Has anyone ever tried drying the desiccant you keep in your AMS, in the AMS? I’ve read that the drying time is 8 - 12 hours for desiccant, but it’s at a temperature in the 300s (F). Filament is around the same time frame, but nowhere near the temperature… So I don’t think it’ll melt, but I can’t help but wonderful if it’d be effective?
Had anyone tried it?
What? I dry my desiccant in an AirFryer, 40min with 80C/175F.
I find AMS2 unsuitable for this purpose. They don’t get particularly hot, take far too long and the printer has to be running at the same time. So even more pointless waste of electricity.
I tried it in the AMS HT, which gets hotter – and even there, the desiccant was still black after 3 hours. I’ll stick with 40 minutes in the AirFryer.
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The reason I ask is because I hadn’t done the research yet and I had been taking my desiccant cases out of my AMS when drying my filament. Then I found out it wouldn’t get too hot, so I’ll be leaving them in from now on, but I was curious if the filament drying process would also be effective for the dessicant.
Air fryer, 175° F, 40 minutes. Is that on bake?
An AirFryer is nothing more than a mini oven, so can it do anything else besides baking? 
Mine has one heating element inside (top), and I can set the temperature and time. That’s it.
It’s too cold. Some people will tell you it works, because desiccant will turn orange (if it has color indicator), but this point is FAR away from being dry.
If I dry my desiccant in an oven at 120°C, it takes several hours after that point before its really dry. You can simply test it by holding a piece of glass against it. If the glass starts to fog, your desiccant is still wet
Also, never use your regular kitchen oven for this.
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30 minutes on defrost cycle in the microwave dries desiccant as well. You can leave the desiccant in the AMS as long as the containers were made from PETG, I think PLA will deform and you might not ever get them out again.
I have run 8 hour dry cycles with just the rear desiccant bags, took the levels down from high 30’s to low teens, but went right back up due to not enough desiccant. Once I added the 5 containers in front and the full slot one for the rear, they sit at 10%. Thats probably as low as they can go so don’t know how low they dry to.
Why not?
How is the microwave OK but not the oven?
Also my microwave has a convection oven function, so is that OK as it’s both a microwave and an oven 
some of the color changing ones specifically are toxic, wouldn’t want to mix particles adhering to the inside of the oven getting into your food.
I asked AI what to use for drying silica, here it was CoPilot said
Popular Methods for Drying Silica Gel
- Dedicated Toaster Oven
• Many users buy a cheap toaster oven (often under $30) and use it exclusively for desiccant drying.
• Set to 250°F (121°C) for 2–3 hours.
• Ideal for color-changing silica gel—watch for the beads to return to their dry color.
• Often placed outside or in a garage to avoid indoor fumes. - 3D Printer Heated Bed
• Some Bambu Lab users dry silica gel directly on the printer’s hotbed at 100°C for ~1 hour.
• Works well for small batches, especially if you print a custom tray or rack.
• Not as thorough as oven drying, but avoids food contamination. - Filament Dryers
• Compact filament dryers (like the Sunlu or PrintDry) can be repurposed for silica gel.
• Works best for small batches or satchels.
• Be cautious with printed containers—PETG or ASA may deform if temps exceed their glass transition point. - Microwave (with caution)
• Some use microwaves at low power (e.g., 600W) for short bursts.
• Risk of overheating or melting containers—especially printed ones.
• Only recommended for color-changing silica with clear microwave-safe instructions.
AI responses should be checked for accuracy.
Imagine what PLA would do! 
Microwave ovens are cheap, a small $80 one is all you need. I have one in my shop for warming up epoxy resin. I doubt desiccant would have anywhere near the smell of epoxy.
Last week I needed to dry a refill role of ABS and I didn’t have any high temp spool around. I grabbed some ~5-year old Prusa PETG. Dried it, then printed spools. I then dried the ABS in my Creality X4 set to 80c. A few hours later I check the filament and the spool was completely deformed, almost like it was PLA. I don’t know if it was mislabeled (PETG was printed on the black hex spool from Prusa) or just got old? (doubt that it would change the characteristics that much?)
Now I’m gun-shy with PETG and high temp and I use ABS or ASA
I do it when I do not have anything printing overnight. You have to use the PETG option and after 8 hours, it barely turns a bit of dark orange, but it was good enough for me until the next regeneration cycle.
A word of caution though, be sure your desiccant containers are securely closed and do not open during drying, I’ve had one spill and it was a big pain to clean up.
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You do realize that the glass transition temperature for PETG is 80C, right? It is dried at 65C. No surprise your PETG spools softened at 80C. Your PETG spools would have been fine drying PETG filament.