Elfmaze

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I have been looking for a day or two trying to find some evidence one way or another that Installing thermostats does not damage chest freezers. I have a 14cf freezer that i need for a lagering chamber. But i need it come hunting season to be a freezer again. Can't afford to have the thing fry on me.


Does using the inline power cord johnson style digital thermostat with a compressor lag damage the compressor? Anyone had one chugging along for five years at 50-30 degrees without issues? WOuld it last LONGER being in that it is not trying as hard to keep it at 50* rather than -15*

babalu87

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Chest freezers have temperature controllers built into them.
You are pretty much just by-passing that temp controller by setting it to MAX/COLDEST/11

The general consensus is they will last longer but I dont have absolute proof.

albannach

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When I assembled my keezer, I discussed this topic with my Grandfather who used to be an HVAC engineer. The most important thing to avoid is compressor cycling (compressor turning off and on, off and on, too many times). It is much easier for the compressor to either keep running a bit longer, or wait a bit longer to turn on. So put the temperature probe to the Johnson/Ranco/Love controller in a glass of water or taped to the keg(s) when using it as a keezer to control the temperature of the beer/liquid not the air around it. Since the beer/liquid has a higher thermal mass than air, the temperature is not going to fluctuate as much as the air would, therfore the compressor will not have to turn on or work as much, and when it does come on, it will be on for a long enough time not to be damaged since it has to cool down a larger volume of liquid. My keezer only cycles on for about 5-8 minutes once every hour and a half or so; I told my Grandfather and he said if it runs that little that it should last for at least 20 years.

Also make sure there is proper clearance around the keezer walls so that the evaporator can shed the heat efficiently.

I read online somewhere about condensation being a problem in keezers. It didn't make sense to me because when you defrost a freezer, water runs freely down into the drainhole so the engineers must not agree that moisture inside a chest freezer is a problem. Just in case though, I let my keezer dry out, and I caulked all the inner seams with silicone.

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babalu87

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I think the condensation is more in reference to rusting than anything else.
Caulking the inner seams is a GREAT idea though.

Did you just give them a quick rub with acetone?
Did you use 5200 or something else?
Hows it holding up?

I just picked up a chest freezer for fermenting (swamp cooler only works if someone is home and this summer we're camping A LOT)
Have a spare love control thanks to a backwards terminal board that we turned around the right way at work.
For $30 I'm in like Flynn

I should probably caulk my lagering freezer while I'm at it

albannach

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My chest freezer was newer (got sick of Craig's List so I just bought it new), so the inner walls are aluminum. I guess in my case I don't have to worry about rust.

I didn't do much surface prep before caulking, I just wiped them clean with a little detergent water (to remove any oils left behind from manufacturing), and then wiped that off with a damp rag. Then I liberally applied caulk to all the seams, wiped off the excess while applying enough pressure to make sure the caulk made it into some of the smaller crevices. I topped it off with another liberal line of caulk and just flattened it out (didn't remove much excess). I used the caulk pictured below, (Silicone 2, mold and mildew resistant), it's been on there for about a year now and it looks/performs just as good as the day it dried.

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david_42

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Mine is going on 5 years. I have a similar freezer going on 15. As albannach says, rapid cycling hurts the compressor and using it as a keezer means less cycling than using it as a freezer. The only time a rapid cycle can occur is when the power fails while the motor is running and most refers have a start delay built in these days.

This is one of those myths that will not die.

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samc

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Johnson A419 has a settable anti short cycle delay function, as I recall you can set to 12 minutes which prevents your freezer from going on and off rapidly. When programming remember that feature as your freezer will not work for the length of time you have it set for after initial on cycle and you might think it is broken when in fact it's doing the job.

humann_brewing

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I am wondering what people set their temp difference on for their controllers?

I had my ranco set to 4* so off at 64F and on at 68F when I was doing some fermentation. Well I woke up one morning with it not working when it should have. I thought I had broke the compressor or something. I unplugged it and gave it a days rest and it is working again.

I then stuck the beers back in and set it to a difference of 7* because I think it may have been cycling on and off too much set to 4 and being in a really hot garage.

So what do you set your difference to switch on/off too?

wildwest450

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All 3 of mine are set to a 5* difference.

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