silica gel beads for drying blanks

[indychips]

I came across quite a bit of silica gel beads in 2lb packs several weeks ago. Knowing what these are used for, I decided to see if it could help accelerate the drying process of green blanks. 2 weeks ago I placed several blanks in a box with the beads and several in another box without the beads, The box with the silica beads seems to be drying the blanks noticeably faster. I know some use kitty litter and that is probably much cheaper, but these were free!

I have a few more 2 lb bags if someone would like to try them as well. Send me a PM if interested.

 

[low_48]

I suggest you do some reading about drying wood. There is two types of water in wood. Free water and bound water. Free water pretty much is self explanatory, but the bound water is what is trapped in the cells of the wood. It takes higher temps to get the bound water out of the cells. The silica gel may speed up the drying of the wood over just air drying, but if you want wood that gets to 6% moisture I think it's going to take more.