Freezer Help

I am wondering if anyone can help me out. I have a freezer that I am looking to turn into a fermentation chamber. When I went to take out the shelves, I notice that there is a cooling line running throughout. Anyone know if this can be removed fairly easy or would advise not to. Or should I just sell and pick up another one.

 

I don't think they can be removed easily or if at all, some I have seen can be bent toward the side or back, but if u break a line your stuck with a lemon.

 

Without bleeding the system, modifying, and then refilling with refrigerant, you'll not be removing those.

Edit: that doesnt necessarily kill it as a ferm chamber though... You could leave the top shelf and place 1 gallon chugs that have had 3/4 a gallon of water frozen in them up top. Install a small computer fan just to maintain airflow. This will provide enough cooling to bring temps down quite a bit. Then you can still certainly employ whatever heating method you want. That's still a very well insulated chamber.... I'm doing something similar in a small dorm fridge which I ruined by trying to drill the side.

 

Thank you for the responses. I think I may take the easy way out (not messing up a good freezer) and pick up a new freezer and use this one for its "proper" use.

 

Mightn't it be possible to just tip the freezer up on its' back? That way the door would be on top of the freezer, rather than the front, and you might wind up with a deeper well to store a carboy. I don't know if it'd be deep enough, though.

 

You shouldn't because it will put the compressor in a non-standard orientation for which it was not designed. I don't even know if it'd work.

 

You could build an attached chamber like this one - there are several threads where people have done this with small refrigerators - a freezer with temp. controller should work, I'd think:

http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/my-mini-fridge-fermentation-chamber-build-256068/