Hi All,
I'm sure you are all aware that a high level of humidity is very
damaging to objects. Mould/mildew is bad. To keep any object in ideal
conditions you're looking for a constant temperature of 18 degrees
Celsius and humidity of 50-55% (though the recommended stats vary
around the world a bit). Any higher with the humidity and mould will
grow.
Our houses are not always the perfect storage repositories for our
beautiful instruments and as discussed previously, my (new) lute
struggled a lot in an unusually humid summer here in Melbourne in a
timber house with no cooling. Ideally for the house and lute case
one needs a thermohygrometer (measures both temperature and humidity)
then take measures accordingly. The damaging part can be the sudden
change rather than gentle change over a longer period of time. ie if
an object slowly dries out it will take longer to crack. Japanese
archives have lasted thousands of years with no heating or cooling and
objects just gently expand or contract gradually over the seasons. By
western museum conservation standards the collections absolutely fine.
Good luck with the excess or lack of humidity respectively... I've
ordered new strings to see if that helps the tuning issues since I
can't do much about the humidity.
Claudia
(Former Collection Manager, Museum of Victoria.)
On 09/03/2011, at 9:15 AM, Sam Chapman wrote:
If you go for a room humidifier, make sure you get one with a
hygrostat
built in, or buy a hygrostat separately. This will allow you to keep
the humidity at a constant level, avoiding too much moisture in
the air
which can walls go mouldy (but will please your houseplants). Most
humidifiers, if left on all the time, produce a higher level of
humidity in a normal-size room than is necessary. I keep mine at
50%. I
find that the sound of my instruments deteriorates if the humidity
is
much higher than that. Also, if you use gut strings then they will
stay
in tune better and last much longer if you avoid high levels of
humidity. Unfortunately, most modern concert halls don't take this
into
account...
Best,
Sam
On 7 March 2011 23:09, <[1][email protected]> wrote:
Does anyone have any recommendations for a humidifier for lute.
Would
appreciate any advice - thanks.
regulating the humidity of your home might be the best option; all
your
instruments, your furniture, pets, people will all benefit.
Mildew is the enemy, and the smaller the case the more likely it
is
to go
mildew.
Talk to music stores which deal with serious students of violin,
cello,
and piano, all of which have comercial solutions for
humidification.
--
Dana Emery
To get on or off this list see list information at
[2]http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
--
Sam Chapman
Oetlingerstrasse 65
4057 Basel
(0041) 79 530 39 91
--
References
1. mailto:[email protected]
2. http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/%7Ewbc/lute-admin/index.html
