use their (mainlandmart) 5 mister unit
in a tub with the floatation device to maintain water depth over the mister.
This one's suppose to do .5 litre per hour. This isn't a lot. The other 5 mister
unit at 1.5 may be too much. I was wondering if the mist would make it out of
the tub as the water level sank. Perhaps the ceiling fan would blow it out. Also
really don't need pooling water indoors. Hoping the fans would help with this
too. It is quite breezy in there.

Doug Bolton

On Fri, 30 Jan 2004 13:52:37 -0700, "molli" wrote:

I wound up going back to my cool mist humidifier. All the fogger did was
make a puddle under the bowl! I didnt' notice it raised the humidity that
much, unless it was in the fishtank with my masds..wich interestingly enough
kept them too wet and they all died....I'm no expert here mind you, but
that's the experience I had with it. IF you want to fiddle with one..try
mainlandmart.com they have foggers for $25 you supply the bowl.

Doug,

There are many things to consider when working on boosting humidity. Unless
the room is sealed off from the rest of the house, anything you do will be
attempting to humidify the whole house.

If we assume that the room IS sealed off, and has an 8' ceiling, the volume
of the room is 480 cubic feet. At 80°F, 100% RH occurs when there is about
250 ml of water in the air. If we assume your whole house is about 1600
square feet of floorspace, that's a volume of 12,800 cubic feet, meaning
that the 100% RH level needs almost 6.6 liters of water! If we drop that
back to 65% RH, it still means that there must be 4.3 liters of water in the
air.

Knowing full well that your house is not likely to be totally sealed, you've
got to figure on moisture escaping to the outside, meaning that you have to
keep adding it. (I sure wish there was a way to know what that rate was...)

Anyway, you're better off with something with a large capacity, and
connecting it to a humidistat, rather than getting something small and
hoping it is enough.

As an example, in a friend's greenhouse - about 2000 cubic feet and tight
except for around the door - there is a 2 gph fogger, and in the really
cold, dry days lately, it works full time to maintain 70% humidity. At
70°F, that volume only holds 0.2 gallons of water, so he's losing 10x that
in an hour!

By the way, I put a moisture-capacity calculator on my website if you want
to play around:
http://www.firstrays.com/moistcalc.htm

--

Ray Barkalow - First Rays Orchids - www.firstrays.com
Plants, Supplies, Books, Artwork, and Lots of Free Info!

.. . . . . . . . . . .
"Doug Bolton" wrote in message
...
I'm interested in this as I've found home humidifiers to be problematic.
I'm growing in an upstairs 6x10 foot room using a ceiling fan and 2
oscillating
tabletop fans on the floor. Also a ceramic heater in the winter to
maintain a
daytime 79/81°F temp.

I've found the cool mist wicks dry out too fast and end up doing no
wiking.

The warm mist ones are better but I think add to the heat problem (has got
to
95+, I think the Coryanthes like that but others don't) in the summer and
deteriorate as they're only made to be on a couple of hours a day and not
12.
As I've got the windows open in the summer and dry heat in the winter I
really
need to humidify in both those seasons. Less so in the spring and fall as
ambient temps with the hid on are kinder.

So I've considered this solution. Would use their (mainlandmart) 5 mister
unit
in a tub with the floatation device to maintain water depth over the
mister.
This one's suppose to do .5 litre per hour. This isn't a lot. The other 5
mister
unit at 1.5 may be too much. I was wondering if the mist would make it out
of
the tub as the water level sank. Perhaps the ceiling fan would blow it
out. Also
really don't need pooling water indoors. Hoping the fans would help with
this
too. It is quite breezy in there.

Doug Bolton

On Fri, 30 Jan 2004 13:52:37 -0700, "molli"
wrote:

I wound up going back to my cool mist humidifier. All the fogger did was
make a puddle under the bowl! I didnt' notice it raised the humidity that
much, unless it was in the fishtank with my masds..wich interestingly
enough
kept them too wet and they all died....I'm no expert here mind you, but
that's the experience I had with it. IF you want to fiddle with one..try
mainlandmart.com they have foggers for $25 you supply the bowl.

OK here is my 2 cents worth.
I have used many many, many (did I mention many?) differant appliances
to generate humidity in a given area.
#1
Use RO or distilled water in the unit. It will stay cleaner and not
generate so much white dust.
#2
evaperative units don't put out enough and require more cleaning.
Also you need to mount them up at least 5 feet off the ground or they
will pee condensation all over the floor. (this is true for most
humidifiers, evan atomizers)
#3
Ultrasonics with a nozle do better but can burn out the disc very
easy if it does not have a level sensor and even then I have burned up
a lot of them with sensors (the sensors fail over time)
#4
Warm mist machines are bad. To much heat and I found plants do not
like warm mist, makes them rot.
#5
build your own atomizer. I read everything I could get my hands on
about splitting water molecules then assembled my own versions.
It took many hours of research and part fabrication, cost a fortune
and worked fairly well. The downfall is the reliability. I was allways
dickin with the things, a twist here a tweek there, until I said SCREW
THIS NOISE!
#5
Buy industial atomizers!!!!! For wherehouse, resturant, or whole
house furnace use! Yes they are expensive, but ya know the sayin." Ya
get what ya pay for" (or words to that efect)

Of course this is all dependant on your set up.
If you have a very small space, a small unit from homers depot may do
the job just fine.

In my propagation room (8'X10') it is a negative air flow. The exhaust
fan pulls air in through a filter from the house and expells it
through the wall to the outside (this way the air going in is filtered
and the humidity does not come out in to the living space). Because of
this setup it take a heck of a lot more humidity being pumped into the
room. years ago I would run as many as three evaperative units just to
try to keep it around 70%.
Now I run one OLD Trion 500 series (yeh I couldn't leave the factory
setup alone so I modified it just a touch) in the room and sometimes I
have a pan of water by the inlet where the air pulls across it. This
room can now go 80% or more evan when the high temp fan kicks on.
Also in this room I installed a misting system with six misting heads
that kick on every 3 or 4 hours for just over 1 min. at a time until
4pm. (so any leaves dry off by night time)
For the rest of the house I now run a large industial unit with UV
for sterilization downstairs and pipe the humidity anywhere I need it.
I use small in line plastic duct fans and pull the moisture to the
plants. Yeh it's overkill but I don't have to baby the babies as much
as I used to.
The misting system is enjoyed by Frank the cat as well. He loves to
stand in there with me in the morning while I water and when the
misting heads come on he stairs up at them and collects mist on his
fur then lays down and grooms until I am done working.
I have not tried that fancy fogger you see at Charleys greenhouse or
several other catalog shops. It is in the 4 hundred dollar range I
think. It may be worth it in the right application.

All this is very subjective to what enviroment you have and what you
are trying to achieve. These are a few things I have learned that work
for myself and baby plants growing in a controlable enviroment.
My larger plants elswhere in the house and outside are cared for in
differant ways (next rant)

Anyway hope that sheds a little light or at least gives food for
thought.


HAPPY GROWIN NOOK





On Sat, 31 Jan 2004 03:11:54 GMT, Doug Bolton
wrote:

I'm interested in this as I've found home humidifiers to be problematic.
I'm growing in an upstairs 6x10 foot room using a ceiling fan and 2 oscillating
tabletop fans on the floor. Also a ceramic heater in the winter to maintain a
daytime 79/81°F temp.

I've found the cool mist wicks dry out too fast and end up doing no wiking.

The warm mist ones are better but I think add to the heat problem (has got to
95+, I think the Coryanthes like that but others don't) in the summer and
deteriorate as they're only made to be on a couple of hours a day and not 12.
As I've got the windows open in the summer and dry heat in the winter I really
need to humidify in both those seasons. Less so in the spring and fall as
ambient temps with the hid on are kinder.

So I've considered this solution. Would use their (mainlandmart) 5 mister unit
in a tub with the floatation device to maintain water depth over the mister.
This one's suppose to do .5 litre per hour. This isn't a lot. The other 5 mister
unit at 1.5 may be too much. I was wondering if the mist would make it out of
the tub as the water level sank. Perhaps the ceiling fan would blow it out. Also
really don't need pooling water indoors. Hoping the fans would help with this
too. It is quite breezy in there.

Doug Bolton

On Fri, 30 Jan 2004 13:52:37 -0700, "molli" wrote:

I wound up going back to my cool mist humidifier. All the fogger did was
make a puddle under the bowl! I didnt' notice it raised the humidity that
much, unless it was in the fishtank with my masds..wich interestingly enough
kept them too wet and they all died....I'm no expert here mind you, but
that's the experience I had with it. IF you want to fiddle with one..try
mainlandmart.com they have foggers for $25 you supply the bowl.

I use one of those "fancy" foggers that Charley's sells in my 8x8 lean-to
greenhouse. Don't need it in the winter here in Seattle but it does a great
job in the summer. Have it connected to a humidistat and timer in series so
it only goes on when the humidity goes below whatever I set it to and only
during the times I want it to (early AM thru several hours before sundown
which I vary somewhat as the length of the summer days varies a lot here in
Seattle.).

I would recommend you make sure you either buy something you can hook to a
water source that maintains the level via a float valve or modify whatever
you buy so it does as it would be a pain to always refill it. And you'd
forget and it would be a problem when you need it most - when you're on
vacation.

"NOOK" wrote in message
...
OK here is my 2 cents worth.
I have used many many, many (did I mention many?) differant appliances
to generate humidity in a given area.
#1
Use RO or distilled water in the unit. It will stay cleaner and not
generate so much white dust.
#2
evaperative units don't put out enough and require more cleaning.
Also you need to mount them up at least 5 feet off the ground or they
will pee condensation all over the floor. (this is true for most
humidifiers, evan atomizers)
#3
Ultrasonics with a nozle do better but can burn out the disc very
easy if it does not have a level sensor and even then I have burned up
a lot of them with sensors (the sensors fail over time)
#4
Warm mist machines are bad. To much heat and I found plants do not
like warm mist, makes them rot.
#5
build your own atomizer. I read everything I could get my hands on
about splitting water molecules then assembled my own versions.
It took many hours of research and part fabrication, cost a fortune
and worked fairly well. The downfall is the reliability. I was allways
dickin with the things, a twist here a tweek there, until I said SCREW
THIS NOISE!
#5
Buy industial atomizers!!!!! For wherehouse, resturant, or whole
house furnace use! Yes they are expensive, but ya know the sayin." Ya
get what ya pay for" (or words to that efect)

Of course this is all dependant on your set up.
If you have a very small space, a small unit from homers depot may do
the job just fine.

In my propagation room (8'X10') it is a negative air flow. The exhaust
fan pulls air in through a filter from the house and expells it
through the wall to the outside (this way the air going in is filtered
and the humidity does not come out in to the living space). Because of
this setup it take a heck of a lot more humidity being pumped into the
room. years ago I would run as many as three evaperative units just to
try to keep it around 70%.
Now I run one OLD Trion 500 series (yeh I couldn't leave the factory
setup alone so I modified it just a touch) in the room and sometimes I
have a pan of water by the inlet where the air pulls across it. This
room can now go 80% or more evan when the high temp fan kicks on.
Also in this room I installed a misting system with six misting heads
that kick on every 3 or 4 hours for just over 1 min. at a time until
4pm. (so any leaves dry off by night time)
For the rest of the house I now run a large industial unit with UV
for sterilization downstairs and pipe the humidity anywhere I need it.
I use small in line plastic duct fans and pull the moisture to the
plants. Yeh it's overkill but I don't have to baby the babies as much
as I used to.
The misting system is enjoyed by Frank the cat as well. He loves to
stand in there with me in the morning while I water and when the
misting heads come on he stairs up at them and collects mist on his
fur then lays down and grooms until I am done working.
I have not tried that fancy fogger you see at Charleys greenhouse or
several other catalog shops. It is in the 4 hundred dollar range I
think. It may be worth it in the right application.

All this is very subjective to what enviroment you have and what you
are trying to achieve. These are a few things I have learned that work
for myself and baby plants growing in a controlable enviroment.
My larger plants elswhere in the house and outside are cared for in
differant ways (next rant)

Anyway hope that sheds a little light or at least gives food for
thought.


HAPPY GROWIN NOOK





On Sat, 31 Jan 2004 03:11:54 GMT, Doug Bolton
wrote:

I'm interested in this as I've found home humidifiers to be problematic.
I'm growing in an upstairs 6x10 foot room using a ceiling fan and 2
oscillating
tabletop fans on the floor. Also a ceramic heater in the winter to
maintain a
daytime 79/81°F temp.

I've found the cool mist wicks dry out too fast and end up doing no
wiking.

The warm mist ones are better but I think add to the heat problem (has
got to
95+, I think the Coryanthes like that but others don't) in the summer and
deteriorate as they're only made to be on a couple of hours a day and not
12.
As I've got the windows open in the summer and dry heat in the winter I
really
need to humidify in both those seasons. Less so in the spring and fall as
ambient temps with the hid on are kinder.

So I've considered this solution. Would use their (mainlandmart) 5 mister
unit
in a tub with the floatation device to maintain water depth over the
mister.
This one's suppose to do .5 litre per hour. This isn't a lot. The other 5
mister
unit at 1.5 may be too much. I was wondering if the mist would make it
out of
the tub as the water level sank. Perhaps the ceiling fan would blow it
out. Also
really don't need pooling water indoors. Hoping the fans would help with
this
too. It is quite breezy in there.

Doug Bolton

On Fri, 30 Jan 2004 13:52:37 -0700, "molli"
wrote:

I wound up going back to my cool mist humidifier. All the fogger did
was
make a puddle under the bowl! I didnt' notice it raised the humidity
that
much, unless it was in the fishtank with my masds..wich interestingly
enough
kept them too wet and they all died....I'm no expert here mind you, but
that's the experience I had with it. IF you want to fiddle with
one..try
mainlandmart.com they have foggers for $25 you supply the bowl.

When I had an orchid incubator (large, multilevel, enclosed light cart) in
my basement, I used an off-the-shelf ultrasonic unit to humidify it.
Instead of using the small tank for water (about a gallon capacity), I cut a
notch in the sidewall of the base to allow water to overflow, and after
silicone-gluing some plastic tubing for inlet and outlet purposes, hooked it
up to a small submersible pump in a 15-gallon plastic drum on the floor.

Worked like a charm, and I only had to top up the drum about once a week.
It ran continuously (under it's own humidistat's control) for more than 5
years before I dismantled the setup. I still have the humidifier, and it
works fine.

--

Ray Barkalow - First Rays Orchids - www.firstrays.com
Plants, Supplies, Books, Artwork, and Lots of Free Info!

.. . . . . . . . . . .
"Jerry Hoffmeister" wrote in message
...
I use one of those "fancy" foggers that Charley's sells in my 8x8 lean-to
greenhouse. Don't need it in the winter here in Seattle but it does a
great
job in the summer. Have it connected to a humidistat and timer in series
so
it only goes on when the humidity goes below whatever I set it to and only
during the times I want it to (early AM thru several hours before sundown
which I vary somewhat as the length of the summer days varies a lot here
in
Seattle.).

I would recommend you make sure you either buy something you can hook to a
water source that maintains the level via a float valve or modify whatever
you buy so it does as it would be a pain to always refill it. And you'd
forget and it would be a problem when you need it most - when you're on
vacation.

"NOOK" wrote in message
...
OK here is my 2 cents worth.
I have used many many, many (did I mention many?) differant appliances
to generate humidity in a given area.
#1
Use RO or distilled water in the unit. It will stay cleaner and not
generate so much white dust.
#2
evaperative units don't put out enough and require more cleaning.
Also you need to mount them up at least 5 feet off the ground or they
will pee condensation all over the floor. (this is true for most
humidifiers, evan atomizers)
#3
Ultrasonics with a nozle do better but can burn out the disc very
easy if it does not have a level sensor and even then I have burned up
a lot of them with sensors (the sensors fail over time)
#4
Warm mist machines are bad. To much heat and I found plants do not
like warm mist, makes them rot.
#5
build your own atomizer. I read everything I could get my hands on
about splitting water molecules then assembled my own versions.
It took many hours of research and part fabrication, cost a fortune
and worked fairly well. The downfall is the reliability. I was allways
dickin with the things, a twist here a tweek there, until I said SCREW
THIS NOISE!
#5
Buy industial atomizers!!!!! For wherehouse, resturant, or whole
house furnace use! Yes they are expensive, but ya know the sayin." Ya
get what ya pay for" (or words to that efect)

Of course this is all dependant on your set up.
If you have a very small space, a small unit from homers depot may do
the job just fine.

In my propagation room (8'X10') it is a negative air flow. The exhaust
fan pulls air in through a filter from the house and expells it
through the wall to the outside (this way the air going in is filtered
and the humidity does not come out in to the living space). Because of
this setup it take a heck of a lot more humidity being pumped into the
room. years ago I would run as many as three evaperative units just to
try to keep it around 70%.
Now I run one OLD Trion 500 series (yeh I couldn't leave the factory
setup alone so I modified it just a touch) in the room and sometimes I
have a pan of water by the inlet where the air pulls across it. This
room can now go 80% or more evan when the high temp fan kicks on.
Also in this room I installed a misting system with six misting heads
that kick on every 3 or 4 hours for just over 1 min. at a time until
4pm. (so any leaves dry off by night time)
For the rest of the house I now run a large industial unit with UV
for sterilization downstairs and pipe the humidity anywhere I need it.
I use small in line plastic duct fans and pull the moisture to the
plants. Yeh it's overkill but I don't have to baby the babies as much
as I used to.
The misting system is enjoyed by Frank the cat as well. He loves to
stand in there with me in the morning while I water and when the
misting heads come on he stairs up at them and collects mist on his
fur then lays down and grooms until I am done working.
I have not tried that fancy fogger you see at Charleys greenhouse or
several other catalog shops. It is in the 4 hundred dollar range I
think. It may be worth it in the right application.

All this is very subjective to what enviroment you have and what you
are trying to achieve. These are a few things I have learned that work
for myself and baby plants growing in a controlable enviroment.
My larger plants elswhere in the house and outside are cared for in
differant ways (next rant)

Anyway hope that sheds a little light or at least gives food for
thought.


HAPPY GROWIN NOOK





On Sat, 31 Jan 2004 03:11:54 GMT, Doug Bolton
wrote:

I'm interested in this as I've found home humidifiers to be
problematic.
I'm growing in an upstairs 6x10 foot room using a ceiling fan and 2
oscillating
tabletop fans on the floor. Also a ceramic heater in the winter to
maintain a
daytime 79/81°F temp.

I've found the cool mist wicks dry out too fast and end up doing no
wiking.

The warm mist ones are better but I think add to the heat problem (has
got to
95+, I think the Coryanthes like that but others don't) in the summer
and
deteriorate as they're only made to be on a couple of hours a day and
not
12.
As I've got the windows open in the summer and dry heat in the winter I
really
need to humidify in both those seasons. Less so in the spring and fall
as
ambient temps with the hid on are kinder.

So I've considered this solution. Would use their (mainlandmart) 5
mister
unit
in a tub with the floatation device to maintain water depth over the
mister.
This one's suppose to do .5 litre per hour. This isn't a lot. The other
5
mister
unit at 1.5 may be too much. I was wondering if the mist would make it
out of
the tub as the water level sank. Perhaps the ceiling fan would blow it
out. Also
really don't need pooling water indoors. Hoping the fans would help
with
this
too. It is quite breezy in there.

Doug Bolton

On Fri, 30 Jan 2004 13:52:37 -0700, "molli"
wrote:

I wound up going back to my cool mist humidifier. All the fogger did
was
make a puddle under the bowl! I didnt' notice it raised the humidity
that
much, unless it was in the fishtank with my masds..wich interestingly
enough
kept them too wet and they all died....I'm no expert here mind you,
but
that's the experience I had with it. IF you want to fiddle with
one..try
mainlandmart.com they have foggers for $25 you supply the bowl.

That's interesting, Ray. Did you use RO or distilled water? I've
understood that the ultrasonic nebulizers are terribly vulnerable to mineral
deposits. Also, when I asked the people at Charlie's Greenhouse about their
heavy duty fogger, they recommended a less expensive, filtered misting
system because of my hard water.
Tom
Walnut Creek, CA, USA
(To reply by e-mail, remove APPENDIX)

From: "Ray"
Newsgroups: rec.gardens.orchids
Date: Sun, 1 Feb 2004 09:16:56 -0500
Subject: Fogger?

When I had an orchid incubator (large, multilevel, enclosed light cart) in
my basement, I used an off-the-shelf ultrasonic unit to humidify it.
Instead of using the small tank for water (about a gallon capacity), I cut a
notch in the sidewall of the base to allow water to overflow, and after
silicone-gluing some plastic tubing for inlet and outlet purposes, hooked it
up to a small submersible pump in a 15-gallon plastic drum on the floor.

Worked like a charm, and I only had to top up the drum about once a week.
It ran continuously (under it's own humidistat's control) for more than 5
years before I dismantled the setup. I still have the humidifier, and it
works fine.

--

Ray Barkalow - First Rays Orchids - www.firstrays.com
Plants, Supplies, Books, Artwork, and Lots of Free Info!

. . . . . . . . . . .
"Jerry Hoffmeister" wrote in message
...
I use one of those "fancy" foggers that Charley's sells in my 8x8 lean-to
greenhouse. Don't need it in the winter here in Seattle but it does a
great
job in the summer. Have it connected to a humidistat and timer in series
so
it only goes on when the humidity goes below whatever I set it to and only
during the times I want it to (early AM thru several hours before sundown
which I vary somewhat as the length of the summer days varies a lot here
in
Seattle.).

I would recommend you make sure you either buy something you can hook to a
water source that maintains the level via a float valve or modify whatever
you buy so it does as it would be a pain to always refill it. And you'd
forget and it would be a problem when you need it most - when you're on
vacation.

"NOOK" wrote in message
...
OK here is my 2 cents worth.
I have used many many, many (did I mention many?) differant appliances
to generate humidity in a given area.
#1
Use RO or distilled water in the unit. It will stay cleaner and not
generate so much white dust.
#2
evaperative units don't put out enough and require more cleaning.
Also you need to mount them up at least 5 feet off the ground or they
will pee condensation all over the floor. (this is true for most
humidifiers, evan atomizers)
#3
Ultrasonics with a nozle do better but can burn out the disc very
easy if it does not have a level sensor and even then I have burned up
a lot of them with sensors (the sensors fail over time)
#4
Warm mist machines are bad. To much heat and I found plants do not
like warm mist, makes them rot.
#5
build your own atomizer. I read everything I could get my hands on
about splitting water molecules then assembled my own versions.
It took many hours of research and part fabrication, cost a fortune
and worked fairly well. The downfall is the reliability. I was allways
dickin with the things, a twist here a tweek there, until I said SCREW
THIS NOISE!
#5
Buy industial atomizers!!!!! For wherehouse, resturant, or whole
house furnace use! Yes they are expensive, but ya know the sayin." Ya
get what ya pay for" (or words to that efect)

Of course this is all dependant on your set up.
If you have a very small space, a small unit from homers depot may do
the job just fine.

In my propagation room (8'X10') it is a negative air flow. The exhaust
fan pulls air in through a filter from the house and expells it
through the wall to the outside (this way the air going in is filtered
and the humidity does not come out in to the living space). Because of
this setup it take a heck of a lot more humidity being pumped into the
room. years ago I would run as many as three evaperative units just to
try to keep it around 70%.
Now I run one OLD Trion 500 series (yeh I couldn't leave the factory
setup alone so I modified it just a touch) in the room and sometimes I
have a pan of water by the inlet where the air pulls across it. This
room can now go 80% or more evan when the high temp fan kicks on.
Also in this room I installed a misting system with six misting heads
that kick on every 3 or 4 hours for just over 1 min. at a time until
4pm. (so any leaves dry off by night time)
For the rest of the house I now run a large industial unit with UV
for sterilization downstairs and pipe the humidity anywhere I need it.
I use small in line plastic duct fans and pull the moisture to the
plants. Yeh it's overkill but I don't have to baby the babies as much
as I used to.
The misting system is enjoyed by Frank the cat as well. He loves to
stand in there with me in the morning while I water and when the
misting heads come on he stairs up at them and collects mist on his
fur then lays down and grooms until I am done working.
I have not tried that fancy fogger you see at Charleys greenhouse or
several other catalog shops. It is in the 4 hundred dollar range I
think. It may be worth it in the right application.

All this is very subjective to what enviroment you have and what you
are trying to achieve. These are a few things I have learned that work
for myself and baby plants growing in a controlable enviroment.
My larger plants elswhere in the house and outside are cared for in
differant ways (next rant)

Anyway hope that sheds a little light or at least gives food for
thought.


HAPPY GROWIN NOOK





On Sat, 31 Jan 2004 03:11:54 GMT, Doug Bolton
wrote:

I'm interested in this as I've found home humidifiers to be
problematic.
I'm growing in an upstairs 6x10 foot room using a ceiling fan and 2
oscillating
tabletop fans on the floor. Also a ceramic heater in the winter to
maintain a
daytime 79/81°F temp.

I've found the cool mist wicks dry out too fast and end up doing no
wiking.

The warm mist ones are better but I think add to the heat problem (has
got to
95+, I think the Coryanthes like that but others don't) in the summer
and
deteriorate as they're only made to be on a couple of hours a day and
not
12.
As I've got the windows open in the summer and dry heat in the winter I
really
need to humidify in both those seasons. Less so in the spring and fall
as
ambient temps with the hid on are kinder.

So I've considered this solution. Would use their (mainlandmart) 5
mister
unit
in a tub with the floatation device to maintain water depth over the
mister.
This one's suppose to do .5 litre per hour. This isn't a lot. The other
5
mister
unit at 1.5 may be too much. I was wondering if the mist would make it
out of
the tub as the water level sank. Perhaps the ceiling fan would blow it
out. Also
really don't need pooling water indoors. Hoping the fans would help
with
this
too. It is quite breezy in there.

Doug Bolton

On Fri, 30 Jan 2004 13:52:37 -0700, "molli"
wrote:

I wound up going back to my cool mist humidifier. All the fogger did
was
make a puddle under the bowl! I didnt' notice it raised the humidity
that
much, unless it was in the fishtank with my masds..wich interestingly
enough
kept them too wet and they all died....I'm no expert here mind you,
but
that's the experience I had with it. IF you want to fiddle with
one..try
mainlandmart.com they have foggers for $25 you supply the bowl.

That's interesting, Ray. Did you use RO or distilled water? I've
understood that the ultrasonic nebulizers are terribly vulnerable to mineral
deposits. Also, when I asked the people at Charlie's Greenhouse about their
heavy duty fogger, they recommended a less expensive, filtered misting
system because of my hard water.
Tom
Walnut Creek, CA, USA
(To reply by e-mail, remove APPENDIX)

From: "Ray"
Newsgroups: rec.gardens.orchids
Date: Sun, 1 Feb 2004 09:16:56 -0500
Subject: Fogger?

When I had an orchid incubator (large, multilevel, enclosed light cart) in
my basement, I used an off-the-shelf ultrasonic unit to humidify it.
Instead of using the small tank for water (about a gallon capacity), I cut a
notch in the sidewall of the base to allow water to overflow, and after
silicone-gluing some plastic tubing for inlet and outlet purposes, hooked it
up to a small submersible pump in a 15-gallon plastic drum on the floor.

Worked like a charm, and I only had to top up the drum about once a week.
It ran continuously (under it's own humidistat's control) for more than 5
years before I dismantled the setup. I still have the humidifier, and it
works fine.

--

Ray Barkalow - First Rays Orchids - www.firstrays.com
Plants, Supplies, Books, Artwork, and Lots of Free Info!

. . . . . . . . . . .
"Jerry Hoffmeister" wrote in message
...
I use one of those "fancy" foggers that Charley's sells in my 8x8 lean-to
greenhouse. Don't need it in the winter here in Seattle but it does a
great
job in the summer. Have it connected to a humidistat and timer in series
so
it only goes on when the humidity goes below whatever I set it to and only
during the times I want it to (early AM thru several hours before sundown
which I vary somewhat as the length of the summer days varies a lot here
in
Seattle.).

I would recommend you make sure you either buy something you can hook to a
water source that maintains the level via a float valve or modify whatever
you buy so it does as it would be a pain to always refill it. And you'd
forget and it would be a problem when you need it most - when you're on
vacation.

"NOOK" wrote in message
...
OK here is my 2 cents worth.
I have used many many, many (did I mention many?) differant appliances
to generate humidity in a given area.
#1
Use RO or distilled water in the unit. It will stay cleaner and not
generate so much white dust.
#2
evaperative units don't put out enough and require more cleaning.
Also you need to mount them up at least 5 feet off the ground or they
will pee condensation all over the floor. (this is true for most
humidifiers, evan atomizers)
#3
Ultrasonics with a nozle do better but can burn out the disc very
easy if it does not have a level sensor and even then I have burned up
a lot of them with sensors (the sensors fail over time)
#4
Warm mist machines are bad. To much heat and I found plants do not
like warm mist, makes them rot.
#5
build your own atomizer. I read everything I could get my hands on
about splitting water molecules then assembled my own versions.
It took many hours of research and part fabrication, cost a fortune
and worked fairly well. The downfall is the reliability. I was allways
dickin with the things, a twist here a tweek there, until I said SCREW
THIS NOISE!
#5
Buy industial atomizers!!!!! For wherehouse, resturant, or whole
house furnace use! Yes they are expensive, but ya know the sayin." Ya
get what ya pay for" (or words to that efect)

Of course this is all dependant on your set up.
If you have a very small space, a small unit from homers depot may do
the job just fine.

In my propagation room (8'X10') it is a negative air flow. The exhaust
fan pulls air in through a filter from the house and expells it
through the wall to the outside (this way the air going in is filtered
and the humidity does not come out in to the living space). Because of
this setup it take a heck of a lot more humidity being pumped into the
room. years ago I would run as many as three evaperative units just to
try to keep it around 70%.
Now I run one OLD Trion 500 series (yeh I couldn't leave the factory
setup alone so I modified it just a touch) in the room and sometimes I
have a pan of water by the inlet where the air pulls across it. This
room can now go 80% or more evan when the high temp fan kicks on.
Also in this room I installed a misting system with six misting heads
that kick on every 3 or 4 hours for just over 1 min. at a time until
4pm. (so any leaves dry off by night time)
For the rest of the house I now run a large industial unit with UV
for sterilization downstairs and pipe the humidity anywhere I need it.
I use small in line plastic duct fans and pull the moisture to the
plants. Yeh it's overkill but I don't have to baby the babies as much
as I used to.
The misting system is enjoyed by Frank the cat as well. He loves to
stand in there with me in the morning while I water and when the
misting heads come on he stairs up at them and collects mist on his
fur then lays down and grooms until I am done working.
I have not tried that fancy fogger you see at Charleys greenhouse or
several other catalog shops. It is in the 4 hundred dollar range I
think. It may be worth it in the right application.

All this is very subjective to what enviroment you have and what you
are trying to achieve. These are a few things I have learned that work
for myself and baby plants growing in a controlable enviroment.
My larger plants elswhere in the house and outside are cared for in
differant ways (next rant)

Anyway hope that sheds a little light or at least gives food for
thought.


HAPPY GROWIN NOOK





On Sat, 31 Jan 2004 03:11:54 GMT, Doug Bolton
wrote:

I'm interested in this as I've found home humidifiers to be
problematic.
I'm growing in an upstairs 6x10 foot room using a ceiling fan and 2
oscillating
tabletop fans on the floor. Also a ceramic heater in the winter to
maintain a
daytime 79/81°F temp.

I've found the cool mist wicks dry out too fast and end up doing no
wiking.

The warm mist ones are better but I think add to the heat problem (has
got to
95+, I think the Coryanthes like that but others don't) in the summer
and
deteriorate as they're only made to be on a couple of hours a day and
not
12.
As I've got the windows open in the summer and dry heat in the winter I
really
need to humidify in both those seasons. Less so in the spring and fall
as
ambient temps with the hid on are kinder.

So I've considered this solution. Would use their (mainlandmart) 5
mister
unit
in a tub with the floatation device to maintain water depth over the
mister.
This one's suppose to do .5 litre per hour. This isn't a lot. The other
5
mister
unit at 1.5 may be too much. I was wondering if the mist would make it
out of
the tub as the water level sank. Perhaps the ceiling fan would blow it
out. Also
really don't need pooling water indoors. Hoping the fans would help
with
this
too. It is quite breezy in there.

Doug Bolton

On Fri, 30 Jan 2004 13:52:37 -0700, "molli"
wrote:

I wound up going back to my cool mist humidifier. All the fogger did
was
make a puddle under the bowl! I didnt' notice it raised the humidity
that
much, unless it was in the fishtank with my masds..wich interestingly
enough
kept them too wet and they all died....I'm no expert here mind you,
but
that's the experience I had with it. IF you want to fiddle with
one..try
mainlandmart.com they have foggers for $25 you supply the bowl.

I was using my well water, which is pretty pure, but has a very low pH,
requiring injection of potassium carbonate to raise it.

I have no idea what the TDS was.

--

Ray Barkalow - First Rays Orchids - www.firstrays.com
Plants, Supplies, Books, Artwork, and Lots of Free Info!

.. . . . . . . . . . .
"tbell" wrote in message
...
That's interesting, Ray. Did you use RO or distilled water? I've
understood that the ultrasonic nebulizers are terribly vulnerable to
mineral
deposits. Also, when I asked the people at Charlie's Greenhouse about
their
heavy duty fogger, they recommended a less expensive, filtered misting
system because of my hard water.
Tom
Walnut Creek, CA, USA
(To reply by e-mail, remove APPENDIX)

From: "Ray"
Newsgroups: rec.gardens.orchids
Date: Sun, 1 Feb 2004 09:16:56 -0500
Subject: Fogger?

When I had an orchid incubator (large, multilevel, enclosed light cart)
in
my basement, I used an off-the-shelf ultrasonic unit to humidify it.
Instead of using the small tank for water (about a gallon capacity), I
cut a
notch in the sidewall of the base to allow water to overflow, and after
silicone-gluing some plastic tubing for inlet and outlet purposes,
hooked it
up to a small submersible pump in a 15-gallon plastic drum on the floor.

Worked like a charm, and I only had to top up the drum about once a
week.
It ran continuously (under it's own humidistat's control) for more than
5
years before I dismantled the setup. I still have the humidifier, and
it
works fine.

--

Ray Barkalow - First Rays Orchids - www.firstrays.com
Plants, Supplies, Books, Artwork, and Lots of Free Info!

. . . . . . . . . . .
"Jerry Hoffmeister" wrote in message
...
I use one of those "fancy" foggers that Charley's sells in my 8x8
lean-to
greenhouse. Don't need it in the winter here in Seattle but it does a
great
job in the summer. Have it connected to a humidistat and timer in
series
so
it only goes on when the humidity goes below whatever I set it to and
only
during the times I want it to (early AM thru several hours before
sundown
which I vary somewhat as the length of the summer days varies a lot
here
in
Seattle.).

I would recommend you make sure you either buy something you can hook
to a
water source that maintains the level via a float valve or modify
whatever
you buy so it does as it would be a pain to always refill it. And
you'd
forget and it would be a problem when you need it most - when you're on
vacation.

"NOOK" wrote in message
...
OK here is my 2 cents worth.
I have used many many, many (did I mention many?) differant appliances
to generate humidity in a given area.
#1
Use RO or distilled water in the unit. It will stay cleaner and not
generate so much white dust.
#2
evaperative units don't put out enough and require more cleaning.
Also you need to mount them up at least 5 feet off the ground or they
will pee condensation all over the floor. (this is true for most
humidifiers, evan atomizers)
#3
Ultrasonics with a nozle do better but can burn out the disc very
easy if it does not have a level sensor and even then I have burned up
a lot of them with sensors (the sensors fail over time)
#4
Warm mist machines are bad. To much heat and I found plants do not
like warm mist, makes them rot.
#5
build your own atomizer. I read everything I could get my hands on
about splitting water molecules then assembled my own versions.
It took many hours of research and part fabrication, cost a fortune
and worked fairly well. The downfall is the reliability. I was allways
dickin with the things, a twist here a tweek there, until I said SCREW
THIS NOISE!
#5
Buy industial atomizers!!!!! For wherehouse, resturant, or whole
house furnace use! Yes they are expensive, but ya know the sayin." Ya
get what ya pay for" (or words to that efect)

Of course this is all dependant on your set up.
If you have a very small space, a small unit from homers depot may do
the job just fine.

In my propagation room (8'X10') it is a negative air flow. The exhaust
fan pulls air in through a filter from the house and expells it
through the wall to the outside (this way the air going in is filtered
and the humidity does not come out in to the living space). Because of
this setup it take a heck of a lot more humidity being pumped into the
room. years ago I would run as many as three evaperative units just to
try to keep it around 70%.
Now I run one OLD Trion 500 series (yeh I couldn't leave the factory
setup alone so I modified it just a touch) in the room and sometimes I
have a pan of water by the inlet where the air pulls across it. This
room can now go 80% or more evan when the high temp fan kicks on.
Also in this room I installed a misting system with six misting heads
that kick on every 3 or 4 hours for just over 1 min. at a time until
4pm. (so any leaves dry off by night time)
For the rest of the house I now run a large industial unit with UV
for sterilization downstairs and pipe the humidity anywhere I need it.
I use small in line plastic duct fans and pull the moisture to the
plants. Yeh it's overkill but I don't have to baby the babies as much
as I used to.
The misting system is enjoyed by Frank the cat as well. He loves to
stand in there with me in the morning while I water and when the
misting heads come on he stairs up at them and collects mist on his
fur then lays down and grooms until I am done working.
I have not tried that fancy fogger you see at Charleys greenhouse or
several other catalog shops. It is in the 4 hundred dollar range I
think. It may be worth it in the right application.

All this is very subjective to what enviroment you have and what you
are trying to achieve. These are a few things I have learned that work
for myself and baby plants growing in a controlable enviroment.
My larger plants elswhere in the house and outside are cared for in
differant ways (next rant)

Anyway hope that sheds a little light or at least gives food for
thought.


HAPPY GROWIN NOOK





On Sat, 31 Jan 2004 03:11:54 GMT, Doug Bolton
wrote:

I'm interested in this as I've found home humidifiers to be
problematic.
I'm growing in an upstairs 6x10 foot room using a ceiling fan and 2
oscillating
tabletop fans on the floor. Also a ceramic heater in the winter to
maintain a
daytime 79/81°F temp.

I've found the cool mist wicks dry out too fast and end up doing no
wiking.

The warm mist ones are better but I think add to the heat problem
(has
got to
95+, I think the Coryanthes like that but others don't) in the summer
and
deteriorate as they're only made to be on a couple of hours a day and
not
12.
As I've got the windows open in the summer and dry heat in the winter
I
really
need to humidify in both those seasons. Less so in the spring and
fall
as
ambient temps with the hid on are kinder.

So I've considered this solution. Would use their (mainlandmart) 5
mister
unit
in a tub with the floatation device to maintain water depth over the
mister.
This one's suppose to do .5 litre per hour. This isn't a lot. The
other
5
mister
unit at 1.5 may be too much. I was wondering if the mist would make
it
out of
the tub as the water level sank. Perhaps the ceiling fan would blow
it
out. Also
really don't need pooling water indoors. Hoping the fans would help
with
this
too. It is quite breezy in there.

Doug Bolton

On Fri, 30 Jan 2004 13:52:37 -0700, "molli"
wrote:

I wound up going back to my cool mist humidifier. All the fogger
did
was
make a puddle under the bowl! I didnt' notice it raised the humidity
that
much, unless it was in the fishtank with my masds..wich
interestingly
enough
kept them too wet and they all died....I'm no expert here mind you,
but
that's the experience I had with it. IF you want to fiddle with
one..try
mainlandmart.com they have foggers for $25 you supply the bowl.

"tbell" skrev i meddelandet
...
That's interesting, Ray. Did you use RO or distilled water? I've
understood that the ultrasonic nebulizers are terribly vulnerable to
mineral
deposits. Also, when I asked the people at Charlie's Greenhouse about
their
heavy duty fogger, they recommended a less expensive, filtered misting
system because of my hard water.
Tom
Walnut Creek, CA, USA


I used RO-water for my small ultrasonic fogger. Everything went well for a
while, until I worked in another country for a month. When I got back the
person who had watered my plants had used regular water a couple of times,
and then forgotten to refill the container the fogger was placed in. It
didn't work at all, and I could see the mineral deposits all over the
device.
Now, I live in an area with terrible water (I think kH 16-18 or something,
and pH 8) so I guess the fogger got quite a shock. But it seems very
sensitive.

Via

On Sat, 31 Jan 2004 15:35:27 -0500, "Ray"
wrote:

Doug,

There are many things to consider when working on boosting humidity. Unless
the room is sealed off from the rest of the house, anything you do will be
attempting to humidify the whole house.

It's a regular room that's totally enclosed except for an interior door that
gives access to the rest of the house. I haven't sealed the door.

I did install a fan to vent excess humidity to the outside via clothes dryer
ducting to a roof vent. The fan is controlled by a humidistat. When I water the
humidity soars to 87-90% during the night and down to perhaps 75% during the day
as the room heats to about 79°F. Night temp is about 64-68°F. Wish now I'd
installed a quieter fan (it's next to my bedroom) with 110CFM instead of the
noisy 50CFM one. Thought it'd draw too much humidity out. No way. It'd go all
night if I let it after I water. And that's just to get it down to 80%. So
that's a project I'm going to undertake this fall. The space under the door is
where the fan draws air as it expels the room air. As the room dries off from
the watering the humidity drops to perhaps 50% before the next watering. This is
without an humidifier (or equivalent). I've found that adding an humidifier did
even things out and prevented that sort of drop.

As this isn't a greenhouse situation I do have to be aware of the effect of
excess humidity on the gyprock (plasterboard?) walls. Already had to redo a part
of the single windowsill because I wasn't bailing it enough when I first set
this up. Now that's a daily chore. And there's no water source in there to hook
a fogger to. I did have a look at the smallest JBird. Seems way in excess of
what I need in winter though in summer I do keep the window open to cool the
room down so it'd probably be suitable then. 2 gallons an hour seems too much.
Think .5 might be more suitable. Is there such a thing?

Doug

If we assume that the room IS sealed off, and has an 8' ceiling, the volume
of the room is 480 cubic feet. At 80°F, 100% RH occurs when there is about
250 ml of water in the air. If we assume your whole house is about 1600
square feet of floorspace, that's a volume of 12,800 cubic feet, meaning
that the 100% RH level needs almost 6.6 liters of water! If we drop that
back to 65% RH, it still means that there must be 4.3 liters of water in the
air.

Knowing full well that your house is not likely to be totally sealed, you've
got to figure on moisture escaping to the outside, meaning that you have to
keep adding it. (I sure wish there was a way to know what that rate was...)

Anyway, you're better off with something with a large capacity, and
connecting it to a humidistat, rather than getting something small and
hoping it is enough.

As an example, in a friend's greenhouse - about 2000 cubic feet and tight
except for around the door - there is a 2 gph fogger, and in the really
cold, dry days lately, it works full time to maintain 70% humidity. At
70°F, that volume only holds 0.2 gallons of water, so he's losing 10x that
in an hour!

By the way, I put a moisture-capacity calculator on my website if you want
to play around:
http://www.firstrays.com/moistcalc.htm

On Sat, 31 Jan 2004 15:35:27 -0500, "Ray"
wrote:

Doug,

There are many things to consider when working on boosting humidity. Unless
the room is sealed off from the rest of the house, anything you do will be
attempting to humidify the whole house.

It's a regular room that's totally enclosed except for an interior door that
gives access to the rest of the house. I haven't sealed the door.

I did install a fan to vent excess humidity to the outside via clothes dryer
ducting to a roof vent. The fan is controlled by a humidistat. When I water the
humidity soars to 87-90% during the night and down to perhaps 75% during the day
as the room heats to about 79°F. Night temp is about 64-68°F. Wish now I'd
installed a quieter fan (it's next to my bedroom) with 110CFM instead of the
noisy 50CFM one. Thought it'd draw too much humidity out. No way. It'd go all
night if I let it after I water. And that's just to get it down to 80%. So
that's a project I'm going to undertake this fall. The space under the door is
where the fan draws air as it expels the room air. As the room dries off from
the watering the humidity drops to perhaps 50% before the next watering. This is
without an humidifier (or equivalent). I've found that adding an humidifier did
even things out and prevented that sort of drop.

As this isn't a greenhouse situation I do have to be aware of the effect of
excess humidity on the gyprock (plasterboard?) walls. Already had to redo a part
of the single windowsill because I wasn't bailing it enough when I first set
this up. Now that's a daily chore. And there's no water source in there to hook
a fogger to. I did have a look at the smallest JBird. Seems way in excess of
what I need in winter though in summer I do keep the window open to cool the
room down so it'd probably be suitable then. 2 gallons an hour seems too much.
Think .5 might be more suitable. Is there such a thing?

Doug

If we assume that the room IS sealed off, and has an 8' ceiling, the volume
of the room is 480 cubic feet. At 80°F, 100% RH occurs when there is about
250 ml of water in the air. If we assume your whole house is about 1600
square feet of floorspace, that's a volume of 12,800 cubic feet, meaning
that the 100% RH level needs almost 6.6 liters of water! If we drop that
back to 65% RH, it still means that there must be 4.3 liters of water in the
air.

Knowing full well that your house is not likely to be totally sealed, you've
got to figure on moisture escaping to the outside, meaning that you have to
keep adding it. (I sure wish there was a way to know what that rate was...)

Anyway, you're better off with something with a large capacity, and
connecting it to a humidistat, rather than getting something small and
hoping it is enough.

As an example, in a friend's greenhouse - about 2000 cubic feet and tight
except for around the door - there is a 2 gph fogger, and in the really
cold, dry days lately, it works full time to maintain 70% humidity. At
70°F, that volume only holds 0.2 gallons of water, so he's losing 10x that
in an hour!

By the way, I put a moisture-capacity calculator on my website if you want
to play around:
http://www.firstrays.com/moistcalc.htm