# WARNING..  for those with a vacuum chamber sealer...



## daveomak (Sep 11, 2022)

I was sous-viding some chicken thighs in some great seasonings at 138F...  They had been in long enough to pasteurize and there was a bunch of liquid in the bag, per normal...  I thought, "Humpf, I should let those thighs marinate in that fine liquid until tomorrow...
I was trying to think of how to seal the vac-bag, so the liquid didn't run out in the refer and AHA, my chamber vacuum sealer is perfect for the task..."...  
Into the Costco LEM Max-Vac Pro chamber sealer, the bag, thighs and liquid went...  I checked to make sure there wasn't too much liquid that it might run out of the bag..  Perfect... No chance...
Set up the bag and START it went...   About 6 or 7 seconds into the run, there was a foamy liquid full of seasonings erupting all over the chamber and it's lid...  Like a bubble machine had been turned on...
A myriad of ideas flashed through my brain as to what to do...   I just watched, in disbelief, as it finished and sealed the bag...  Perfect seal...  Then I had to open the lid... I was holding it down with my left hand as my right hand was busy slapping my forehead... Up goes the lid, marinade all over the place... 
In hindsight, I should have pushed the KILL-SWITCH on the front of the machine...  Funny how clear thinking can happen when looking through one's sphincter...
During the clean-up, I remembered how the boiling point of water lowers as the pressure decreases...    Too late, WAY TOO LATE... High school physics class lab experiment, at 74, in my kitchen... Hell, cold tap water will boil under vacuum...  NOTE, I did really well in physics class...
Most of you probably know all of this...  I thought a timely reminder might help forgo a messy cleanup for some of my friends at SMF..  
Until my next F.U.

P.S. If this info was in the directions, I missed it...


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## tbern (Sep 11, 2022)

Sorry to hear about the mess, but thanks for the info to maybe help out others!


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## indaswamp (Sep 11, 2022)

Thanks for passing the info along.....


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## bacon_crazy510 (Sep 11, 2022)

Thanks for the insight... I got one not too long ago, but have not run into this yet. Now I'll have the bug in my head to avoid this issue.


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## Brokenhandle (Sep 11, 2022)

Yep...thanks for the note to self! No cleanups needed here!

Ryan


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## Winterrider (Sep 12, 2022)

Thanks Dave. . .


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## LoydB (Sep 13, 2022)

Jumping on this thread because the title will get people looking at it.

Another thing not mentioned in the directions, but very important to know, is that if you're sealing an open bag of really powdery spices (for me it was mesquite powder), some of it (potentially a lot of it) will escape the bag and explode into the chamber. My vac machine, and the kitchen, smelled like mesquite for a couple of weeks even after cleaning up.

The solution is to tape the spice bag shut and put a tiny pinprick into it somewhere for air to escape without bringing powder along with it.

But I absolutely love my chamber vac over the small countertop version I used for a decade (RIP).


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## tbern (Sep 13, 2022)

LoydB said:


> Jumping on this thread because the title will get people looking at it.
> 
> Another thing not mentioned in the directions, but very important to know, is that if you're sealing an open bag of really powdery spices (for me it was mesquite powder), some of it (potentially a lot of it) will escape the bag and explode into the chamber. My vac machine, and the kitchen, smelled like mesquite for a couple of weeks even after cleaning up.
> 
> ...


good tip and info also!!  thanks for sharing it!


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## daveomak (Sep 13, 2022)

LoydB said:


> Jumping on this thread because the title will get people looking at it.
> 
> Another thing not mentioned in the directions, but very important to know, is that if you're sealing an open bag of really powdery spices (for me it was mesquite powder), some of it (potentially a lot of it) will escape the bag and explode into the chamber. My vac machine, and the kitchen, smelled like mesquite for a couple of weeks even after cleaning up.
> 
> ...


The LEM sealer I have, the vacuum sealing heat bar comes down and closes the bag before air enters the chamber to seal the bag..


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## LoydB (Sep 14, 2022)

daveomak said:


> The LEM sealer I have, the vacuum sealing heat bar comes down and closes the bag before air enters the chamber to seal the bag..


Put some talcum powder in a bag and seal and let me know how it goes. The mesquite powder is so fine that it gets pulled out of the bag, even with the bar clamped (obviously the bar clamp is not airtight or it couldn't remove air from inside the bag...).


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## river100 (Sep 27, 2022)

daveomak said:


> I was sous-viding some chicken thighs in some great seasonings at 138F...  They had been in long enough to pasteurize and there was a bunch of liquid in the bag, per normal...  I thought, "Humpf, I should let those thighs marinate in that fine liquid until tomorrow...
> I was trying to think of how to seal the vac-bag, so the liquid didn't run out in the refer and AHA, my chamber vacuum sealer is perfect for the task..."...
> Into the Costco LEM Max-Vac Pro chamber sealer, the bag, thighs and liquid went...  I checked to make sure there wasn't too much liquid that it might run out of the bag..  Perfect... No chance...
> Set up the bag and START it went...   About 6 or 7 seconds into the run, there was a foamy liquid full of seasonings erupting all over the chamber and it's lid...  Like a bubble machine had been turned on...
> ...


I just bought a chamber vacuum unit, still in route. While doing research on them I saw a lot of people say you need to let liquids cool before putting in the chamber. Most say cool in the fridge.


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## radioguy (Sep 28, 2022)

PV=nRT.....if I  recall correctly.  Hadn't though about that in 50 years or so.  At least your ceiling got a wash.

RG


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## daveomak (Nov 12, 2022)

river100

I just bought a chamber vacuum unit, still in route. While doing research on them I saw a lot of people say you need to let liquids cool before putting in the chamber. Most say cool in the fridge.

I was so excited I thought of a way to use the delish marinade, my age and circuit shorting occurred in my memory recall zone, maybe...  
At least I learned something "new" for the second or third time... HAHAHAHAHAHAHA...


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## sbaker25 (Jan 3, 2023)

LoydB said:


> Put some talcum powder in a bag and seal and let me know how it goes. The mesquite powder is so fine that it gets pulled out of the bag, even with the bar clamped (obviously the bar clamp is not airtight or it couldn't remove air from inside the bag...).


The bar clamp isn't airtight, but the seal it produces should be.  Since the seal isn't applied until the air has been removed from the chamber and the bag, I don't see what would be pulling the powder out of the bag.  I'm sure this is obvious and I'm missing something, so I'm going to have to test this with talcum powder :).


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## sbaker25 (Jan 3, 2023)

daveomak said:


> river100
> 
> I just bought a chamber vacuum unit, still in route. While doing research on them I saw a lot of people say you need to let liquids cool before putting in the chamber. Most say cool in the fridge.


That sounds like a good idea.  I had to look it up because I thought it would have to be a lot colder than a fridge would make it, but at 29.5 inches Hg of vacuum, the boiling temperature of water is at about 50F so that should help a lot.  Thanks for the tip.


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## Coreymacc (Jan 4, 2023)

It must have been temperature, ive vacuum packed soup with mine and had not 1 drop spill out. But it was allowed to cool fully. Not sure about the fine powder, but ive done milk powder before with not a whisp of anything came out.

Corey


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## rexster314 (Jan 4, 2023)

I had one explosion of spaghetti sauce several years ago. The result of putting too much sauce in a too small a bag. 
We had some people over for an after Christmas meal and since out Vacmaster 320 sits prominently in the kitchen, we had to show it's vacuum power off by flattening a plastic coke bottle and aluminum can. It's always impressive


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