Dehydrator capacity and brand

Although I don’t have an Excalibur, I think that it would be a good choice. Mine is a LEM Products 5 tray, similar in size to the Excalibur. I doubt that there would be a really quiet dehydrator, but mine doesn’t make a lot of noise. I’ve no idea how much noise would be acceptable, or not. When purchasing a dehydrator, be certain that you can but extra trays, mesh sheets and non-stick liner sheets. You will want all of these and several extras. One of the difficulties in using a dehydrator is finding a place to clean the trays. Mine are 15″ (38cm) square and will not fit in any sink in the house. I found a plastic tub that is large enough to hold them, so I have a place to let them soak. The mesh sheets and liner sheets are important for dehydrating liquids or purees and small solids. Some items will want to be flipped during the drying process and this is where the extra trays and sheets will be important. Good non-stick sheets will make drying sticky items like fruit leathers and vegetable barks much easier. I’ve used parchment paper and freezer paper, but the food doesn’t always come off easily. Much of this is covered by backpacking chef Glenn McAllister in his newsletter and website.

Bill, thank you, some good advice.

I’ll probably buy either a Sedona or an Excalibur, so I should be covered. Leaning towards the Sedona because of the supposed lower noise, and the smaller trays for easier cleaning. I think they can go in the dishwasher.

Would you feel the capacity of your hydrater should be enough for making food for a week of hiking for two?

Cheers

I have the Excalibur and it has enough shelving for 8 trays.  I use mine in the garage, not for the noise but to reduce the smell of drying food from permeating the house.  Though it has a lot of trays, I seldom dry more than 3 at a time.  In many cases, this is due to using different drying temperatures.  Best regards.

I process alot of dehydrated backpacking meals and if I’m home and not out backpacking I’m using my dehydrator.  If you do alot of trips and need alot of food quickly done, I recommend going with a 10 tray model and get all the drying done in a couple days.

My dryer of choice is this TSM stainless steel model with 5 strainless steel trays—I’d go with the 10 tray next time.

Since most of my meals are liquid or soups or chilis, I purchased 5 of these excalibur silicone sheets and they fit the TSM trays perfectly and are easy to clean.

5 big trays have alot of processing power but if you need 20 days worth of meals quickly, go the 10 tray route.

Btw, the TSM is not a quiet machine!

I was given an Aroma for my birthday. It’s quiet and seems to have a large capacity. I’ve only used it once and made some fruit. For many years I’ve used a super cheap Ronco thing. It has worked fine all these years. The Aroma seems to dry things really quickly and it seems really quiet, although I don’t have a similar one with a fan to compare it to.

I had no issues with my Good4U with fan and digital temperature control, ran it hard for 5+ years, then I left it with friends when I moved.  It was inexpensive but full of features

I own both a Nesco and an Excalibur. I got the Nesco first, and it works well. However, the capacity of my Excalibur 9 tray model, which I only purchased recently, seems to be at least four times the volume of my Nesco with five trays. I didn’t think that it would be such a big difference, but that is what I am finding. Now that I am busy cranking out the recipes for this coming summer’s trips (check out my YouTube channel, “Vegan Packer”), I am still cooking and dehydrating around the clock, but the larger capacity has become a big time saver.

I really don’t have a problem with the noise of either machine. People make it sound like there is such a roar while going, but I find that it is no worse than the sound of the central air conditioner blower in my home. If you watch a few of my videos, you will catch the sound, and you can decide for yourself.

I bought my Excalibur from Costco, since they have such a great return policy, and because they always have a fair price on everything that they sell. My original idea was to keep both machines, but I am now thinking that I will end out selling the Nesco. Nothing at all against it, but I now have so much capacity with the Excalibur that I can no longer picture having both machines going at the same time. I’ll hold out a while before making the final decision, but that is where I currently stand on that issue.

As far as where to purchase, if you are not sure which way to go, I would suggest looking on places like Craig’s List for a good used machine. People are always buying things like this, thinking that they will use them, and then they end out selling them for a fraction of their original price, often with little time on them.

Good luck with your decision.

I can’t really say how my dehydrator would do for a week long trip for two, because I just don’t use it that way. I normally make one pot of something or other and it usually takes about three trays to dry it. One thing that needs to be considered is portion size. I weigh everything. If I made a pot of beans and dehydrated it, I would weigh the product and figure the portion weights.  If I really got serious about dehydrating, I think that I would rather have two five tray dehydrators than one ten tray dehydrator. I could dry at two different temperatures at the same time or just use one if I don’t need all of the trays. I would get machines that use the same trays and screens.

Thank you all very much. Very informative.

I need to hear one of the excaliburs IRL.

How long does it generally take to dry a meal? Like a stew/chili. I was just wondering if it could be done while going to work, so nobody would be bothered by noise.

I would say that dehydrators are fairly similar and easy to overthink a blow dryer inside a box. Mine is some simple $60 model and it works great.

What is more important is making sure that you get one with more than one tray for liquids so you can do at least two wet meals at once. You will tend to need the wet tray more than the four open racks they give you. Most people tend to dry soups and such over mountains of sliced fruit.  Yet manufacturers tend to include only one wet tray for every  three or four open racks.

Hope that helps

Times for dehydration range, but I would say that most things take between eight and twelve hours. It also depends on where you live, because each place has different humidity.

My first one was a nesco 5 round tray one with the heating element and fan that was within the lid for like $80… it dried very unevenly, took a very long time, did not hold very much and after 2 months stopped working…

I bit the bullet and bought an Excalibur 9-tray (3948CDB – 10 year warranty) which dries evenly (since the fan is at the back of the unit and blows horizontally rather than vertically) and within the time stated by most dehydrator books.  As for capacity I would go the biggest you can afford as the extra capacity is worth the extra cost, especially if you plan to use it often and for different things – besides backpacking food my family uses it often to make healthy snacks.  I bought mine on harvest essentials website (authorized dealer) and it came with a great “Preserve in Naturally” free book which is very informative on how to dehydrate various fruits, vegetables and meals along with their thicknesses, dehydration times, what dehydrates better than others, temperatures (even taking into account humidity conditions), etc…

I will say this though – when I fist got my Excalibur dehydrator there was a rattling noise coming from the rear of the unit and the only way for me to stop it was to put pressure on the rear of the unit with something heavy and it would stop.  This was not normal so I called Excalibur and had about a 30 second conversation before they asked me to send them my receipt and they would send me a new unit along with a pre-paid fedex label to ship them back the old unit.  Based on that I would say they stand behind their products.

EDIT:  I actually just dehydrated some chili last week, took about 9 hours to dry in my Excalibur

I found a used deal on the 5 tray excalibur with timer. One year old, used 10 times. Almost half price. I went to listen to it. It wasn’t noisy to me. I bought it. Thanks again for your input. Very helpful.

Cheers, Peter

Mine is Excalibur 10 tray, it was the most expensive model but I really liked that the control panel is in front, the neat glass doors, and most that there is no plastic at all near the food (in fact only the thin rim around the front is plastic, the rest of the body inside and out is stainless steel). It is also surprisingly good looking and compact, and fairly quiet – like a room fan? Very very happy with it.

When living in central Copenhagen; the big 10 tray dehydratorwould never earn the description “compact”…

When living in central Copenhagen; the big 10 tray dehydrator would never earn the description “compact”…

That’s what I thought when I was ordering it, and had resigned to having an elephant in my kitchen…. When it arrived however it was a pleasant surprise, it felt not much bigger than the 5-tray model our friend borrowed us at the time.

Looking at spec dimensions it made sense, both 5-tray and 10-tray had almost identical footprint (17″ width and 19″/20″ depth) as they are both designed to take the same size trays. At the same time the extra 8.5″ height of the 10-tray model made it look an aesthetically pleasing square, hence the description ‘compact’ came to mind….

Or perhaps ‘Tardis’, bigger on the inside heheh ;)

Okay Mr Bohdi, when I get to be a dehydrating champion, the 10 tray model will be the upgrade ;-).

It wasn’t just the size that did it, but also the great deal. Circa a sixth of the price of the 10 tray model…

But thanks, it does sound very nice!

Cheers