chemical composition 70% silicon oxide/silica gel SiO2, , 20% Alumina, Al2O3.... considered silica gel..... you would need to reheat the before use... oven at 150C will do or... microwave that exites the water molecules, There is usually some colour indicating gel.. be it blue to red.....deep blue to light blue

You would have to remove the silica gel beads from the cloth bag by removing some stitches and heat those beads in a tray... refill the bag and.. stitch back/ put into smaller containers...

Edit.. it appears to be to be clay type desicator with Si02 present... still regeration of the desicating function maybe possible.

This post has been edited by BeastX: Apr 5 2007, 12:39 PM

SiO2 and Al2O3is not poisonous.. it is the trace elements/colour indicators that is poisonous such as cobalt that is often used for colour indicator.. As long as there is no dust particles it should be save... Wipe the interior microwave with wet towel will do..

Silica gel will often crack/break into smaller pieces under microwave but most will remain intact.

As for how long .... the colour indicating gels are a good measuring stick (if present), pinkish to deep blue or light blue to deep blue.. ... or even weighing the end results... Silica Gel may loose up to 20% or more of its initial mass after heating.. I usually mix a little colour indicating gel distributed evenly in non-indicating gel as a guide

For example.. 200g of ordinary silica gel with roughly 3 to 5 mm diameter beads takes probably 7 to 10minutes in a 700w microwave oven to regenrate.

This post has been edited by BeastX: Apr 7 2007, 08:05 AM

Basic chemistry SiO2 water molecule binding is reversible... deactivation... heating the SiO2 to around 120-135C (245-275F),.. reactivation.. period 12 hours would be the ability of SiO2 water molecule binding reaction to reach an equalibrium to keep the moisture content in an enclose space relatively stable (low)..

This post has been edited by BeastX: Apr 8 2007, 12:02 AM

unlike drying cloths... unless you concentrate the sun rays... there is no way sunning provide enough energy for the water molecules to discociate from SiO2 molecule..

Microwave on other hand use wave that excite/vibrate molecules (and other high density solids.. as well).. that lets H2O to disassociate with relatively low energy..

This post has been edited by BeastX: Apr 10 2007, 09:25 AM