Battling the drought

[MichaelD23]

With this cold weather settling in — even here in Tennessee — I'm battling to keep the relative humidity at a decent level. I already run an ultrasonic humidifier, which does an okay job through most of the winter but falls behind when temps stay in the 20s and 30s. I bought an additional smaller Honeywell product today but it's not working very well and I'm taking it back, considering replacing it with a bigger, better unit.

I also humidify each of my acoustics, using either Planet Waves Two-Way Humidifiers, Kyser, Damp-It, or the regular Planet Waves units. If I'm careful to keep each of those in-case units in good shape, do I need to worry so much about the house itself?

[CTGull]

I run a big Essick humidifier in the basement, where my guitars are. I put 3.5 to 4.5 gallons of water into it daily!! I just checked it and it must have run out an hour or 2 ago and the wick is dry. The humidity down here is 21%!!!!!!! It had been holding at 27% for the last few days. I can't crank it up all the way because it sounds like a plane about to take off and our son wouldn't be able to sleep on the other side of the room. Fortunately all the solid wood guitars are put away except a Seagull S6, that was survived many winters on the wall. Unfortunately, the furnace pulls air from the same space and the room is connected to the rest of the house thru a doorway.