Harvest Right Freeze Dryer - The Best Way to Preserve Food - Food Dehydrator, Small Size, Aqua Color

This machine is quite loud. The vacuum pump runs the entire time it is drying and it is very loud. It’s hot outside so we set it up in the living room because the manual said it’s best not to operate in temperatures above 75F. Not a great idea because it is blasting us with unpleasant noise for many hours on end.

This freeze drier is hands down best investment I've made. Very simple to set up and get started. Love the simplicity! Only thing I'd change is the oil vacuum pump , too loud.

I have had great success and have been very pleased with my Harvest Right freeze dryer. I saw a review that said the unit is very loud. I have the premium pump and while it does make some noise it is not excessively loud. I have this in a small room outside our living area and when the unit is running you truly have to try to listen for it. I have found the freeze dryer to be fun. My kids love the freeze dried fruit and I am starting to use it for more complex meals .

Great freeze dryer. Looking forward to using this for putting by food from the garden.

I had a lot of conversations with customer service as I think my machine was just a lemon but they have made things right and I love love love freeze drying

Had to pay $150 for shipping from Northern Utah to Southern Utah. Arrived and got it plugged in a ran the pressure test. Failed. Called them and after talking to a customer service rep from china that barely spoke English, she was able to get an email sent over of what we could do to fix problem. The email looked like she had used google translate from Chinese to English and it was very confusing. So called back to see if I could get some help clarifying email, I got transferred from the sales guy again saying he didn’t have a clue how to help, to a different china girl. After 30 min of explaining situation again and not gaining much ground, I hung up. So this is where we are at. We ran a batch of bread for 10 hours (to take away new appliance smell) and that didn’t work because of the pressure. We are going to try to figure something out tomorrow which is a Saturday so I doubt they are open tomorrow….Very disappointing. Pressure test failure. So finicky. I’d rather buy $4000 worth freeze dried food than have to worry about a machine that might not last long enough to get $4000 back.

I agree with the 5 star reviews. A freeze dryer is useful to have. However, you need to understand that a freeze dryer isn't a turnkey device. You have to maintain the vacuum pump (which means filtering the oil after every batch and then benching the vacuum pump, disassemble and clean it after 20 batches). That's not hard, but it's not turnkey either.Also, it generates a lot of heat, even the small freeze dryer. I have a standard 2 car garage and it keeps it toasty in the winter. Dealing with the vacuum pump is messy. You probably don't want to do that over carpet. A freeze dryer is loud. I understand that some folks keep theirs in their house, I just can't imagine that working out well. Ours is in the garage. In the summer, I have a fan that runs continually to keep the garage cool. In the winter, I enjoy the toasty garage when working on projects.I have two freeze dryers. A small I bought new in August and an older unit I bought on Craigslist. Between the two, I end up calling Harvest Right tech support at least once a month. My new freeze dryer had the vacuum pump bind up. I was able to bench it and fix it, but the vacuum pump is the Achilles heel of the HR freeze dryer. They tend to fail.The bottom line is there is a learning curve. You need to join a facebook HR group to get past the first several loads. This is because the videos don't really go through the step-by-step of using a freeze dryer and you will assume that it works differently than it actually does. This results in probably a month or so of learning about how to prep food for the freeze dryer and how to setup of the freeze dryer for different types of food. It turns out high sugar fruits (like pineapple or apples) are the hardest to get right. Which was also the first thing we tried and were understandably disappointed with the results because of our ignorance about using the appliance.Having said all of that, we really like our freeze dryers. I've lost 20+ lbs because of snacking on freeze dried fruit rather than chips or other high calorie snacks. My wife who has several food allergies has been using it to make travel food so she can eat something when traveling. That has eased her travel anxiety because of food issues. The bottom line is know what you are getting into before you buy one. Start by following a Facebook group to get an idea of what you are in for.

We have had various issues come up with our freeze dryer. When you have them, you usually are in need of help and answers right away, as you are ready to start or are in process of freeze drying when those questions come up. Who you gonna call? Well, Harvest Right, of course. They will send you to their "technical" number which will ring and ring until you get a recording asking you to start a ticket and they will get back with you within 24 hours. That is just great and completely unhelpful. Of course, the sales line will answer immediately if you call them. Recently I called the sales number with a question about the quality of food I had dried, which seemed to be perfectly dried when I packaged it, but was now soft and pliable. I wondered if it was safe. I was ready to do a new large batch that day. I was told to talk to the technical people. I was hoping this salesperson would have some knowledge to share, but he said, "What do you want from ME? Do you want me to look at your food and see if something is growing on it?" It came across as snarky and sarcastic. Sorry to have bothered you, Harvest Right.