[jjflash]

So I finally figured out my barrels need to be at 60 degrees and 60% humidity.
See my prior post for this info.
I stack my barrels in a commercial refrigerator so temperature control is no problem.
Now I have been trying to figure out how to hold the humidity at 60%.
There are many ways to do this with spending big bucks.
I first looked at wine barrel humidifiers - $1000 plus. No good.
I then stumbled onto these cigar closet humidifiers.
http://www.thompsoncigar.com/product/CIGAR-HUMIDORS/ELECTRONIC-HUMIDIFIERS/LE-VEIL-DCH-55-GEL-HUMIDIFIER/79613/sc/9445/c/9445/pc/8389.uts
This $150 Le Veil DCH-55 has a remote digital control panel.
Suppose to work up to 55 cubic foot closet.
Only holds 1/2 gallon of water in gel base.
Not sure this is enough without daily refill.
I live in the desert southwest, can you say dry?
Any thoughts / suggestions?

[majorvices]

That 60/60 thing may be ideal - but far from necessary. I've been to a couple of breweries that had humidity controlled "cellars", but the vast majority just keep them out in storage at ambient temp.

[1vertical]

i have some ole equipment that i used to conrol the temp.humidity and light in a grow
chamber for gourmet mushrooms. PM me if you may be interested. I can shoot you
some links on the equipment. It was more geared to 100% humidity and not 60.
It involves a humidifier unit and water hook up with a float valve and cheepo
plastic ventilation duct with a plenum fan and air flow control.

[tschmidlin]

Why not just get a cheap thermometer with humidity measuring, and a room humidifier.  Run it for a while when the air dries out.  It won't be exact, but it doesn't need to be.

[james]

If you have the technical skill to do it look at a webcontrol board (http://amzn.to/rQxjZ6) or build something with a PIC, arduino, etc.

The webcontrol has a 1 wire bus you can hook temp sensors up to and a port for 1 humidity sensor.  There are 8 output lines you could use to fire a relay that runs a humidifier.  If you didn't want to deal with refilling a reservoir you could rig up a humidifer that hooks to a furnace that is tapped into a water line.

I use one of these boards for my homemade glycol chiller and brewhemoth temp control.

[pyrite]

Why couldn't you use the same principle that a cigar box works on. Put a small bucket of water in there, maybe even with a fish tank heater and let the water evaporate.