What to do about wet locations?

[Roert42]

What do you guys do a about moisture and humidity in your shops/ garages?

It’s always crazy humid here, and sometimes when we get a bad rain I get water running through my shop. Everything is always mold on it or getting rusty just from sitting out.

Hell, my truck started getting moldy just sitting in the driveway for a few days.

I have a dehumidifier in the basement, that helps a lot, so I am thinking about putting on in the garage too.

Does anyone have a better suggestion

 

[Roert42]

 

[Bgunner]

Water drainage around the property would be the best start to prevent water from entering the shop from rain/down pours. Next would be to deal with the humidity by using a dehumidifier or two (depending on there size and capability) to control the moisture in the air.

A good cleaning of everything would be needed to stop the growing of the mold already present once the first two things are taken care of.


EDIT: Sunlight and ventilation would help to if possible. Maybe Dirtman can give a suggestion or two for chemicals to kill the mold present as he just went through a mold problem recently.

 

[scotts90ranger]

That's just gross...

Dehumidifiers would be a good idea, my brother has a couple going in the garage where he keeps some vegetables for farmers markets

Other than that there's a few desiccant setups that would work, one common one over here is Dri-Z-Air, it's some salt that goes in a canister mesh thing that's over a bowl, let it do it's thing for a while until it's gone, pour it out, put another $1 bag of salt in the top and go again...

 

[sgtsandman]

The short term solution is a dehumidifier. Long term is to address at least the water intrusion. Not much you can do with the humidity. You could try encouraging air movement with vents in the roof. Outside of that you are looking at climate control like heating and air conditioning. I doubt you'll want to go that far.

 

[85_Ranger4x4]

Drafty 1940's garage with huge drainage canals in the floor FTW?

 

[rubydist]

What I did about it was to move to Denver. Pretty much solved that problem for me.

 

[Ranger850]

Sunlight and ventilation would help to if possible.

This^^^^ is the way. Sunlight kills mold. ventilation keeps it from ever happening.

 

[ericbphoto]

Drafty 1940's garage with huge drainage canals in the floor FTW?

Sounds like a dairy barn

 

[85_Ranger4x4]

Sounds like a dairy barn

No, the barn has a nice cement floor.

 

[ericbphoto]

Big +1 on drainage to keep water from coming in and sunlight and ventilation to prevent mold. My bigger issue over the years has been rust. Drill press and some tools just seem to like to rust. I use WD-40 on stuff that’s prone to rust. Wipe off before use. Then reapply afterwards. I’ve finally gotten to where Im using stuff more often and that helps. Like the drill press. It gets cutting oil on the table regularly now and frequent cleaning.

 

[Dirtman]

Get a dehumidifier with UV lights. These do 3 things, first dries the air in the shop, second creates airflow, third kills any mold spores that pass through it.

Second suggestion would be windows. Sunlight kills mold. But there are special bulbs similar to plant growing bulbs witch will help a little bit if windows are.not possible.

Third a UV air purifier will also help with airflow and kill anything that passes through it. Some simple box fans can also help just keeping the air moving.

Fourth would be fix the damn water drainage issue...

 

[Roert42]

Fixing the water ingress is on the todo list, but it’s a major landscaping/hardscape project. Hopefully next year, I have over things book marked for the cash.

I got a dehumidifier today, ordered some desiccants for the toolbox, cabinets, car.

Natural light is a bit difficult. I have a window, but there is a lot of trees everywhere.

I leave the garage doors open about a foot at the bottom. To help with ventilation, and let the water out.

I wanted to add some exhaust vents, maybe bump them up on the todo list.