I've given up entirely on the small humidor I received with my first purchase. It simply does not hold humidity as well as my cooler, I can't stand the constant maintenance, and honestly even though it only holds my every days at this point I'm concerned about the damage I might do to them from the constantly changing rh level.

You all have similar experiences?

Was it stabalized before you started putting your gars in it? If not, as you add/remove cigars you may prolong stabalization time. Just my .02

Don't give up yet, use the humi for grabbing smokes daily. Try to limit the amount of access to the cooler so as to maintain better constants as well as for better aging. It's hard though. I was at one point using my cooler for daily smokes, but upon good advice, and experience, I learned that it was only adding to variations in temp. and rH.

i'm having trouble with mine, too. used to be at 70% with JUST the h2o in the humidifyer. added 50/50 pg/h20, though, and now i can't get it above 62%.

i seasoned it by wiping it down with h2o and then let a bowl of water sit in it for a couple of days/nights. that's when it got to and stayed at 70%. when i try to add h2o to the humidifier now, though, it's like the oasis foam in it is totally saturated; the water won't soak in. any suggestions?

Wintertime is hard on humidity. Coolers do better because they are more airtight, and tend to get opened less often.

Also, dont keep using 50/50... do a search on a study I posted, it keeps adding up and you won't achieve what you want.

On That 50/50 mix. Was that by weight, or volume. To maintain 70% RH you need to mix, by weight, not volume. If you mixed, by volume, you have too much PG in the mix. Hence the lower humidity. I am using 52% PG/ 48% H2O, and keep an almost constant 65%. This is my favorite smoking humidity level. I went down to the college Chem lab, and used their digital scales to make my measurements. I believe Volume measurements, rather than weight measurements are your problem.
Just my .02
Later
Dave (A.K.A. Homebrew)
P.S. After initial charging use straight h20, rather than h20 PG mix. Recharge with mix about every 6 mo. or so.

what homie and telly man said - but use distilled water not tap.

no, i mean i wet the foam down once with 50/50 and have added h2o ONLY since (and always distilled).

Contrary to popular belief, 62 - 65 rh is fine, especially for long term storage. I have kept cigars for years and never had a complaint by myself, or from others. Check out ***OOPS Didn't mean to post a competitor website***.
"KoS"

What mrtelcom said. Winter is rough on the humi. I'm bustin my butt keeping my 3 humidors above 60%. You may want to think about temporarily moving the humidors to another part of the house. That may help.

thanks, guys. i appreciate the reassurance! i've not been doing these nearly long enough to know what's okay and what's going to ruin some very nice smokes. i want to take the best care of them that i can.

my den is pretty well ventilated, so i'll move the humi to a less "breezy" area and see if that helps it.

is it better to have a higher or lower rh% for storage for, say, 6 mos-1 year?

"Is it better to have a higher or lower rh% for storage for, say, 6 mos-1 year?"
As a matter of practicality, no -- stable temp & RH w/in the desirable range. I probably posted I prefer a max of 75%, so if my "go-to" storage is tending to lose humidity, I don't have as much trouble maintaining 65-70. Higher humidity does risk mold problems if there's a humidity spike in your storage unit[s]. I think as others have posted some tobacco smokes/ages better toward the drier end of the "ideal" range & others toward the higher.
For long term, visit occasionally, but don't disturb too much [ie daily]