Dew collection method

Here is my semi-automated method to collect dew.



1. A bowl (red) full of frozen water collects dew on its walls during the night.
2. Dew concentrates and falls into the blue bowl (2).
3. A modified aquarium pump draws the dew to the receiver (4) just before sunrise.
4. Dew receiver put inside a bath of cold water in order to keep the "spirit".
5. Timer, responsible for the activation of the pump at morning.

It gives about 20 - 30 ml per night depending on weather.

I've seen some nice ways to collect dew from other members scattered around the forum. Maybe we could gather our methods here, under this topic, for a quick reference and comparison.

Since the salt attracts moisture by nature, couldn't you just collect your dew and mix the two by simply placing your salt in a glass tray and leaving it outside and leech off the water?

I also think it's worth having full moon light directly in sight of your reciever to maximize the chances of trapping the lunar spirit.

Also, the Alchemical illustration of collecting Dew I've seen shows them simply using cloth suspended above the ground and then squeezing the dew out of the cloth into buckets.....

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Since the salt attracts moisture by nature, couldn't you just collect your dew and mix the two by simply placing your salt in a glass tray and leaving it outside and leech off the water?

Hm, I don't think you will get a saturated salt solution out of this. The salt keeps the moisture inside, it doesn't become delequiem like carbonate. Maybe I could add some salt in the receiver (4) in order not to lose the spirit but I don't feel like to deviate so much from original recipie.

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I also think it's worth having full moon light directly in sight of your reciever to maximize the chances of trapping the lunar spirit.

Thanks for the idea.

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Also, the Alchemical illustration of collecting Dew I've seen shows them simply using cloth suspended above the ground and then squeezing the dew out of the cloth into buckets.....

I' ve seen this too but it is not so simple to do it. When one leaves the imaginary world of designing how to do sth and goes to real practice, encounters so many problems that make him to stick to the easiest, most repeatable and verified method.

Yeah, I guess we do have it a little easier these days with plastics etc... Might as well take advantage of it.

I found very interesting document from Hebrew University of Jerusalem about dew collecting experiment. Experiment was initiated in late May 2003 on a roof in Jerusalem using passive radiative dew condensers.In the documents there are also the picture of this "condensers" which are very simple to make.Here is the link for document:

http://www.up.ac.za/academic/geog/meteo/EVENTS/fogdew2003/PAPERS/C75.pdf

The Fool, if you dont mind i will copy my message from my thread about modern collecting methods from the organization called "International Organization For Dew Utilization" just in case that you dont miss this good information.

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I found highly interesting organization about modern dew collecting.The organization is called "International Organization For Dew Utilization" and their main goal is to provide the drinking water from dew collecting.On their website are many examples of modern and ancient dew collecting techniques together with photos and videos.Highly recomended!!!

Link to the website:

http://www.opur.u-bordeaux.fr

Here is another one with pictures and detailed information how to build practical dew condenser.

http://www.plastemart.com/upload/Literature/write-up_for_plastmart.asp

Thanks for the info dejan07. Their site is really useful. I've seen also that they mention the importance of dew in alchemy and they sell dew collectors. Seems easy to replicate one but I yet cannot figure out what material to use.

They are using plastic,aluminium and other soft metal material for the contstruction of this condensers but i will advise you to cover them with some kind of folien(I dont know is that a english word) or some kind of "plastic bags" so that the dew dont come in touch with this metals and when you are about to collect the dew you can take only this "bags" full of dew with you without difficulty.The next day you put again new folien to keep it clean and so on...Here are the pictures of "folien":

http://www.lohrmann.de/UserFiles/Image/_junk/PE_Folie2.JPG
http://hdigx180.customerweb-v1.hotdigital-server.net/images/product_images/original_images/92_0.jpg

I am building this model right now:

http://img212.imagevenue.com/img.php?image=35846_fig3_122_398lo.jpg

This construction is very practical because they are very cheap,so you can put a lot of them at night to collect much dew and moonlight as possible and you dont need to wash them if you use "folien".Good luck!!!

Another document about dew collecting techniques with photos and detailed measurements.

http://www.up.ac.za/academic/geog/meteo/EVENTS/fogdew2003/PAPERS/C70.pdf

Hi

According to the link (enclosed) a dew conical condenser has 38% more efficiency than a flat sheet condenser

http://tel.archives-ouvertes.fr/docs/00/32/04/50/ANNEX/Presentation_these_owen_clus_condensation_rosee_eau_douce.pdf see page#18

Thanks for the info chercheur01 but i unforunately i dont understand French.

Maybe a silly question, but would it be possible to use a dehumdifier very early in the morning outside of your home?

Edit: Maybe not such a good idea?:

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But for this work - dew and sea salt - that might lose us the spirit of the dew, as Nick has said:

"The problem with distillation is the escape of the gentle spirit that is in the dew. Our Philosophical Gold which is the sea salt is bound up and fixed in the salt, so there is no fear of loosing it. But with the morning dew, the Philosophical Silver is volatile and easily escapes, which is the reason the dew needs to be immediately bottled and sealed before it even reaches room temperature. "

There is a member of my group I.A.O. that is using a dehumidifier. But so far he has not completed the work, or even gotten to the stage of completing the Alkahest and testing it on dissolving metals. So we will have to wait and see.

I split this topic into a new one "Programming and Imprinting Water" with the posts relating to the video.

I live in a cold climate (nothern USA) Is it possible to collect dew in winter months?

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Is it possible to collect dew in winter months?

When I use a bowl full of frozen water, dew will collect on it, even in the winter.

I have seen drawings depicting alchemists collecting dew using sheets suspended horizontally above the ground and then simply wringing the sheets out into a container. This seems like it would be a simple and efficient way to collect a substantial amount of dew in a single night since the sheets have a large surface area to collect dew as opposed to just trying to collect it with a relatively small bucket filled with ice.
It would also seem to be of great importance to collect a large amount in a single night since there are so few nights in an entire year when the conditions and timing are right for collecting the dew. The moon is, after all, only full a couple of times every spring and even then you are not guaranteed to have a clear sky.

Silverdragon07

Sorry I just looked over the thread again. I hadn't realized that Nagual had already mention the suspended sheets method.

Silverdragon07

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This seems like it would be a simple and efficient way to collect a substantial amount of dew in a single night since the sheets have a large surface area to collect dew as opposed to just trying to collect it with a relatively small bucket filled with ice.

Yes, using sheets allows you to collect much more dew during one night. But my problem was that dew usually isn't forming every night. Especially during this winter which was more than usual cloudy and rainy. The ice bucket method allows you to have some humidity condensed out of the air every night. This might not reach the quality of natural dew but gives you sth to work with.
Maybe from now on, as the Spring is approaching and the weather gets better, this method with the sheets is the indicated one.

I am at 6000 ft in Nevada; snow on ground now. I've had reagent grade calc. nitrate outside under a porch for 7 days, and it is only slightly more translucent, showing that a little moisture has been attracted.

Here' a free dew point calculator (windows). Enter your relative humidity and temperature from any weather website and it shows the temp you need fall to to get dew. climatenotebook.org/downloads.html

"The DewPoint Calculator illustrates the interrelation of temperature, RH, and dew point. Enter values for any two of these three elements, and the software application will provide the third, allowing you to explore this three-way relationship in a hypothetical storage or display environment."

Great info, Thanks

So the dew doesn't have to be collected in May and June or even a full moon as per the Leyden letters? Or is there added benefit to doing it this way?

goatz wrote:

So the dew doesn't have to be collected in May and June or even a full moon as per the Leyden letters? Or is there added benefit to doing it this way?

Read the topic True, without error, certain and most true

http://www.decatur.de/javascript/dew/index.html
another dewpoint online calculator


I got myself a hygrometer (normally for a sauna) and put it outside next to a thermometer.

Right now at 8 pm today, 9th of February 2009, fullmoon, middle europe, austria it has

+3.7°C (ca. 38,66 F) and a relative humidity of 77% (pretty high isnt it??):
The calculator tells me that a temp of +0.05°C is needed for dew to condense.
I will definitely try to gather dew tonight.

I heard severel times that on fullmoon-nights the sky is mostly clear. We had claudy weather and rain for the past 2 weeks and yesterday was already pretty nice but today the sky is 90% clear. Seems like whoever brought that up, that on fullmoon-nights the sky is clear, is right.


Wilfried