Commercial Fridge/ Freezer

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Gabe

It's a sickness!
Joined
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I was given a nice non working commercial fridge / freezer from my local hillbilly country store.:D I checked into getting it fixed by calling the company who maintained it while in service at the store. The guy told me it would be like 600$ to get it fixed. I know it would make a nice fermentation chamber or beer fridge with multiple uses. It's roughly 6ft wide 3 ft deep and 7 ft tall. It has dual fans already hooked up in the ceiling of it and the owner said they worked, I was thinking an AC unit would work nicley but I have know idea of where to start? Any ideas on what to do with such a score? Or ideas on where to go with a project like this? Cheers and heres to a Happy Brewyear.:mug:
 
Find a repair man who likes beer. Probably not $600 worth of anything in that thing. I have a friend who owns a bar and bought a single glass door, 6 1/2 foot tall 40" beer chiller for his bar and only paid $975 for it delivered and set up.
 
You could cut a hole in one end and put in a small room AC unit. I'd put it as close to the top as possible to avoid blocking the air flow. There have been a couple of threads where people use them to chill beer sheds and such. If you wanted tight temperature control, you'd probably want to spring for a Ranco.
 
Those dual fans are useless without the compressors and refridgeration lines that go along with it, and I have a feeling that the store held onto that for their replacement unit(s). So without those, which is probably why it'd cost so much to repair, a big honkin' AC unit is probably your best bet.
 
iT has all that stuff but thats the prob non of it works! I thought about the AC unit and think that would be my best bet. Anyone know of a good AC unit to buy?
 
$600 sounds pretty cheap for a fridge that size. I'm sure you could shop around or get someone to actually look at it for less than that. Also, that price sounds like he is assuming it needs a new compressor, used parts are cheaper. Finally, you'll probably pay $100 just to get someone to drive to your house and look at it.
 
That's why I came to the DIY section. I want to use this as a fermentation fridge and to store corny's and bottled beer. Just looking for a good method to achive my goal. I see some of you have the Kenmore 5150 AC unit and I want to know how would that chill the space I have? What will I need to hook somthing like this up? Cheers
 
The $600 is probably high because;
a) it was an on-site tech call
b) the tech was probably a certified tech for that brand of equipment (because it was a commercial call)
c) it was a commercial call (store) so the price is probably higher anyway

Drag it somewhere and have it looked at, probably be cheaper.

The smallest window A/C unit would have no trouble cooling it because it's smaller than any room you would buy a window unit for.
 
Damn, if I had the right now I'd offer to trade you even for my big chest freezer and just get the compressor fixed/replaced/recharged. Did the repair man tell you what was wrong with the unit?

All you have to do to install a room A/C is cut a big hole in the side of the box and stick the A/C unit in the hole. Turn the A/C all the way up and connect a temperature controller to it. Johnson and Ranco seem to be the most popular with folks. Since you'll be keeping the fridge a little colder than the design you might want to add some fans over the condensers like John did to keep them from freezing up. Wire the fans in parallel with your temperature controller and a little household timer which runs the fans 15 minutes every couple hours and you're done.

You're looking at $100 for the A/C unit, $50 for the temperature controller and another $50 or so for a couple 110VAC fans and a timer. So for $200 you should be good to go.
 
The compressor and all the wiring looks like it needs to be gone over! I will try to find a mom and pop buis that will look at it and give me a price for fixing it. It looks like it would be a nice setup once it works. I still might go the AC route if it turns out cheaper.
 
Ten Four good buddy, it's going outside so noise is not a prob. Getting it to work is. Now where's that chisel?
 
I really hope you can find someone to fix it for around the same price as adapting it to a room A/C system. I really think you'll be happier in the long run. Plus the commercial refrigeration compressor will last a lot longer than a room A/C will.

If you have trouble finding a business to look at it send me a PM and I'll see if any of my HVAC friends know anyone out your way.
 
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