Sudden heavy rainstorm just soaked all of my gear

[ONIKKINEN]

As the title suggests, i got caught mid imaging with a quick but strong shower. It took me a while to pull all electronics out and cover the scope.

 

Is astro imaging gear sensitive to rain, and if so whats the next step?

[Alien 13]

No astro gear I know of is designed to be waterproof weatherproof but perhaps damp proof so its best to dry each item as best you can and leave then somewhere warm and dry, sensitive electronics can be placed in a container of uncooked rice if its realy wet.

Alan

Edited October 16, 2021 by Alien 13

[ONIKKINEN]

1 hour ago, Alien 13 said:

No astro gear I know of is designed to be waterproof weatherproof but perhaps damp proof so its best to dry each item as best you can and leave then somewhere warm and dry, sensitive electronics can be placed in a container of uncooked rice if its realy wet.

Alan

Yeah, the mini-pc might have died as it rained directly inside it through the vent holes on top 😭. My tube orientation was such that the camera and the various usb and power ports were also exposed to rain for a bit...

Well ill throw them in a rice bath and hope they didn't mind an unscheduled wash.

[Chefgage]

13 hours ago, ONIKKINEN said:

Yeah, the mini-pc might have died as it rained directly inside it through the vent holes on top 😭. My tube orientation was such that the camera and the various usb and power ports were also exposed to rain for a bit...

Well ill throw them in a rice bath and hope they didn't mind an unscheduled wash.

Avoid the rice idea, bit of a myth type thing anyway. A nice warm room will be better. The thing with rice is you risk getting small particles/rice dust onto your optics.

Edited October 17, 2021 by Chefgage

[HiveIndustries]

Hate to butt in here but blow dryers are ok on low heat, right? It's a thing I find myself doing as an impatient person.

[ONIKKINEN]

1 hour ago, Chefgage said:

Avoid the rice idea, bit of a myth type thing anyway. A nice warm room will be better. The thing with rice is you risk getting small particles/rice dust onto your optics.

Im not worried abot the telescope, being a newtonian its exposed to weather, dew and frost all the time. My mini-pc is what took a beating there, being made for normal inside use it is not designed to be in rained on.

Ill have to come up with some sort of shield on it to prevent this kind of thing again.

 

[waroffice]

The rice thing is a myth by the way, it doesn't do anything, saw it on QI

 

The best thing is to not rush the drying out leave them in a warm place for a few days

[ONIKKINEN]

1 hour ago, waroffice said:

The rice thing is a myth by the way, it doesn't do anything

Care to link somewhere that explains this?

Edited October 18, 2021 by ONIKKINEN

[ItsmeMaw]

I had a Canon camera set up for widefield meteors and it got rained on. You could see water in the lens.

I took the lens off the camera and put both in a plastic container with a lid that snapped tight.

Then put a container of "damp rid" you use to get rid of moisture in a cabinet or closet.

Worked like a charm.  Still using the camera and lens.

[The Lazy Astronomer]

4 hours ago, waroffice said:

The rice thing is a myth by the way, it doesn't do anything, saw it on QI

 

The best thing is to not rush the drying out leave them in a warm place for a few days

2 hours ago, ONIKKINEN said:

Care to link somewhere that explains this?

Actually, I think it does work (in that rice will absorb moisture), albeit not that well, so really it should really be thought of as a poor man's dessicant sachet.

Flushing with pure ethanol apparently the way to do it, so you'd better raid your spirits and get distilling!

Edit: I've actually just discovered it's not possible to distill pure ethanol out of a water and ethanol mixture containing less than 95.6% ethanol without the use of benzene, so maybe don't do that...

Edited October 18, 2021 by The Lazy Astronomer

[ONIKKINEN]

Whether it was necessary or not to play with rice, all the gear appears to work as intended. The wire going from my power supply to the integrated cooling fan on the VX8 mirror assembly had blown a fuse but works after a new one, but other than that everything appears undamaged. Really quite surprised the PC boots up as i saw water dripping directly inside the case, and where i assume the motherboard to be. Opened up the case a bit to maybe improve air circulation (put it in front of a fan for a while) so i don't think anything is damaged.

8 hours ago, The Lazy Astronomer said:

Actually, I think it does work (in that rice will absorb moisture), albeit not that well, so really it should really be thought of as a poor man's dessicant sachet.

Speaking of desiccant sachets, buying some reusable silica gel and putting moist electronics in a box with it might be a good idea in the future if the weather forecast  when the weather forecast does a 180 suddenly.