One of the cheapest dehydrators I ever had was the back window of my car in TX
As long as I put bug screen over the food and wound the side windows down to get ventilation, it certainly got hot enough in the vehicle 9 months yearly to dehydrate fruit & veggies.
In humid WA, I either had to leave it in the sun with a fan blowing across it (summer) or leave it next to my fireplace with a fan blowing across it (winter).
In super-humid SC, I had a box with a 60w lightbulb and a fan... still less power consumption than a commercial electric model.
It's really arid where I'm at in AK, so dehydrating isn't too much of a problem. Just leaving something out long enough will dehydrate it. When we need to dry something fast, we normally salt it and hang it by the firepit.
If it takes more than a few hours to dehydrate the food, you just need to treat it against spoilage and bugs for the time it takes to dry it... salt/brine, sugar, acid dip (citric/ascorbic acid, lemon juice or vinegar), and smoking/cure (nitrates) all works. Salting definitely works the fastest... an hour or two in salt layers and then a few hours in sun and wind by a smokey is normally all it takes to dry meat. For fruit, sugaring works the same way (minus the smoke
). It doesn't really add overpowering flavor, just using the salt/sugar to draw the moisture out of the food.