Side-By-Side Refridgerator Help

Curious if anyone has done this before.

I am looking to convert the fridge side of my side-by-side fridge into a fermentation chamber (cooling). And still keep the freezer side frozen?

I have a keezer on its way and want just the ability to control fermentation temperature, and also still keep hops frozen on the other side, and maybe any extra meats from upstairs.

Is this possible? I could put a simple johnson analog on the fridge side, but that will control power to both sides, unless I turn the setting on the fridge side to slightly warmer setting internally, and force it to run more and have the freezer side on max?

Great question. I just read through several hundred pages of the Aquarium Temperature Controller DIY and didn't see the answer to this so I also am wondering. FYI- If you haven't read throught he aformentioned thread you should do so, if you haven't already bought a Johnson Control the DIY build will save you some money. Now I'm gonna hang up and wait for an answer to your original question as I too have been contemplating using my side by side in the way you mentioned.

Bump

From what I remember reading the freezer is was cools the fridge side. I remember seeing one thread were the guy had two temp controllers for each side, but not sure how he did it. If I find it I will post.

You actually need two controllers possibly three if you want to ferment ales. one to control the compressor and keep the left side below freezing and then another to control a fan or some other method for moving the cold air into the right side. In my experience the third is needed to run a heating element in your fermentation chamber so that you can keep the desired temp, especially if your drawing really cold air like you intend to do. Check out my build in my signature, i used a dual stage love controller ut found hat i needed the heat source for doing ales.

I am planning on doing the same thing. My plan is to completely seal off the fridge side from the freezer. I found two vents, one at the top of the fridge that regulates how cold you want your fridge to be and one at the bottom for controlling the coolness level of the veggie drawers. I am going to seal both of those then, bore a hole big enough for a small fan (110V, 120mm) into the divider between the fridge and freezer. I am going to mount a lightweight hinged 'flap' in front of the fan so that when it's not on, no cold air comes in from the freezer side. At the bottom of the fridge, I am going to mount a small reptile heater. Both of these will be controlled with a two stage temperature controller.

I think some side-by-side units use a motorized damper to regulate the temperature of the fresh food side. If that's the case, then substituting the original 'stat with the new controller for just the refridge side should work & retain the original control on the freezer side? If you can find a wiring document for your particular unit it may help....

I found the model of my fridge:

Maytag MSD2756GEW

I just started pulling the trays out. I found the veggie box air in spot, and found a flap behind the veggie boxes that air from the freezer is coming in at. I'm looking for a wiring diagram, where would I find one?

I need to get this to work soon as I have about a week for my control panel to come in and I plan to make a lager first.

I took out all the shelves. After understanding how the system is cooled, I am playing around with the temperature controls, if I turn the fridge down all the way to 1 and play with the freezer temp. I can see where that gets me.

I attached this picture just to understand everything. What is that coil? the actual thermometer? the blue flap you see, it is setup as if its for air to leave the fridge and not to come in because the flap opens toward the freezer. There is a small hole where the veggie drawer was that allows some cold air in. I can't find any other source from the freezer side.

I just had a look at this link: http://www.searspartsdirect.com/par.../Model-MSD2756GEW/3048/0165000/M0404275/00008

It has all of the drawings & parts descriptions you should need. It looks to me like there is a single electrical control running the whole shebang geared somehow to the control rods / levers. The must be some kind of movable damper to divert some airflow to the fresh food side. The coil in the middle of the picture looks like the tank to chill water when the dispenser is equipped.

Good luck with it!

I wish I knew more about things like this.

Can anyone offer assistance in how to set this up? I'm wondering what temps this will hold on the lowest settings

Yes, that plastic s-shaped coil is the chiller for the water on the door. That blue flap is the air return to the freezer. The fridge air supply damper is up at the top left of the fridge, under the shroud, and it's position is controlled by the fridge t-stat. If you open the freezer you will see a small plastic duct on the top right that directs the chilled air from the freezer into the fridge. The main t-stat/defrost control (freezer t-stat) is also located under the plastic shroud at the top/right of the fridge. It's the only thing that brings on the compressor and evaporator fan. If the fridge needs cooling when the compressor is running it will open the damper and let the chilled air flow through. If you set the main t-stat lower to get the freezer colder, and the fridge temp is satisfied, the damper will close to avoid over-cooling the fridge side.

That makes sense. You are correct under the shroud are two cold air exhausts from the freezer. I'm going to pop off the shroud (somehow), and look at the controls. I wish it was as easy as a coarse screw on a freezer and just adjusting it further to allow slightly warmer temperatures.

I found the same wiring diagram that was stashed away up in this shroud. The top left gear is what controls the setting for the fridge. I'm wondering if I can adjust the screw for that past where the lever control won't let me. More to come! Any advice is appreciated.

I am halfway expecting someone to tell me, ya, your going to have to buy a temperature controller and install a fan yourself dude.

You're basically doing this:
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/side-side-kegerator-fermentation-chamber-245879/

minus the kegerator part. Just finished up my conversion, relatively easy to do.

Thanks for the link. I may try that if my method doesn't work.

I found the coarse screw on the side of my fridge thermostat. I gave it two rotations in. For the last two hours a cup of water with a thermometer has been at 50. And the freezer is frozen. I'll check in the morning to see what results I have if it will hold that. The dampener was closed for the fridge section and the compressor was running. If this works I'll try to fine tune it to 48 or so for lager fermentation.

Something to keep in mind. Every so often (the timing will depend on if your fridge has a simple timer or the adaptive defrost control) it will go into defrost mode even if the t-stat is calling for cooling. Defrost will shut off the compressor and evaporator fan and energize the defrost heater that is located directly under the evaporator coil. It will melt the accumulated ice on the coil and then resume cooling after the defrost cycle terminates. Maytags are infamous for the defrost timers failing. If it fails, the evaporator will ice up and the flow of air into the fridge will almost completely cease. Just something to watch for as you're messing around observing the operation.

Here is a link where I got the idea to do a side by side fridge:
http://www.homebrewersassociation.o...tem/show?title=pimp-my-system-richard-trevino

This project is based on the project in this link:
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/side-side-kegerator-fermentation-chamber-161176/

I bought a Jenn-air side by side off Craigslist last month and have completed the build. It works great. My fridge only had one thermostat that controlled the compressor. So I got a 2 stage love controller and hooked one up to the replace the inline thermostat. This controls the temp on the freezer side, because it is what kicks on the compressor. The other stage controls a 120V ac fan that is set between the freezer and the fridge. So this fan controls the temp in the fridge side. It works great so far, but of course with this set up the freezer side has to be colder than the fridge side. I can post pictures and a schematic if everyone is interested.
I didn't have much trouble with the wiring, but there is a little trick to get the fan wired up correctly. For me the side by side is great because I can get 4 carboys in the fridge side. I wanted to be able to get 2 carboys in the freezer side, but it just isn't wide enough. I bought four 3 gallon better bottles that fit great in the freezer side, which allow me to lager two 5 gallon batches in the freezer side at the same time.

slarkin712 said:

Here is a link where I got the idea to do a side by side fridge:
http://www.homebrewersassociation.o...tem/show?title=pimp-my-system-richard-trevino

This project is based on the project in this link:
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/side-side-kegerator-fermentation-chamber-161176/

I bought a Jenn-air side by side off Craigslist last month and have completed the build. It works great. My fridge only had one thermostat that controlled the compressor. So I got a 2 stage love controller and hooked one up to the replace the inline thermostat. This controls the temp on the freezer side, because it is what kicks on the compressor. The other stage controls a 120V ac fan that is set between the freezer and the fridge. So this fan controls the temp in the fridge side. It works great so far, but of course with this set up the freezer side has to be colder than the fridge side. I can post pictures and a schematic if everyone is interested.
I didn't have much trouble with the wiring, but there is a little trick to get the fan wired up correctly. For me the side by side is great because I can get 4 carboys in the fridge side. I wanted to be able to get 2 carboys in the freezer side, but it just isn't wide enough. I bought four 3 gallon better bottles that fit great in the freezer side, which allow me to lager two 5 gallon batches in the freezer side at the same time.

Click to expand...

I wouldn't mind seeing pictures. When I came back in the morning the temp was back down to 38. The compressor was running again. I turned the freezer portion down to a middle setting again (it was cranked up), and going to come back at lunch to see what happens. I may try putting that screw all the way in and see what that does. My idea comes from here:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/gu...mostat-32f-eliminate-external-control-249612/

Turns out I was backing the screw out and I got it loose. I since have gotten it back in (had to remove the entire unit), found it strange that it is not powered by anything? This shouldn't be any surprise but it looks like all it does is open or close the damper.

My ebay temp controller just came in. I may just use this if putting the screw all the way in is of no promise. I may just forgo that part of my setup and just hook up this controller. I'm guessing just need to wire a PC fan into the cooling portion. Find a power supply from my wiring diagram (possibly one of the light bulbs?) and put that into the power supply and set the temp and good? Can it really be that simple?

I suppose the thing I would need to do then is either remove the damper completely and make that hole big enough for a fan with some sort of 'flap' to stop all the cold air from coming in. Wondering if I should try to hook up two fans to the cooling (splice?) one for bringing air in, and another to circulate it inside the fridge portion?

Ok so I have the ebay controller. What power source can I take from the fridge? I know some people use the ice maker? Which appears to be a white.blue line. I don't wire anything normally so how should I proceed?

From the line cord the RD is HOT and WH is neutral which should be powered as long as the unit is plugged into the wall. If the adaptive defrost board is physically located near the temperature control, then all the wires you need should be in that area. It might be easier to connect your new controller in the compressor area as far as room goes....

The schematic looks a lot like the fridge I modified. Just use the red (hot) wire that goes into the temperature control for power or any other red that is convenient. Then use the white wire coming off the light or any other component that is convenient. You can run both of those to the controller you bought and then splice than as necessary. For the red (hot), one to power the controller, one for the compressor, and one for the AC fan if you're going to do that. Then run the blue wire that was on the old temp controller (that you removed) to your new controller. With this wiring scheme you will still have the adaptive defrost hooked up, which is good unless you like manually defrosting a freezer. The build by rtrevino is pretty much like I describe, although my wiring might be simpler. And his diagram will show you how to wire the fan. I'll get a picture of my set up later tonight and post it for you.

Here's a schematic I drew up quickly. I left out most of the components from your fridge, but you don't need them. You just need the red, white, and blue wires. Does this help?

That does help. Before I saw this I tried another method which has failed:

I took the white/blue line from the ice maker and used that for power and then spliced the white neutral I found with the cables and used that. Everything works fine, except no power to the STC-1000 controller.

Your drawing helps a ton, the only thing I was wondering: Don't I just need to hook up the red to the power, the white to neutral on the controller. Then, the thermometer, and finally, just take a 120v ac fan and hook that up to the cool stage? Essentially, I am not touching anything to do with the compressor or anything and just want a fan to turn on/off to keep temperature in the fridge side constant. What am I missing?

Ohhhhhh. I didn't understand what you were doing. I thought that you wanted to control the temperature on the freezer side and that you had a 2 stage controller. Yes, just run the red to the power and white to neutral. You hook your fan up to the cool stage like I have in my schematic with a love controller. But I think with the STC-1000 you just hook the fan directly to the cool stage. I actually have an STC-1000 for a son of a fermentation chamber that controls a fan and a fermwrap heater. It works great, I have a german wiessbier in it right now.

So where are you putting your AC fan? I expanded a hole in the wall between the freezer and fridge side. This had a manual damper in the hole that turned open or closed. I didn't put a fan to return air to the freezer. There was already a few ports down by the crisper drawer that allowed air to flow back to the freezer.

I think I am going to plug up the veggie drawer hole. I may take a utility knife to connected wall where there is already a hole at the top of the fridge that had the damper on it before. I'm thinking of embedding the fan in the wall on the freezer side, slightly enlarging the hole on the fridge side, but not big enough the fan can pass through it and then I am thinking I can just put some sort of damper the size of the fan. Something that a 120mm ac fan can blow open, but something heavy enough that it will provide some insulation between the sides. I have noticed since removing much of the guts of the sides, that when the compressor isn't running, there really isn't that much of a 'draft' naturally coming over.

And like you, i have a port down below that when airflow begins up top, has a plastic flap that allows air to travel back to the freezer.

The reason for this was that my basement sits at a great 68 degrees, which in combination with cold cement, a ale ferments great! I wanted to be able to use this fridge for two purposes. One to freeze all of my hops and any extra meat I have on the freezer side, but be able to ferment a lager on the right side.

Here are some pictures of my madness.

This is my poor mans effort at reattaching the line I cut into, and then found out it was too short to reattach so I need to 'add' extra line.






IT'S ALIVE!!! I just need to go buy that damn 120MM AC fan now.

Now that I've thought about it some more, your set up might not work like you want. Is the temperature control in your schematic in the fridge or freezer side? If it's in the fridge side then you might not need a fan. My fridge worked like this, but I wanted to control the freezer side temp. What you may want is to override the existing temp control with the cool side of the STC-1000 and then wire up your fan in parallel with the STC-1000. Without the fan it may be difficult to get very low temps in the fridge side. But, you could always try it first without a fan.
First, you must find out where the original temp control in the schematic is. If it's on the fridge side I suggest you try what I am describing. If it's on the freezer side then the method you are planning will work.

So I got the fan hooked up and installed between the wall. I'm testing it now to see if it will get me to my temperature and hold it.. Results in the morning

First day the temperature would vary from the 8.9 C I set down to 6 C at times. This whole day it's been around 8.7 - 9.0. I just picked up a ceramic heater and probably going to put it in at the bottom of the fridge.

Great. Yeah, the heater will solve your problems. And you can hook it up to the heat side of the stc-100.

Big Help thanks!