2 Zone Fermentation Chamber Build

I could not believe it when I saw this. I've been planning something just like this in my head for a year and just recently started looking for ideas on what other people have done. I have a few questions.

1. What are you using to turn on/off the fans in the upper level? and is the pipe on the right the return to the bottom area?

2. What is the material you used on the inside walls? Looks flimsy, does it work?

3. You said you would do some things different if you built another one, can you give some examples?

4. One more, did you alter the A/C in anyway and what size unit are you using?

I live in FL and plan on starting my version in the next few months, any advice would be grand. Great job, this is the best I've found yet.

 

I'm starting my version in a few months. I cannot wait to see more pictures of your setup.

 

Hi Zoo_Guy, thanks for the compliments, I'd be happy to answer your questions.

1. I'm using two STC-1000 temperature controllers from ebay, one for each section of the chamber(pictured below). I have these wired into an outlet in each section. So the top section is controlled by the top controller. When cooling is needed the controller sends power to the bottom plug on the outlet which i have the fans plugged into. If heating is needed it sends power to the top plug, which has a hair dryer plugged into it.

2. Its 1/8 white hardboard that is supposed to be moisture resistance. It is basically the material used for dry erase whiteboards. It is fairly strong actually and I also have the rigid insulation behind it. It works fine but I ended up painting it so probably regular plywood would have been better.

3. I might have used different materials in a few places. For example like i mentioned above the interior walls could have been regular plywood. The only major thing would probably be the doors though. They work but aren't quite square, mostly because I used a piece of plywood for door faces which warped. Probably using MDF or something similiar would work a lot better.

4. The A/C unit is just a cheap 5000 btu window unit. I got mine used but you can get them new for around $100 at any of the big box stores. Even the basic ones like this where you just set it to on or off have a thermostat that prevent them from cooling past a certain point. I think its somewhere around 60. I disabled this so it would be able to get cooler. I also re-wired the fan portion so it has a separate plug. This way I can leave the fan running at all times and just have the compressor turn on when needed for cooling. Doing this prevents icing. You could also just wire some pc fans to blow across the coils instead of using the built in fan. This might actually be a better solution so your not wearing out the A/C fan.

I finished this last summer and we had about a week stretch of 100+ degree days and it had no problem holding temp. This did take a lot longer to build than I originally anticipated and also eneded up costing more. You may actually be able to buy a few used chest freezers for cheaper and just throw on johnson controllers. The main reason I didn't do this was due to space, I didn't have room for several big freezers.

I would also highly recommend putting extra effort into making sure the interior is water tight. I've seen a lot of people build things like this and have them molded and rot within a few years and have to throw them out. Using the linoleum on the floors really makes the inside nice. Then exterior latex paint on the walls plus lots of caulking on the seams.

Lastly i highly recommend using a Eva-dry to further prevent any issues due to moisture.

Let me know if you have any other questions about the build I can answer.

 

Zacc did a good job and I'm not about to hijack his thread, but I will make an effort to get my build on-line in the next several days. If you are about to go out and buy an AC unit, however, I would suggest looking at the Home Depot 5,000 BTU LG unit. There is an easy was to hotwire the temp controller, which I will put in my thread. Super fun project.

On another note, there are "Keezers", "Kegerators", etc but I don't know of any particular term to describe the type of fermentor we are discussing here. Is it a "wardrobe-inator" or an "armoire-inator"? We should come up with a name for it...suggestions?

 

I'm looking forward to seeing what you've done as well. I've seen Zacc's and it's a beauty. I'm about to pull the trigger on mine with some Christmas money so any tips, thermostat bypassing information etc would be much appreciated!

 

I'll get it up in the next day or two.

 

Thanks for all the information. I'm probably going to go this route due to space as well. I also think if designed and built well it will use less power than the freezer units. I'm also a big fan of going through the doors instead of a top lid on a chest freezer.

 

Yeah those are some other good benefits. It took longer to build than I expected but it was well worth the work. It turned out great and has been an awesome addition to the brewery!

 

How about "Duo-Ferm"?

I'm definitely building one of these soon.

 

As promised, my build is posted:

http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/2-tier-2-zone-fermentation-chamber-build-aka-racer-x-377233/

Thanks again for the inspiration Zacc.

 

I've heard of issues with dampness and mold. Any problems here? It's been a few years. Curious how this is holding up.

 

It's been running for nearly 4 years now with no mold or other issues!

I had heard of others having moisture problems with their fermentation chamber builds so I took great care from the start to protect against this. The main thing I did was ensure all interior surfaces were moisture resistant and that it was completely sealed so moisture wouldn't penetrate into the insulation or wood frame.

I also have kept a eva-dry mini dehumidifier in the chamber to further protect it from moisture. If you havent used these I would highly recommend them. The crystals absorb any moisture in the air and change color when saturated. Just plug it in for a few hours and the crystals are dried out and it's ready to go again. I typically renew it once a month or so.

Most likely the first major problem I'll see with this chamber will be the a/c unit going out. If/when this happens I've designed it so it will be very easy to swap in a new a/c unit. At some point I'll probably also need to redo the caulking and repaint the interior but that's pretty small stuff.

Overall I could not be more pleased with this build! I've fermented over 400 gallons in this bad boy and expect to continue using it for many years to come .

 

That's great. I have been building mine for a couple months now. It's slow going but I have been using a lot of the info you provided. It's probably 80% done now. Thank you for taking the time to reply.

 

Almost done.
View attachment 342493

 

Top

 

Bottom chamber

 

Looking good William!

It's awesome to hear from folks my build has helped inspire!

I've been thinking about upgrading from the stc-1000 to BrewPi. I'll definitely post an update if I end up doing this.