Keeping a keezer outside?

Hey guys,

Building a new keezer and I plan on leaving it outside in a sheltered area (Colorado)

I have a 2 stage temp controller and I plan on hooking up some heat lamps on my collar inside the freezer to be the "heater"

Anything i should take into consideration?

Sub-freezing temperatures are not good for refrigeration units. I'd read that keeping a freezer outdoors will ruin it. I ignored that wisdom and bought a used one, keeping it in my garage anyway. It worked great through the summer and fall, cooling when it got too hot. I worked great through the winter (I hooked a light bulb up to the "Heating" circuit). But when spring came 'round, it would run continuously, but never get below about 10° C. The compressor was shot. I had to scrap it.

I would not recommend keeping a freezer outdoors through a sub-freezing winter.

A lot of people have refrigerators and freezers outdoors without issue; mine have been in the garage for years. Also, there may be a few houses in Wisconsin without a beer frig in the garage, but an awful lot have them and they have plenty of sub-freezing days. That said, I think that the un-buffered temperature swings outside of a structure would do more damage, especially with the wild swings that we have here in CO. I don't have any experience or specific knowledge to back this, so thake this for what you find it to be worth.

I kept a chest freezer out in the garage for years. Even kept a freezer on my covered patio. More important than anything was making sure to clean out the compressor area routinely. It was quite surprising how much debris could collect in that cavity.

Sounds good y'all. Thanks for the advice. For those who have, is one light bulb enough? Or should I do two just in case one burns out?