Where's the best room to cellar in a basement?

I am moving into a new house with a walkout basement on the north side. I have two rooms to choose from to use to cellar beer: the sw corner with dirt against two sides or the nw corner with dirt against the west wall and the north wall exposed to the elements. Which would be a better room to cellar in?

I'd use the one that doesn't have exposure to the elements. That room will be warmer in the summer where the other will be more temperature stable.

Get some thermometers in both rooms and see what the temperature fluctuation is between them. If there's a door you can close between them, even better.

sounds like you should rack or transfer in either room due to the dirt. But for cellaring/long term storage I would pick the room that had the consistent/predictable temps and remained the darkest. Even if the consistent room is warmer you can find a way to lower the ambient temp but keep it consistently cool.

lutherslagers said:

sounds like you should rack or transfer in either room due to the dirt. But for cellaring/long term storage I would pick the room that had the consistent/predictable temps and remained the darkest. Even if the consistent room is warmer you can find a way to lower the ambient temp but keep it consistently cool.

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I think he meant dirt outside the concrete walls.

I'd pick stable temps

Thanks for the replies. I wish I had time to monitor the temps in both rooms but my wife wants to use one so I have to pick now. I think I'll use sw room because the sun shining on the wall of the nw room like Golddiggie said. Maybe if I'm lucky, I can build a walk in cooler.

Thanks again.

light, vibration and temperature fluctuations are bad for beer. Take the dark, cool, remote one.

Also - pitching a product made by a buddy of mine - these are a great addition for cellering:

http://www.brewbicle.com/

How do you maintain the temps in your cellar? Mine ranges from 62-72 and it's an interior room in the basement.

If I build a cellar I'll use an air conditioner to control the temp.

kwingert said:

If I build a cellar I'll use an air conditioner to control the temp.

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You might not even need an AC in the basement. IME, basements are in the good temperature range for enough of the year. If you're in a region that gets that hot for long enough, the AC effect from the rest of the house could take care of it for you. Cold air falls after all.

Well this whole idea of cellaring is based on maintaining temps at a constant... This my question of how is this possible, without buying big commercial fridges or something like that?

kwingert said:

Which would be a better room to cellar in?

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The one she doesn't ***** about seeing all the beer in.

drawdy10 said:

Well this whole idea of cellaring is based on maintaining temps at a constant... This my question of how is this possible, without buying big commercial fridges or something like that?

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It depends on the architecture of your basement and the environment around you. Some basements keep an extremely tight temperature range year round. Even if it doesn't, the range is usually much smaller than the rest of the house. You might need to climate control your basement, but if you do it will still be significantly less that you'd need to control the rest of the house.

The other thing to keep in mind is that you're trying to keep the beer at a constant temp - not the air in the room. Obviously big swings in room temp will effect the beer eventually - but the mass of the beer, the insulation property of the glass and the barriers (brebicle, bags, etc) around the bottles all mitigate temperature swings.

An AC unit may be necessary if your basement swings a bunch, but many basements are pretty consistent year round - especially if they're underground.

brycelarson said:

...but many basements are pretty consistent year round - especially if they're underground.

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A basement that is not completely or partially underground would be called the first floor.

GilaMinumBeer said:

The one she doesn't ***** about seeing all the beer in.

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Haha!

I agree with all the smart people posting about minimizing temperature fluctuation, vibration, an light exposure.

Actually controlling the temperature is a whole other beast.

I would consider what you are actually aging as well. As far as I know, beer benefits from a temperature of 50-55F. I suppose it depends how serious you're becoming with cellaring. I personally have a small closet under my basement stairs that I did basic insulation on, and it keeps around 50-60 throughout the entire year (living in New England, that ain't bad!).

Here's an article I dug up to confirm the 50-55F range. Has quite a few other interesting points on storing beer.
http://beeradvocate.com/beer/101/store

For what it's worth, I'd choose the room with dirt on two sides. Better than dirt on one side and winter on the other, right?

Cheers

Schecter said:

I personally have a small closet under my basement stairs that I did basic insulation on, and it keeps around 50-60 throughout the entire year (living in New England, that ain't bad!).

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That's what I'm doing as well. Mine is a bit warmer - but same idea.