This is a characteristic of Scotland’s weather that people either choose to ignore, or are fortunate enough not to live with its effects…
Condensation caused by dew point when cold weather quickly turns to warm – or perhaps I should better describe it as ‘Less Cold’ 🥶
I get hit with this fairly frequently, when cold weather suddenly decides to invert itself, and swing upwards by anything up to +10℃, or more, overnight, or within a few hours.
Looking at some of the temperature charts I post around this time of year, it can be seen that the dew point is often only about 3℃ less than the actual temperature, so anything that possesses a significant thermal mass will lag the prevailing temperature rise, be at or below the current dew point, and end up covered with running condensation.
I was out in my garage, obviously unheated, where I have a hydraulic reservoir for a pneumatic/hydraulic pump I need to clean and service, after it was flooded with water that filled the tank and forced out most of the hydraulic fluid, while I wasn’t looking, of course.
There’s no drain on the reservoir, which will therefore need to pumped out, but that’s not going to happen until spring, or more likely summer.
It’s been dripping condensation all over the place for two days, and it’s lucky I happened to sit it on some old newspaper, originally to catch the oil and muck that was coming off the sides.
But
While I’m not worried about the reservoir, it’s saturated inside and out with hydraulic fluid, so the condensation isn’t going to cause it any problems.
I’m more worried about those ‘Foo Fighters’ seen against the dark background of the tank in the last pic.
They’re not on the tank, but appeared as the camera was focussing and setting the exposure – and should obviously NOT be there!
😩
Secret Scotland 