Folks,
Being an avid mountain biker and riding 3 times a week even through the winter i'm struggling to get my kit dry in between rides.

When you get back from a ride covered in crud (even with mudguards) you have to hose off your gear then try and get it dry again to out on 2 days later, shoes and pads are the worst offenders for slow drying.

I have a spare area corner in the garage 2ft x 2ft and 7 ft high.

I have a dehumidifier and I am thinking of making an insulated cupboard/wardrobe from ply with kingspan etc and hanging the pads, shoes and jackets etc in there and putting the dehumidifier on.

My theory is that if the cupboard is sealed (as far as practical with plywood) then the dehumidifier will only have access to the air inside the cupboard and will recycle it over and over until it is dry.

From my internet research the dehumidifier will create enough warmth to keep the air warm.

However with my available space being tall and narrow will all the warm damp air sit at the top of the cupboard and not be circulated/dried by the dehumidifier.

If I put the dehumidifier at the top of the cupboard then the warmth it creates wont help extract the moisture from the garments lower down in the cupboard.

Is my science/theory flawed??

Cheers
Col

I had something similar when I was younger for fishing gear, mainly because of the smell I don't think my parents wanted it in the house.

I bought insulation foam boards to make the box, cut a hole in it and had a heater blower then just blew straight into the box (did have a thermostat cut off on it). 30mins later i'd go and open it up and everything would be dry with hot and humid air in it but that just escaped out when I opened it.

I cant see any reason why a sealed dehumidifer wouldn't work though, I don't know the physics in terms of if you pull all the moisture out the air how long for the actual water would take to evaporate off the clothing without any heat though.

As long as there are gaps around the clothing, air should circulate enough. assuming the DH is at the bottom.
you could improve sealing just using draught excluder on the door, and I doubt a lot of insulation would be needed. inch should be more than adequate.

If circulation became an issue, a small low power fan would be easy to add.

We dry caving gear in what looks like an old wardrobe.... Fan heter at the bottom and a vent at the top to let the wet air out. Doesn't need to be hot to dry stuff. Not familiar with de humidifiers. How much power do they use?

We had one when we rented a log cabin in lapland, I vaguely remember it working as tegwin suggests, just a warm air blower and an exposed air vent. I also remember that it wasn't overly warm, it just kept the air circulating.

There was frequently a puddle in the bottom of the cupboard, so you might want to consider the capacity of the dehumidifier. Clothes can hold a remarkable amount of water.

We have one of these for wet clothes

Just a rack with hot air blowing up into a semi sealed "balloon".




Tornado Dry

[Edited on 18-11-14 by ken555]

I have been using a dehumidifier to dry stuff for ages. They work well but the drying will be vastly improved adding some heat in there. My humidifier does less the lower the temp. I think they work by blowing air across cold fins inside the unit. The greater the difference in air temp/fin temp the more water condenses on the fins - the better the result. A sealed system might get hot enough to work well but I'd think about a little heater as well.

I have never used one, but several of my unit mates had large fans for drying clothes on a conventional drying rack, as presumably increasing the air speed effective at drying, without the power consumption of trying to heat the air or pull the humidity level down.

Obviously, depending on the house you might have to do something to get the moisture out, but your other battle with a lot of winter biking gear is its all waterproof/windproof material so hanging it up will spaced etc will help. I put my 5:10's on the hall radiator with the tongue opened out a bit and they are bone dry in 2 days and I have two pairs.

If you want shoes dry overnight, look at ski boot blowers/driers.


Daniel

We use a dehumidifier to dry clothes in our front room and it works great. Your idea should work well.

Dehumidifiers are like a Air Conditioning unit with both coils on the same room.
One condenses the water vapor, and the other warms the cool air again.
You may want to add baffling to help the air circulate.
If I were you, I'd buy a second set of gear too.

Thanks for your replies It looks like it cant hurt to give it a go.
I have got 2 of most things, and so has SWMBO who rides the same amount. But i'm not spunking another £150.00 on more Goretex SPD shoes if I can turn them round in reasonable time in the 'hot box'

Ill keep you all posted on the results.
I'm favouring putting the dehumidifier in the middle heightwise and if needs be I can put a little foot warmer heater in the bottom of the unit on low to keep the air warm and moist and help with movement too.

Cheers
Col

I feel your pain.

How about buying more sets of gear (shorts and tips off ebay) and drying them in the airing cupboard. Surely that will work out cheaper? This time of year itll be pretty warm in there.

Shimano winter boots, the black coloured model, waterproof so no need to dry out, downside not breathable so wet socks.