Fermentation cabinet question/thoughts/ideas...

Ok here is the plan.

Build a fermentation cabinet using 2x4's, plywood and insulate the heck out of it. My goal is for it to handle 4 carboys and my 15gal conical.

Now I have two options for cooling it. A 5000btu air conditioner or cutting a hole in my freezerator collar and mounting some fans to exchange the air in the fermentation cabinet with the air in the freezerator.

Also if I go the A/C route, the A/C will be mounted in a basement window and the fermentation cabinet will be built around it.

Thoughts?

And for picture purposes here is what these two ideas would look like.

A/C option:


Freezerator option: (Like this, but mine would be a chest freezer with a wood collar on it)

I'm thinking of going this route: The Northern Brewer Homebrew Forum :: View topic - Fermentation Chiller (Pic's Included)

It uses Propylene Glycol from the freezer pumped through a transmission cooler in the fermentation chamber.

I've got a 2 carboy pink foam box connected to the 40 degree kegerator with insulated duct and a ~50mm 12v fan. In testing I could only get it down to ~52 degrees and the fan ran constantly. If you're going to cool that much more stuff, you'll at least need a *much* bigger fan.

Well I talked with the owner of the fermentation chamber in the second picture.

That full size freezer you see just couldn't keep up (the coils kept icing up) so he replaced it with a 4500BTU A/C unit.

So that answers that!

good to know! thanks for the info. i was looking into similar things.

That Gylcol unit on the Northern brewer site looks like an good idea.

I would use a 120v submersable pump and a ranco controller. 12 volt is to much a pITA.

brewjunky said:

That Gylcol unit on the Northern brewer site looks like an good idea.

I would use a 120v submersable pump and a ranco controller. 12 volt is to much a pITA.

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I agree, but I'm having a hard time finding an affordable 120V pump with enough power. If you have a good source, please share it.

I was going to go with custom built fermentation cabinets but I just decided that upright freezers would end up costing about the same and look a hell of a lot nicer. Check the projects in my sig.

John Beere said:

I was going to go with custom built fermentation cabinets but I just decided that upright freezers would end up costing about the same and look a hell of a lot nicer. Check the projects in my sig.

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Did you buy those upright freezers new or used? I looked at some new, and they were pretty expensive vs. something I could put together myself. (I think...projects always end up costing me more than I thought they would.)

I agree about projects costing more than you thought they would - seems to happen to me everytime. I just decided to do it this way and save myself the trouble as I did not want it to end up looking like an eye sore.

I got them new for $350 each at Lowes after dicking with the manager a bit. The love controllers were $50 each. So, minus the labor and misc parts, they were almost exactly $400 each. I have already justified them by the increase in quality of my beer.