Marine grade coolers?

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dcbrewmeister

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Has any one tried one of these as a MLT?

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It's a marine grade cooler. I would imagine it's built not to react to the salt environment, but they have incredible cold retention. I'm getting a used one (I hope) this weekend as my friends father is getting a different boat. The boats have a rack built for these coolers and will end up with a "spare" cooler. I thought about buying one, but the one pictured is $299...

All day in the sun fishing and barely an inch of water in the bottom from the ice melting (last summer). If it can keep ice from melting that long, imaging how long it can hold a temp as a MLT.
 
I picked up an enormous marine grade coole several years ago in hopes of converting it to a mash tun for making 10 gallon btches, but determined that I would be btter off using it for other things, like storing food, and cornies (cooler on it's side) for those hot summer days when you go to big picnics and need 5 gallons of homebrewed delight.
If it's free well then go for it, I have found that regular picnic coolers will hold temps stable for at least an hour of mashing.
 
There's no reason I'm aware of that would prevent them from being used.

It's my understanding that the main difference is the marine coolers are manufactured with a special UV resistant formula and that's the reason for the increased price.
 
I think it's overkill for an MLT, but on the other hand, insanity and obsession is a prized trait, imo, so I say go for it.

Yes, those coolers have a very good thermal insulative value. Did you know you can also buy the foam by itself to make your own cooler? Just glass in the foam to whatever shape you want and voila! I thought that'd be great for for cask conditioning or lagering. Especially where people are using dorm-type fridges. Those things have poor insulation and, as a result, the electric bill on them is terrible. I'd be very tempted to use marine-grade super-high R value foam insulation for those kinds of purposes.

As for the cooler, same thing. I'd rather use it as a lagerator or something. But, if that doesn't work for you, and I doubt it'd be easy to convert a pre-made cooler to a lagerator, then I say go with your original plan and make it into the supreme ultimate MLT. There's nothing wrong with having the best insulative overkill MLT in the history of man... nothing wrong with that at all.... You should call it "My Precious".

:mug:
 
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