Why does morning dew seem to only soak things that are mostly ‘outdoors’?

820 viewsOtherPlanetary Science

I keep a motorcycle outdoors under a waterproof cover, but noticed that with morning dew the bike is still noticeablely wet on the inside of the cover.

Meanwhile a buddy has his bike in a plywood shed that is by no means air tight but has 4 walls and a roof, but no insulation or air handling fans/AC and he says dew is never an issue..what’s the difference?

In: Planetary Science

14 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

The first difference is temperature. The temp inside of the shed doesn’t drop as quickly so there’s less condensation on the surfaces inside the shed. The second issue is moisture levels. A shed, or room doesn’t have to be completely airtight to keep moisture out. It just has to be mostly closed off the to outside elements. Obviously some moisture gets in but it will happen very slowly and by the time the sun rises and the temp comes back up, the space wont have accumulated a noticeable amount of moisture. This is why your home and garage remain dry even though neither of these are airtight. If your friends shed was in Alaska in the winter where it was perpetually dark, it would probably accumulate moisture over time.

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