I wanted to hold 10 kegs at serving temp in my garage. I found a used 15 year old Revco Chest Freezer for 100 bucks on craigslist. Picked it up, worked when I loaded it into truck... had it sitting properly as it would operate while transporting... got it home, unloaded and the compressor short cycled. I did some research, and asked a few people who know a bit about refrigeration... I let it sit for 24 hours, tried again, still short cycling.... then I pulled the relay and sent power directly to the compressor, and the wire nuts I used to connect the IEC power cable to compressor started to melt. - So - I'm no specialist on these things, but to me, seems like a dead short like that has to be a bad compressor... sucks it happened after I paid for it, but this is the nature of buying used stuff from people I guess.
Moving forward, I have to accept the unfortunate fact that I can't use this as a keezer... I mean, I might attempt to have the compressor replaced and the system recharged by someone who owes me some favors.... but I'm impatient and need a solution asap.
So I looked on here and found some guys talking about using AC units to pump cold air into the dead freezer to set at fermentation temps.
What I gathered was basically, if you're pumping the cold air in, it has to also have an exhaust, so the post mentioned using a portable AC unit with the exhaust kits they come with, and mounting the exhaust kit in the lid of the freezer.
I found a portable AC, 10,000 BTU for about 230 bucks. An LG model. The dimensions are right and it should actually fit right into the chest freezer no problem.
I'm thinking I can cut the hole in the lid for the exhaust, dill a hole for the power cord, fill with spray foam... power up, set at the lowest temp of about 66 or 68 degrees and let it rock.
I mostly ferment Ales so I don't think I'll have too much of a problem maintaining good Ale Fermenting Temps.
I also don't think that I'd need a controller if the actual unit itself just does what it would normally do if it were just cooling a room, right? I mean, I know there is variables, and that the ambient temp around the fermenters won't be the same as the actual liquid inside, but the difference will likely only be a couple degrees.
Has anyone done this? Does anyone see any reason why this wouldn't work? Or any other issues, drawbacks etc? This would only be for the warmer months then I'd probably switch over to some heat source for the Fall and Winter.
Lastly, I was also considering using a coolbot unit on the portable AC if possible, to bring it down to serving temps and maybe still get away with using the 24 cubic foot freezer box as a keezer when I'm not fermenting anything in it. Anyone have any opinions on that idea? I know the coolbots only work with specific makes and models of AC units... so for all I know it might not even be possible to use on a portable one.
Moving forward, I have to accept the unfortunate fact that I can't use this as a keezer... I mean, I might attempt to have the compressor replaced and the system recharged by someone who owes me some favors.... but I'm impatient and need a solution asap.
So I looked on here and found some guys talking about using AC units to pump cold air into the dead freezer to set at fermentation temps.
What I gathered was basically, if you're pumping the cold air in, it has to also have an exhaust, so the post mentioned using a portable AC unit with the exhaust kits they come with, and mounting the exhaust kit in the lid of the freezer.
I found a portable AC, 10,000 BTU for about 230 bucks. An LG model. The dimensions are right and it should actually fit right into the chest freezer no problem.
I'm thinking I can cut the hole in the lid for the exhaust, dill a hole for the power cord, fill with spray foam... power up, set at the lowest temp of about 66 or 68 degrees and let it rock.
I mostly ferment Ales so I don't think I'll have too much of a problem maintaining good Ale Fermenting Temps.
I also don't think that I'd need a controller if the actual unit itself just does what it would normally do if it were just cooling a room, right? I mean, I know there is variables, and that the ambient temp around the fermenters won't be the same as the actual liquid inside, but the difference will likely only be a couple degrees.
Has anyone done this? Does anyone see any reason why this wouldn't work? Or any other issues, drawbacks etc? This would only be for the warmer months then I'd probably switch over to some heat source for the Fall and Winter.
Lastly, I was also considering using a coolbot unit on the portable AC if possible, to bring it down to serving temps and maybe still get away with using the 24 cubic foot freezer box as a keezer when I'm not fermenting anything in it. Anyone have any opinions on that idea? I know the coolbots only work with specific makes and models of AC units... so for all I know it might not even be possible to use on a portable one.
