Humidity in wine fridge/cellar

WINE TALK
1

Hi everyone-

I’m wondering how/if a home wine fridge controls humidity and also looking for humidity management tips. I have two wine fridges at home: a 48 bottle unit made by Wine Enthusiast (bought new about 5 yrs ago) and a larger 150 bottle EuroCave (purchased off Craigslist, not sure how old it is but seems to be in good shape). Both seem to be working well in terms of temperature control. Neither have controls for humidity.

The Wine Enthusiast fridge is quite damp inside. I have had some labels develop mold and I sometimes find condensation on the inside of the unit. I’ve taken to wrapping bottles going in there with plastic wrap. I’ve never had mold or visible dampness inside the EuroCave.

A few questions:
1- Given that these units don’t have knobs or buttons to adjust humidity, do you think either of them are actually doing anything to control the humidity?

2- I’m not measuring the humidity in either unit. Should I be? Is this something I should be worrying about?

3- If this is something that I should be worrying about, how would you recommend that I adjust it up and down?

Thanks!
Noah

2

Really high humidity can ruin labels, as you noted, and really low humidity can dry out corks.

I’d get a humidity meter and check what you have - anything between 50-70% is acceptable.

I don’t control humidity in my cellar but I do keep an eye on it - usually around 60%, so nothing need be done.

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3

SensorPush is an easy way to measure humidity.

4

Thanks for the information and just purchased an affordable one for my wine cooler.

5

I think the first part is certain, but there is a lot of debate how true the second part is, particularly if the bottles are resting on their sides.

You can search and find long threads on here discussing whether elevated humidity really is or isn’t necessary in your storage cabinets.

Just me personally and my experience, I think the need for elevated humidity in wine storage is one of those old axioms that probably wouldn’t bear out if you actually did a scientific test.

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6

Not sure about the WE unit, but this issue occurs in the Eurocaves when bottles are touching the back panel of the unit - I believe it’s mentioned in the manual.

If you do bulk storage, I find it it impossible to avoid and end up having to pull the bottles and wipe down the back around once a year or so.

7

Can too much humidity damage the cork/cap? Which in turn could possibly damage the wine ? Just curious. Worse case I guess you lose your label and the unit works inefficiently.

8

I have three wine coolers and use the WirelessTag products which allow you to monitor temp, humidity and light. They also allow you to set alerts which push out email/texts based on your settings. Additionally the data is accumulated so you can produce graphs/reports which compare each cooler. Best part is no data storage fee just product cost. Check it out and let me know if any questions. Here is a link https://wirelesstags.net/

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9

I think the answer is clearly no. Lots of older French wines, where the bottles were stored in damp cellars without capsules until shipping, have lots of mold under the capsule. You just wipe it off with a paper towel.

If the cork is so poor that it lets in mold smells, you’re probably going to have some serious oxidation.

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10

If you want something discreet go to a cigar shop and by an insert they use in a humidor. You can get a battery powered temp and humidity reader for cheap. Smaller than a credit card.

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11

There’s plenty of humility in my wine fridge. Sure, I’ve got some pretty nice, age-worthy wines in there, but I’m not above having a bottle of Bogle or Kirkland’s in there, too.

12

That’s certainly true of my 1994 vintage Marvel cooler.

13

Lots of good suggestions, everyone. Thanks! If I do end up monitoring the humidity, what to do I do if it’s too high or low? What is the best way to adjust it up or down in a home wine fridge?

14

little water in a glass bowl will raise humidity, little baking soda in glass bowl will lower humidity. Keeping bottles away from walls and keeping door closed as much as possible help maintain constant humidity (knowing what bottle you want to grab and where its located before opening the cellar will help decrease time the door is ajar.

15

Make sure the bottles aren’t too close to the fan/cooler. I had one bottle too close and the label disintegrated and the fridge froze up a bit .

16

Noah,
We had briefly corresponded via PM but I figured I’d write out my small odyssey and some recommendations here -

I too have a Wine Enthusiast brand fridge that deals with excessive humidity. I live in a humid climate and really pretty early on it was clear my fridge just did a poor job with humidity management. I kinda sucked it up and did basic troubleshooting to little avail. I was on the verge of a move and sort of gave up until after the move, and then the movers broke the fridge door during the move. Due to supply chain and Covid etc I didn’t get my replacement door for 1 year but as soon as the fridge was up again the humidity problem returned and of course I’m out of warranty now. There were no WE approved service providers in my area so I got a basic Mr. Appliance service tech to come out and look at it. The guy was friendly enough and basically said, yes the fridge is working, yes the drainage pathway in the fridge isn’t blocked, the fridge is just bad at draining the condensate for reasons he wasn’t really sure of, he thought maybe tilting the fridge slightly towards the drain hole would help ( spoiler, it didn’t) but otherwise couldn’t come up with any meaningful solution.

@MChang has an absolutely excellent suggestion in SensorPush, these little sensors are amazing, you can just set them up as local sensors which your phone will connect to with bluetooth, or buy a gateway so you can monitor your fridges or whatever else you want from anywhere you have internet access (no fee for cloud access). I installed these and it’s clear that for my climate and the ability of the fridge to clear moisture, the cooling cycling is just way too long and infrequent. Why it is programmed to cool down 8 degrees and then turn off is beyond me, this allows way too much humidity to build back up inbetween cycles. I would suggest to anyone dealing with humidity to install a sensor in the fridge. It has been really helpful for me. FWIW I talked to WE support about this range of temperature swings and they told me that was “normal operation”.

EDIT: I totally forgot to add that Sensorpush customer support is top-notch. When my gateway stopped functioning, not only did they send me a new gateway basically no questions asked, but when we were working through troubleshooting, they of their own accord were able to see it still plugged in pinging their servers, reset it and my account to repair it, and just told me to keep the extra gateway.

Lastly if anyone is just at their wits end and needs a new fridge I’d highly recommend reaching out to Jim Mackey at Wine Appreciation - no affiliation or disclosures here, he has just come in clutch for me when my only available offsite storage option abruptly closed and even offered some pro bono advice and suggestions dealing with the aforementioned humidity problem.

Attached images - SensorPush data from the Humid fridge, you can see the temperature swings are way too wide and the cooling only turns on on average once every 18 hours or so. The second image is of a fridge in my hot garage which maintains in comparison an iron grip on both temperature and humidity in a much more extreme environment.

Humid Fridge

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Properly Operating Garage Fridge

garagefridge
garagefridge1125×1711 236 KB

3 Likes
17

You can use something like this to get rid of excess moisture, just keep an eye on humidity: DampRid Hi-Capacity Moisture Absorbent No Scent 64 oz - Ace Hardware

18

I haven’t tried this particular product but I have done many others. The fact that the cooling system works the way it does just ensures that humidity eventually climbs back up unless it’s dry air outside. Stuff like this will work temporarily but it will also mean that the humidity in the fridge cycles between like 35-75% instead of 55-100%. At that point I’m not sure what’s worse, too dry or too wet. At least I can just Saran Wrap the bottles to prevent mold forming in a humid environment, right?

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19

Oof…

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Amazing post- thanks for the information. I’m almost scared to do this. Right note I’m living in ignorant bliss that my bottles, while damp, are at least at the right temp. I’ll be bummed if they are subjected to near 10degree temp swings on a daily basis.,