AMS Filament Drying Finally Perfected! The PolyDryer Mod Is Complete

[@MattWeber]

For future reference, when using a hole saw on plastics, run it in reverse and it will give you a nicer cleaner cut as it scrapes the plastic away instead of tearing through it.

[@KeoPrints]

Ahh good call. What a helpful comment! Thanks friend!

[@christopherpardell4418]

About drying. You do not need to re-circulate air to dry. You need dry air, and to get rid of it once it’s damp. OR, you need to otherwise dry the air in the loop BEFORE it gets into the AMS. I used to design drying rooms for companies that cast product in plaster, hydro stone and Portland cement. Freshly set, nearly 70% of the weight of cast plaster is water that has to evaporate out before you can ship it ( it will grow mold and make the box actually soggy ) or paint it. Well, not all of it, but you want the exhaust plenum humidity to read below 15% before you can paint the castings. The key was the incoming air had to be DRY. Electric heaters do NOT dry the air very much. They mostly just increase how much moisture it can hold. So all the actual water in the air is still in there and you can never get relative humidity below the that of the ambient air. That is, if the ambient air is 25% and the filament is 42%, you can expect to dry the filament to about 27% We used GAS furnaces. Like for your house. Gas furnaces DRY the air- ( which is why homes in snowy areas with forced air furnaces have to have humidifiers in winter - and also why gas fired clothes dryers dry clothes faster ) A gas furnace may be impractical for an AMS- ( though if you have forced air, taking air from one of the vents, passing it thru a HEPA filter and into the AMS then then out would likely get you VERY dry filament. At least in winter ) Also why a gas oven dries filament faster, especially if you leave the door ajar so that shot humid air can escape. So what you need is to blow your heated air over something DRIER than the air before it goes into the AMS. Again, heating the air alone only increases its ability hold water. For a recirculating drier, place box in line full of desiccant. That is, force the outgoing air thru a matrix of desiccant. Then, if you re-heat and recirculate the air it’s going to get drier over time. Expect the desiccant to get waterlogged pretty quickly. You want the desiccant on the outflow side of the loop because as water transfers out of filament into the hot dry air, the temperature of the air will drop. As the air leaves the chamber its temp will drop further and the water will want to condense out because the cooler air cannot hold as much water. You want to extract the water from this cooler air before you reheat the air for another loop. Think of it like a heat pump, but for moisture. You need to transfer the moisture that comes out of the filament into something drier than the filament. The drier the incoming air, the faster the filament will dry and the drier it will get.

[@bergie5737]

I must give you credit here for one of the few people I've ever come across that understands the process of drying. What people don't seem to get, is that for a given RH/temp there is so many grams of water in a volume of air. (Ignoring air pressure for now) Let's say 6 gram per cubic meter. Heat up the air, the RH goes down, but you still have six grams of water. What you try and do is heat up the filament and hopefully it will release some 5g or more into the (unsaturated) air. In a closed cycle, you will end with 11g of moisture in that cubic meter, so one would expect the RH to increase when the temp goes down again. My tests have shown that every single roll of vacuum-packed filament I ever got, had its desiccant packet 100% saturated. Plastic spools usually release around 8g of moisture down to 10% RH, and carton spools well over 16g. I use a molecular sieve to keep my filament dry in an IP67 box, but sadly when I crack open a new roll, my sieve gets saturated within a day. I always measure the sieve to the exact same values, 80g and 100g respectively, (My storage box has about 14 rolls in it at 100g desiccant) and by the time the RH reaches around 25%, it weighs 89g and 112g. The air or lack of air in a vacuum pack is meaningless. Even if there is as much as 3 liters of air in a filament bag, at 80% RH that air contains like 0,002gram of moisture. So that 4g of desiccant should be able to keep your filament dry, but unfortunately, fresh filament contains around 1% (10g) of moisture. So, unless the moisture condenses, the silica packet is useless. With a cardboard spool, of course, the cardboard is almost as good a desiccant as the silica. A vacuum is making absolutely no bloody difference, apart from looking cool! So as for drying. If the air is dry around it, below the "release" level of filament, it will give up its moisture, no need to heat it up. Heating the air will lower the RH and then the filament release moisture. Once the cool down happens, the filament will re-absorb that moisture - but hopefully slow enough to finish that print job you are busy with. So, I tend to think that you should stop the heating process once the absolute humidity (AH) stabilize, then compare it to outside, if lower, exchange the air.

[@garyfu3942]

How does the gas furnace “dry the air” anymore than an electric heater of similar theoretical wattage? As far as I’m aware, it’s still drying by the same action - heating the air to increase the amount of moisture it can hold (i.e. reducing its relative humidity). In a closed system, the total moisture still remains whether you’re using gas furnace or electric heater, so I am confused by your statement “gas furnaces DRY the air” as I am interpreting it like you’re saying it has some other drying mechanism that electric heaters do not.

[@christopherpardell4418]

@ Well, I would guess it’s because combustion byproducts react and bind with the water in the air. All I know is we throughly tested electric heaters, and gas heaters, and gas drying ovens produce drier hot air, whereas electric heaters only decrease the relative humidity of the air. RH is not a measure of moisture content, it’s the relation between how much water is in a volume of air versus how much it CAN hold at its temperature. Heating air, alone, simply increases its ability to hold moisture, but it does not reduce the amount of moisture in the air. So if there is 50 grams of water in a given volume of air with an RH of 50%, heating that air will show the RH has dropped to 25%, but it STILL has 50 grams of water in it. The moment the temperature drops, its RH goes right back up to 50% ( or actually higher if you used that hot air to DRY something, because you have the original 50 grams, plus whatever additional water it absorbed. ) Again, the key is getting RID of the water. A de-humidifier literally condenses the water out of the air by LOWERING the air’s ability to hold moisture by refrigerating the air. The water is taken out of the loop. Desiccants work to take water out, but only if you take the desiccant OUT of the chamber and evaporate the water out, somewhere outside your drying loop. Left in the loop, they simply transfer water back and forth. It’s why you leave the door ajar when drying filament or desiccant in an oven. So the humidity can leave the box.

[@ConstantinGrudda]

I had the same idea of putting the dryer under the AMS after i commented on your last video. Die cabels and electronics made me reconsider. Aside of that i designed similar ducts like you but with bigger diameter for less air restriction and because i like to see the world burn i used supports on everything - lol. Anyway I used PLA on purpose but designed the fit just a little bit to small. That way the heated site fomed itself into a perfect fit and the cold side got initially bit of help and later also fitted itself nicely! Thanks fot the inspiration! Amazing!

[@KeoPrints]

Good work! Way to get out there and give it a shot as well. That’s awesome

[@ShakosJournal]

you are now my favorite youtuber, a follow up video with multiple revisions, and your demenor is 👌 . also.... thank you nick

[@KeoPrints]

Thanks for the kind words friend. I am so happy this is resonating and we plan to keep the one video a week train rolling. Happy to have you around. My nick miller line is “this is my nightmare” but it’s not my nightmare so I’ll just stick with “I hate doors”

[@ShakosJournal]

@@KeoPrints you hate doors, and support material

[@KeoPrints]

Exactly. In this universe Nick Miller Hates support material. I’m gonna make a shirt that says support material is garbage

[@JW-lp8oz]

This is amazing! I was seeing the setup in the background throughout the video, and hoooooping it would be brought up in the end :D

[@TBooneFisher6931]

Great real world/unvarnished video. Thx😉😉

[@Candymanic]

Not sure if it's already mentioned, but putting the two Filament dryers underneath, with ducting and a modified AMS Hydra print to help direct the hot air away from the electronics and into the space might help alleviate the potential risk of overheating the electronics. Some desiccant mounted in the bottom might also contribute to keeping it as dry as possible to boot, and perhaps some adjustable ducts in the lid instead of those 'duck holes', perhaps themselves filled with desiccant might be improvements as well.

[@celsofx]

I am loving all the videos dude, if this dryer box goes on sale I may give something like this a shot

[@KeoPrints]

That’s amazing! I appreciate you hanging out

[@SeanSaunders-l8v]

For added sealing, run a bead of 100% silicon around the TPU to help seal the unit even further

[@chubbyadler3276]

Something I've wondered about for dumping the moisture is to intentionally put a small hole in both the intake and exhaust of the ductwork you designed for the dryer base allowing for an intentional leak that will both intake "dry" air and exhaust "wet" air from within the box. It wouldn't take much, maybe 1/8 to 1/4 inch in diameter,.I've done that with my Sunlu dry box, but it is entirely passive. Then again, I typically dry my filament in 24 hour cycles.

[@KeoPrints]

Interesting thought!

[@zwurltech9047]

Yeah, now it's great!

[@KeoPrints]

I agree. This puppy cooks now

[@RJin3D]

It is real cool the community was able to help out and perfect the project. Keep up the good work!

[@LuisLanda]

It looks like aligning the dryer hot vent to were the desiccant pouches go in the AMS should minimize the potential issue with the electronics, not to mention that the hot air would blow freely into the spool chamber. It would also make it possible to use the dry box's plugs to cover the vent opening when the dryer is off the AMS.

[@technicallyreal]

So only the holes in the bottom were needed? No extra holes in the tray or anything to let the hot air up to the spools?

[@KeoPrints]

I did throw some holes in the tray as well to help out as there wasn’t much room for the air to circulate otherwise. You can just barely see it in the video but I did not mention it

[@ibcrootb]

Awesome, I thinking having the 3 popular desiccant containers in conjunction with the active drying would be ideal. The percentage RH never really got that low.

[@lcax8804]

Imagine you didn't have to make any holes in your AMS like the guy on BambuLab subreddit with the title " I just made an AMS Dryer" :). In any case I like you dry humor :), as well as the overall drying progression journey.

[@KeoPrints]

Dry humor… nice!

[@VictorCaoCA]

Print two white smaller circles and then some smaller black ones. Now you got some eyes for your AMS.

[@KeoPrints]

You’re onto something here

[@scotc84]

You deserve more subscribers just because of your demeanour

[@KeoPrints]

They’re on their way and I’m glad you’re hanging out with us

[@andyspoo2]

I was about to say there is apparently an AMS PRO 2 coming out that might have a dryer installed.....and then remembered it was you that said it! 🤣

[@KeoPrints]

Haha

[@RealSnail3D]

Very cool man!!

[@edmclaughlin4923]

It would be great if you showed the humidity in the environment. Is your office really at 62%? I have the desiccant only solution, I mean the extra desiccant solution with the printed holders added to the AMS in the back and front. (so that's 7 separate holders filled with the orange beads) My office reads 46%, Both my AMSes read 10%.

[@ZoeyR86]

So if you redo this, put a gore-tex sheet over the holes and crack open the unit for a second while it's warm this will let the moisture out as it cools it will pull air through the gore-tex keeping the humidity out and letting air in i also wired up solidstate dehumidifiers into mine setup as always on. They alone will take days, if not a week, to pull a roll all the way to dry, BUT if you heat dry a roll of say nylon and put in the ams dry it will stay dry indefinitely as long as the power is on

[@KeoPrints]

Those solid state ones are pretty cool. Expensive though aren’t they?

[@ZoeyR86]

@KeoPrints 50-80$ for a tiny one, it will take forever to dry wet filament, but if you dry in advance, it will keep it bone dry basically forever. Also, the color change bepoint less. it's too wet long before it will change colors needs around a 40% rh before the colors change and things like nylon needs a sub 5% rh to be stable. The solidstate units can pull down to sub 2%, but you need a fan in the enclosure, and keep in mind it over time a high concentration of oxygen can build up this can hurt polycarbonate and asa.

[@yeroca]

Looking at online ad from polymaker, the dryer has some moisture venting on the side already, so maybe you don't need any kind of vent.

[@whatsup3d]

If nothing is blowing in from outside (as opposed to recirculating) you won't have positive pressure to open the valves so it's clear where the moisture is going,.

[@jefferynichols2549]

This is a pro and a con. The idea is awesome. That is the pro. the con is Poly isn't selling the dock separately. so you have to pay a ton of money for 2 items to get 1.

[@KeoPrints]

Agreed. The base is a great option but it sucks that you can’t get it on its own. Those suckers would be selling like crazy

[@andyspoo2]

Have you seen that Bambu now to a TPU? Apparently it's quite rigid so it goes through the AMS but is more flexible once printed. It's not cheap though.

[@KeoPrints]

Yup. Check out my recent support material video. I messed with it a tiny bit at the end

[@Binary_Omlet]

Wait, is the Poly Dryer just a peltier cooler?? I was thinking of how you could use the hotside as a heat exchange since they get so hot. (Thanks Technology Connections!) But those use a ton of power. Also, is 27% good? I don't really have a metric for gauging that but have seen people with 5-10% as the goal in other places. I live in the SE USA and it's 80-95% inside the house so anything is better than that. Either way, this looks fantastic, man. Can't wait to try this myself when I get a system. Great job!

[@KeoPrints]

I think it's just a heating element and a blower of some description along with a filter but I am not certain. As for the humidity, 27% is not a good level but it illustrated that the box humidity was dropping at least. It typically sits around 12% these days after four dry cycles instead of two. Let me know how it goes, great to hear you’re giving it a shot when the time comes!

[@Binary_Omlet]

@@KeoPrints Ahh, gotcha. Was thinking since you said it had a hot and a cold side it was a Peltier. Just watched a few of your videos and you're doing awesome! Keep 'em coming and you'll have that affiliate link in no time!

[@KeoPrints]

I appreciate the heck out of it my friend!

[@almarma]

one simple trick to removed a printed TPU piece from a PEI plate: spray it with IPA and it will release like magically. If it's a big piece, spray it again while you're pulling it out. It'll come out effortlessly :)

[@000elemental000]

We need an update with the space pi plus mod. I built it from Asa cf and it is pretty impressive (I designed a base and closed the bottom in.

[@robbates4704]

Slightly disappointed that Bambu doesn’t sell a replacement for the lower body of the AMS. That would make me a lot less nervous about the mod.

[@KeoPrints]

As an individual that has so many holes in his enclosure now; I agree

[@JimmyGFromDayton]

They do, it's 59.99.

[@Notsodirt]

Quack quack. Love the video. Prototype 1, 2, 3, 4, ........ 25. It works! Always nice to have a victory

[@Binary_Omlet]

Hey, Formula 409 got it's name because it took them that many tries to get the formula right! Never give up!

[@brettleonard9228]

what if you replaced all sides of the AMS with polydryers? that way you wouldnt need to drill any holes

[@KeoPrints]

You know, you aren't the first to recommend that but I think you guys are onto something there. Ultimate AMS PolyDryer Mod!

[@johntetreault]

Yeah, good thing you printed the TPU on the textured plate.... You'd have never gotten it off the smooth plate. Just a little tip though...TPU will release with the help of isopropyl alcohol.. just pool some around the base of the print and wait a couple minutes for it to start to wick under.... It'll release with no issues.

[@TheDeathSinger]

the dryers are designed to circulate air right? so could you not hook them up to circulate air between the two and have one exhaust the air?

[@TheDeathSinger]

also place the dryers on top of the lid :) makes it harder to cut the holes and potentially open the lid (unless you find a way to fix em down) but makes it so the electronics are 100% safe

[@KeoPrints]

True true. That would be ideal for the electronics overall

[@DemonicDragonX5]

The polydryer DOES have vent holes on the sides meant to allow moisture to escape bud. Idk how effective they are but they're there.

[@KeoPrints]

Yea I see the little vent holes there but I couldn’t find any documentation to confirm that they were explicitly for moisture evacuation so I’m just moving forward under the assumption that the system needs some extra ventilation

[@rkwjunior2298]

​@KeoPrints I would have to guess that polymaker thought about this when they designed the polydryer. I wouldn't be worried about it. If people are questioning where the moisture goes then they are questioning how well the polydryer works on its own.

[@battyjoe]

In the video on their website it shows them venting out air from the sides.

[@quadlawnmowerman]

@@KeoPrints suffice to say your "duckbill" vent is doing nothing..... Problem is the box is no-longer sealed with the playmaker heater attached, and will quickly draw in moisture when not turner on

[@stickercambodia]

​@@KeoPrints Those holes are intentional for moisture escape. I've asked them prior to purchased.

[@alexritter4594]

The dryers has small holes on the sides which is used for getting rid of the mosture so 1 would have been enough.

[@ZoroarkGX]

nice project, I just started 3d printing a few months ago and just reacently bought a polydryer with 3 aditional storage boxes, but I found out that those were pretty regular boxes with not much sience, so I also theorized a better way to dry fylament using the polydryer and use the AMS lite at the same time with a little bit of thinkering but I don't think I have time nor motivation for that Now my idea... I'm no expert but as far as I know the only real electronics in an AMS aside from the feeder motor units is the motherboard and cables, if you are so worried about electronic componnents geating up I think it's better to insulate those components as much as possible, I guess it's also posible to relocate them to a place where not much heat passes through

[@KeoPrints]

Great to hear! Happy you stopped by Yea we will see how the electronics do in the heat longer term but I’m happy with the progress!

[@geekcruz]

and now I google Voxel Python AMS Dryer Upgrade, lol. BUT!! your journey was a good journey.

[@maffhieu]

AMS emmental cheese mode activated ..! 😂

[@Sodohodos]

Can I use the polymakes cardboard spool on my ams lite?

[@KeoPrints]

Yup the AMS lite does just fine with almost any spool that I’ve used. The cardboard may struggle when used in the standard AMS however

[@Scott_G]

Just found your channel. Great info!! Where did you get .stl for the GTA map on your wall?

[@KeoPrints]

I think I have the link to the download in the description but here’s the video where I talk a bit about it A Custom 3D Printed GTA Map Caused This To Happen | No CAD Experience kzbin.info/www/bejne/npXOk6mPbteqqLc

[@NWGR]

Great videos on your channel, subscribed. 🙂 I think instead of this mod I'd probably do the full enclosure python mod. It has a lot of advantages aside from just being more friendly to cardboard spools. Look into it. 👍

[@KeoPrints]

Totally with you on that. That’s an excellent way to solve a lot of problems this thing has!

[@luislugo2546]

Man, really nice video, did the passive humidity scape worked as you expected? I did my own dry box, and had no silica gel to trap the humidity after and was wondering if a passive solution like yours would be my way to go, too

[@KeoPrints]

Yea man that’s super hard to judge for sure but I can report that the humidity read low and stayed low so I’m guessing it found a way out without desiccant

[@markm6525]

Whelp, I still think a silicone heater pad stuck to the bottom with maybe a raspberry pi keeping the temp from melting the box is a good thing to explore. Having said that on the topic of evacuating the moisture. Have a look at the tech they use in modern HVAC where they use a desicant to transfer heat and moisture between the air leaving the house and the air entering. I'm betting there are useful ideas that transfer to this stuff.

[@4a86-l3e]

Nice video man, thinking of doing this mod to my ams as I have recently started printing nylon and abs for a project! Is there any chance you could share where you found the files for that gta iv map you have mounted on your wall? Dropping a sub btw!

[@KeoPrints]

Sick! Happy to have you around. You inspired me to make a short about this one so that'll be coming out Monday since I already have a new video coming tomorrow at 8am. Here are the files thangs.com/designer/KeoPrints/3d-model/1150406

[@rikogarza1729]

EIBOS 3D will be releasing a BAMBU LABS AMS ADD ON FOR THE STOCK AMS UNIT, HOLD OFF ON MODDING YOUR AMS, RELEASE IS IMMINENT (PENDING BEFORE END OF YEAR) NICK NAMED "PROJECT TETRAS"

[@KeoPrints]

Yea I saw that. Should be super cool!

[@BigInjun05]

Threads on the insert with a lock ring on the back would have solved this mayhem

[@christianlainesse4281]

What if you added one more polydryer on the bottom, and two more, one on each side? /just kiddin

[@KeoPrints]

You’re on the right track I think. That will be my next follow up video

[@IrocZIV]

That's cool. I can imagine using one of those heaters on the bottom, with a spacer to hold up the other side. Combining this with rechargeable desiccant would probably would probably maximize dryness.

[@KeoPrints]

Very true. I initially thought about just making a spacer for the other side and sticking with one heater but having the extra power to cook multiple rolls has been helpful. That said, it is not all that often that I have four rolls needing dryed at the same time but it is cool to know it can be done with two dryers fairly easily

[@NottsKnots]

It's an interesting topic and if you just like to tinker then fair enough. However, I don't think this is practical at all. I just 3d printed the popular desicant mods that fit between the spool feeders and others that fit in the centre of the spool and filled them with re-usable orange desicant. The hydromiter inside the AMS constantly reads 11%. The one outside for conparison reads ~70%. No heaters required, and a tub of desciant probably costs less than those two driers and does not void your warranty by drilling into your AMS.

[@KeoPrints]

Yea have a look at the first video in the series where I spoke about that a little. I wanted to see if there was a way to accomplish the task of drying without the use and maintenance of desiccant. Trivial stipulation but it was a fun project as a result

[@NickBR57]

So spend money on electric dryers and power to run them and achieve 35% humidity. Or for the cost of printing some gel holders and gel (one off, low cost) get 17% himidity.. YMMV but second option for me and all my 4 AMSes are at 17-18%.

[@KeoPrints]

Yea man this certainly isn’t a blanket thing for everyone but it was a super fun project to test what could be accomplished. Happy to spend the time to share my findings anyway. Although at the very end of the video you can see that the humidity came right down 27. After an additional drying cycle it was below 20! Even with all the hacking I did. Totally crazy

[@JimmyGFromDayton]

@keoprints, left a long message on your Patreon page. Loving your projects and wanted to share what your thoughts are doing to my brain.

[@KeoPrints]

My guy. I’m all over it. That’s an excellent place to connect. I’ll get back with you

[@alijah1539]

My big problem with everyone using these polydryers is you literally can't buy the drier by itself and I already have storage boxes for my spools so I'm not going to buy the combo when I'm just going to never use the box. I really hope they make it so you can buy it solo but I highly doubt it.

[@KeoPrints]

I’m with you and so are a bunch of people. This would be such an excellent accessory if it was available like that

[@andreprager247]

Well, this didn't go well. I wouldn't recommend doing this. I just tried this mod on my AMS... Result: after 4 hrs of running both dryers on the medium setting (with 4 full spools of ABS in it) the rear section of the AMS got so warm that the insert started deforming... The rear rollers bowed away and the spools were dragging on the floor. I was able to fix it with a heat gun (carefully heating the insert up and bending it back) but it's now all a little warped... Maybe it's fine if you only do the lowest setting for PLA but what's the point then.

[@KeoPrints]

Jeez thanks for sharing your experience. That sounds super lame. I’ve been using mine regularly for the past three months on the second setting as well and have not noticed any damage. I’ll have to double check when I get home to make sure now

[@andreprager247]

​@@KeoPrints maybe it had something to do with having had 4 full 1kg spools in there? Lots of weight trying to spread the rollers and also the exhaust gets more blocked, concentrating the heat?

[@GunnerAl9]

Wow, a lot of effort and destruction of your AMS. The final design for two on the bottom was really genius and would have saved a lot of time. You never mentioned whether the duck-bill moisture release ever worked or not? Was the duck worth the bill?

[@KeoPrints]

Tell me about it! Yea it’s hard to tell if the duck vent actually worked but what I have measured is the moisture level remaining at 17% after a few days so I would imagine the moisture that is baked out of the filament isn’t returning to the filament

[@MisterkeTube]

Heating does not reduce the amount of moisture it just reduces the RELATIVE humidity because warm air can hold more moisture than cold air. The then warm air hence can hold moisture coming out of the filament and also there the heat helps that moisture to exit the filament. But then that extracted moisture increases the relative humidity of that warm air again and to keep on extracting moisture from the filament you need to get that warm air out. Heating it up further gives diminishing returns and you cannot get it higher than the temperature the filament can stand, so you just need to get that warm and now moist air out, not just by overpressure, but just let it out through big enough holes. Check out how a food dehydrator does it. But if that warm air is exhausted, you need to replace it by new warm air that is less moist, i.e. you want to get external (or dried by dessicant) relatively dry cold air to pass through the heater, where it is heated up again, lowering its relative humidity further and the cycle can start over. Filament dryer manufacturers should really just have a look at even the cheapest food dehydrator on how you actually dehydrate stuff. You don't do that with a tiny DC heater and circulating air around and around, but you use a relatively powerful AC heater to heat up a large amount of air that is just pushed over the thing to dry and is then exhausted together with the moisture.

[@KeoPrints]

These are all fair points. So far I haven’t seen any moisture return to the spools after drying and letting the temp return to ambient. It sits pretty steady at 12% but the disadvantage is completely ruining the system when I open the box to move spools. Desiccant takes the win there no doubt! Oh well. More testing more tinkering

[@MisterkeTube]

@@KeoPrints But again that 12% is relative humidity. It says barely anything on how dry the inside is, unless you also mention the temperature. If you simply heat up a closed space filled with air the relative humidity (and hence the % shown on the meter) will go down significantly, yet the actual amount of moisture in that space has not changed. If there is a source of extra moisture in that space (ex. your filament), it might now release some of that moisture, which is the intention, but that then also makes the total amount of moisture in the air go up. The relative humidity will slightly increase, but likely still be way lower than what you had at room temperature. But, the moment the temperature then drops again, the air will have less room to hold moisture and hence water will condense where it sees fit (typically on the coldest outside walls) and at that point also your filament might regain some of the moisture. Once the temperature is again ambient, If the space is truely closed off, and the relative humidity is then lower than before the temperature cycle, that either means there should now be a puddle of water somewhere in the space or something (your filament? dessicant?) has absorbed more moisture than it held before the cycle. If that is the goal (i.e. if the intention of the heater is just to speed up getting the moisture into the dessicant), then sure this circulating heated air has a use, at least until the dessicant is saturated, which can be very quickly if you're drying really moist filament. Whereas continuously passing fresh heated air over the item to dry and then just letting it out to spread the taken up moisture over a much larger volume (your room, house, the world), can keep on taking up moisture as long as the filament has some to give. Sure, you'll be venting off heat and hence this will be less efficient at getting the temperature inside that space up, but the goal was also not to just get the temperature up, it was to dry the thing in that space!

[@irgendeintyp]

If you’re already spending this much, wouldn’t it be a better idea to just install a large solid state dehumidifier cell? It would be quiet, low power, better for the electronics and neater looking…

[@JPJ333]

Errrrr......You could also just put your filament in an air fryer on a low setting for 20 mins. Works well for me!!

[@KeoPrints]

Ahh I’ve never thought about the old air fryer. Cool

[@JPJ333]

@KeoPrints Mine has an actual dehydrated setting for drying out fruit and veg, but even a standard one should go down to about 100c. They work well.

[@surlycanadian]

Here’s a question from a mostly ignorant person who has not done any 3d printing or yet owned any 3d printers or filament, but is going to plunge into it very soon: What about while whole-room dehumidification, with like, a regular dehumidifier? Surely if you’ve pulled almost all of the humidity out of the air to begin with, the filament wouldn’t be able to absorb much of any humidity.

[@KeoPrints]

In theory that would work just fine. I know some people have rigged up an entire closet to be their filament storage so you don't have to humidity control an entire room but yes, that idea would totally work. You might just dry your sinuses out or something if you hang out in there lol

[@keteflips]

AMS Gruyere Cheese Edition

[@boggisthecat]

Eh… desiccant works well by itself. Cheaper and easier solution. My AMS has been at 20% RH for weeks now, despite quite a few filament swap outs.

[@odinata]

Do not EVER do one of those lightning wood burning projects, Keo. Not you.

[@KeoPrints]

Don't think that would go well for me? You’re probably correct

[@0Wheezy]

Doesn't like supports.. Too annoying to auto generate so models the supports instead. Yep checks out.

[@KeoPrints]

I just care enough about those that would like to print the model that I put aside my hate for a second. This way no matter what slicer settings you’re using, it'll be supported without the need to specify or paint supports. Also I would rather design supports than paint supports or use an object modifier to specify supports. Just a personal preference; not for everyone I understand.

[@JacobBPeak]

Subscribing so you can be a real youtuber.

[@KeoPrints]

You’re one of the real ones

[@IvCastilla]

ALL FILAMENT DRYER DESIGNERS NEED 101 COUSE OF DRYING AT CHEM ENG SCHOOL. ALL HAVE THE SAME PROBLEM AND THEY WILL NEVER WORK

[@The_Privateer]

If you have time to 'fix it later' and do a piss poor job in the first place, you have time to do it right the first time.

[@KeoPrints]

I wouldn't call my first version piss poor... piss middle class at least but certainly not poor. I would say this version is at least piss upper-middle class now