What I presume was happening was that condensation was building up on the cooling coils between the insulation and the chamber and freezing. When I finally turned the FDer off it took 3 days for the ice buildup to melt and slowly soak through the insulation and drip onto the counter.
Only in recent years has the amount of sugar consumed in the American diet been questioned. About half of the Completa energy consumed in the average U.S. diet is from carbohydrates.
Exhaust hoods are necessary part of a commercial kitchen. They are needed for safe operation of the kitchen, plus keeping in line with health standards.
Drying things out played a roll as well as the added insulation. We had 3.5 weeks of constant rain here in central NC with humidity over 95% and temps near 95F in the beginning and tapering down to 80F by the end of the rain. The condensation on the front panel around the seal had water running down the front of the Freeze Dryer constantly during the entire cycle, not just the freeze cycle. I initially went into the FDer to simply stop the humdity from reaching the outer chamber shell and freezing.
And therein lies the cons to buying a freeze dryer. It takes time to make them cost effective. Depending on humidity in your area, a single run can take up to two days to complete.
To protect packaged foods and organic compounds against spoiling, mold growth, color change, and loss of nutrition, use oxygen absorbers to get the residual oxygen inside the packaging to below 0.
Freeze drying is also simple to do – much easier than canning or dehydrating. If you care about having an emergency food supply, a Harvest Right Freeze Dryer is the best and most affordable way to do it.
Used freeze-dryers can be purchased from previous owners, or sometimes the manufacturer will have returned units refurbished for sale.
The evaporator coils that touch the surface of the stainless steel vacuum chamber reach about -42 F. With food in the chamber and because the location of the thermister is on the middle shelf of the four shelves, the temperature it records is going to range from -25 to -30 F in the nove hour default freeze time. This temperature is very adequate for freeze drying the food.
While I had the unit apart to replace the Shop Now display I decided to correct the water condensation problem. If you find yourself using your FDer in the same conditons as we do you may want to consider modifying your FDer to keep the condensation from your FDer control circuit and display cards. Here are the steps that I followed to minimize what the NC high humidity climate does to my FDer.
Ready to shop for a Harvest Right freeze-dryer? I use and recommend the medium-sized unit. Click here to shop for current promotions and sale prices.
I did wonder though, since this is gravity flow and not pressure driven as on a car, if having the filter mounted horizontally might result in using only "half" the filter, as the oil would tend to travel through the low side of the filter -- although in practice, I suppose, as the filter material gets plugged it would force the fluid level higher.
Upon turning off the pump (no isolation valve on the pump - standard setup), the chamber pressure rose quite rapidly going to 2000 mTorr and continuing up in a couple of minutes or so.
And once you have resolved your issue I hope you will stay around and talk to us all about what you have been drying in your machine, etc.