Reddit mentions of Jet Chemical 01-1015 Dry Out Dehumidifier

Hoping this tagged the OP correctly. Going to IM him as well since this is time sensitive stuff and I hope I am responding in time, wish I had read the thread earlier. Let me know if I can help in anyway. Read below for my... ideas :P

Something you MIGHT try is to take the cards and do some... tests. Over the years I have "entertained" this terrifying prospect, and I have a few things on my list of "things that might help/fix cards. I have NOT tried either of the ideas listed below, and they MIGHT cause more damage than they repair, I honestly do not know. In theory #1 SHOULD help a lot, but again these ideas/advice are offered with the caveat that I take no legal responsibility for the outcome. If you try either of these let me know how they go.

Edit: Also, the steel clamp idea in theory is ok, but I wouldn't leave cards in it too long as the cards MIGHT dry and stick actually on the steel. No idea how likely this is, but "fair warning". I think no matter what you will have to take some risks on what you are dealing with.

1. This idea would only work for nonfoils and maybe lightly wet/damaged foils. If you can get access to a chamber vacuum sealer (about a thousand dollar piece of lab/kitchen equipment but not insane to find at college labs or decent kitchens). Think giant overpowered seal a meal (seriously like best seal a meal is orders of magnitude weaker) that pulls a vacuum at like 1/1000th atmosphere. It will boil water at room temp with ease. My thought is, if you take the cards while wet (letting them dry I think could increase the damage to the paper: cause ridges, ripples, bubbling, etc) you might be able to pull a heavy vacuum for a few seconds to effectively rip the water out of your cardboard. The second thing (or rather the "next level") I would try if I had access to one of these and water damaged cards is to take two small hunks of metal (smooth, thick enough to be ridgid, and small enough to fit into the vacuum chamber. Take them, put the card between them, use a clamp to "press" the card(s) between the steel. Clamp HARD, then pull a vacuum to remove the water while the paper is being "held together" by the clamped steel. You might try the same thing with a seal a meal, but they operate differently (both lower powered, and also different mechanism for pulling the vacuum) and I doubt the basic seal a meal would do much tbh.
   
   
2. This one is just a way to assist the drying process rather than something "special" like the first idea. You might still consider using a couple of sheets of steel from Lowes for "squeezing" the moisture out, and keeping the card integrity better than say a book or some other none ridgid material. Anyways, use Chemical Dehumidifier (and AC/dehumidifiers will help as well as they dry out the air. Window ACs in particular remove a lot of moisture.) Link below to assist your googling/search. The smaller the area, the more effect I would expect a chemical Dehumidifier to have (no science on this one, just a assumption). I sometimes use these to unbend foils since a lot of times the warping in foils is just the card absorbing moisture unevenly.
   
   http://www.amazon.com/Jet-Chemical-01-1015-Dry-Dehumidifier/dp/B002DZMJ90