Homemade Dehydrators

I found this article about making your own food dehydrators and thought I would share it here.
They seem to be very easy to make and great for budget-minded preppers.
www.survivopedia.com...

Good article. Some examples I hadn't seen before. Thanks.

a reply to: mamabeth

I have been thinking of buying one, but I just can't justify that I really "Need" one!

This will give me something to play around with!

a reply to: seeker1963

I spent a lot of money on the one I have,it's an Excaliber.
Another thing I learned to,don't try to store too much in a container.
I had a speck of mold in one bag and it contaminated the whole lot.

They still find caches of Pemmican in the midwest, left by Plains indians. They did expeditions, too. Like a base camp and further camps to their destination each stocked with rations in case they needed it.

In my youth this valley had lots of apricot orchards and every harvest there were racks and racks of sun drying apricots.

Couldn't do that now in Silicon Valley, too much pollution raining down.

Storage is a problem. If you dry food to consume every year thats one thing. If you want to store food for years 'jusincase', best to go with number ten cans, enamel lined and nitrogen filled. Thats store bought for you redneck muthas.

Banana chips, nuts and raisins will last years under the right conditions.

I find that some foods dehydrate better than others. Some of my kids really enjoy dehydrated apple slices, so they focus on running that through our old dehydrator when school is out. It works best if you dip them in a solution of citric acid--it keeps the apple's flesh from turning an unappetizing 'snap'--brown. You can buy citric acid in a powder in the canning section at the store. It works for banana slices too, which would otherwise turn an ugly brown color

My spouse and I prefer dried pineapples; the dehydrating process intensifies the flavor, and enough citric acid is present that it doesn't discolor.

Watermelon becomes bitter for some reason, as do strawberries sometimes.

I am experimenting with dehydrating the ingredients for soup. I'd like to be able to just add hot water....

The back of my station wagon makes a great dehydrator. I just park in the sun.

on Good Eats, they showed two furnace filters and a fan. The logic was, cold is better then heat.

I use a TSM. Its stainless and has stainless racks. I plug it into a invertor that is powered by a solar panel recharged battery bank, so I can continue use after dark

Here's an example of a simple homemade dehydrator:




The screens are just to keep the bugs out.

Just set it outside on a warm dry sunny day (a bit of a breeze is even better as it speeds up the drying process) and let nature do its thing.

The trick is to cut up your food into small pieces. The higher the water content, the smaller the pieces need to be.

So many awesome DIY/Solar dehydrators out. If you haven't tried dehydrating before its great, with banana chips and dried strawberries being to die for along with various dried meats The limit of things really is your imagination.

I've got an Excalibur as well and they are awesome! A really great accompaniment is a vaccuum sealer. The best way to seal without using jars/cans and no added weight/size.

On a similar note (similar to the pizza box one form that article). I have built Solar Ovens before, similar to this www.instructables.com... and they are surprisingly effective! I was planning on designing and building one out of wood for when we are camping in summer fire bans.