Temperature control

I have an old fridge in my garage that I would like to use as a fermenting chamber. The warmest the fridge gets is 45*C. is there a easy way to get the fridge up to 55*C-65*C. I think I heard someone say that you can do this with a aquarium temp control.

Any thoughts on this...

BoatsAndBrews said:

I have an old fridge in my garage that I would like to use as a fermenting chamber. The warmest the fridge gets is 45*C. is there a easy way to get the fridge up to 55*C-65*C. I think I heard someone say that you can do this with a aquarium temp control.

Any thoughts on this...

Click to expand...

For $50 you can buy a temperature controller. You plug the fridge into it and it into the wall. Set the dial to the temp you want and that's it.

sure - you have all kinds of options -

search temp control, or fermentation chambers -
Each of us could/would probably recommend our own, so look thru all the stuff here and choose how you want to do it.

Popular controllers are Dwyer/Love, Ranco, Johnson, and, the ubiquitous eBay Aquarium Temp Control - which is quite inexpensive, but measures in C not F... (if that's an issue for you). I think the ChiCompany has something that will work as well.

Basically, you end up plugging the fridge into the controller, and the controller will use it's temperature sensor instead of the fridge's sensor, telling it when to turn on and off.

You can adjust the existing thermostat, but it takes some trial and error to get the temp set, it isn't easily adjutsable, and isn't super accurate. The upside is that's it's free. Here's the thread detailing how to do this-

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/guide-set-internal-chest-freezer-thermostat-32f-eliminate-external-control-249612/

As mentioned you can also buy an external thermostat that you just plug the fridge into. There are several popular brands including Ranco, Johnson, and Love, which range in price from ~$50 for an analog single stage to $150+ for digital dual stage. You can also build a nice digital dual stage controller using an aquarium temperature controller from e-bay for ~$30-$50 depending on complexity and what parts you might already have, but it requires doing a little wiring. Here's the thread for that build-

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/ebay-aquarium-temp-controller-build-163849/