Hi everybody,
I've build with a friend a mother of a fermentation chiller fit enough to fit in my little closet. It consists of 0.5 inches plywood surrounding 1 inch insulation foam (extruded). On this insulation foam, I used Reflectix insulator to gain more insulation.
It its interior, it is about 17.5"x19.5"x 22".
Today, I did a test run with it. I put two one liters bottle of water in it, and it went from 23.5 C (74.3 F) (the temperature of my apartment) to 20C (68 F) in about 7 hours before slowly decreasing to 20.5 now (68.9) (13 hour after the start of its initial run).
Right now, I'm not having what I thought I would have. I thought I would rapidly have my 18 C (64.4 F), but instead, I never reached it. Which I don't like, because I still didn't brew any beer because I wanted to have good temperature control beforehand, and I spent a lot in this.
How much ice should I put in it to have better results? Three liters? 4? Should I have transitionned more quickly from two liters to two other liters? Because, all in all, all the time, I only used one set of two one liters of ice (Guess I'll be trying this!).
The big problem is -- I'm limited in my congelator's space. SWMBO agreed to let me space for 2 liters of ice -- I don't think I can push my luck way further than that (maybe 3 liters?). Maybe while I'm using three liters, I can put three others liters in the congelator, ready to be switched when the need calls...
Any input appreciated -- at this point...
Positive point : at least, the temperature in my fermentation chiller is lower than my appartment's temperature for at least 5 Fahrenheit (it's a bigger number in Fahrenheit) for some hours...
I've build with a friend a mother of a fermentation chiller fit enough to fit in my little closet. It consists of 0.5 inches plywood surrounding 1 inch insulation foam (extruded). On this insulation foam, I used Reflectix insulator to gain more insulation.
It its interior, it is about 17.5"x19.5"x 22".
Today, I did a test run with it. I put two one liters bottle of water in it, and it went from 23.5 C (74.3 F) (the temperature of my apartment) to 20C (68 F) in about 7 hours before slowly decreasing to 20.5 now (68.9) (13 hour after the start of its initial run).
Right now, I'm not having what I thought I would have. I thought I would rapidly have my 18 C (64.4 F), but instead, I never reached it. Which I don't like, because I still didn't brew any beer because I wanted to have good temperature control beforehand, and I spent a lot in this.
How much ice should I put in it to have better results? Three liters? 4? Should I have transitionned more quickly from two liters to two other liters? Because, all in all, all the time, I only used one set of two one liters of ice (Guess I'll be trying this!).
The big problem is -- I'm limited in my congelator's space. SWMBO agreed to let me space for 2 liters of ice -- I don't think I can push my luck way further than that (maybe 3 liters?). Maybe while I'm using three liters, I can put three others liters in the congelator, ready to be switched when the need calls...
Any input appreciated -- at this point...
Positive point : at least, the temperature in my fermentation chiller is lower than my appartment's temperature for at least 5 Fahrenheit (it's a bigger number in Fahrenheit) for some hours...