Side by Side Fridge to Fermenter

After reading through many options for fermentation control I decided that converting a side by side fridge was probably the best way to go. For the past year I have been using an A/C unit with a Johnson control attached to an insulated chamber...not very efficient and running constantly in the summer to maintain 67 degrees.

So I acquired a side by side fridge and freezer for free from my roommate's parents and started ripping it apart. I've only seen this done once on HBT so it was a very experimental project.

I started by removing the center wall that divides the fridge and freezer. This is the dirty work but overall it was easy. Make sure you don't hit any electrical lines or thermostats.

The rest of the work was done by some friends that are experts at special projects and engineering. They measured out all the shelving and we figured out a system that would give us the most capacity. The wood is drilled very securely and even through the fridge's outside walls.

When we pulled out the front door seal (where the 2 doors meet in the middle) we accidentally cut into a freon line. Luckily my friends are also very knowledgeable with fixing this type of thing and were able to braze and flush the line...then they ran it through the rear of the unit so it wouldn't be in the way.

We drilled a hole in the side to mount the johnson control unit and insert the probe. And to seal the front doors we just added window sealing so when you close the doors at the same time it creates a perfectly tight seal.

It works perfectly! We fired it up today and the Johnson control was reading 26 degrees after just a few minutes. This is going to be super efficient at keeping ales in fermentation temps and getting started with lagering!

Check out the pics below and let me know if you have any questions. The capacity is 4 better bottles on the top shelf, 2 on the bottom, plus a 15 gallon demijon. So all in all the capacity is 40 gallons!

 

Wow! That's amazing! Just when you think you've seen pretty much everything when it comes to beer chilling mods, you see something even more radical!

Good job to you and your crew!

Cheers!

 

Genius!

 

You must have some very smart friends to make this set up work.
Your idea was great. Putting it all together was an act of pure genius.

 

I just got a side by side fridge for 30 bucks today. I am going to try this!

 

Okay I have a question. I began messing with the center divider and came upon this:




Is that the freon line?

 

Looks like it to me. You probably want to leave that center divider in anyhow, as it provides a sealing surface for both of the doors where they meet in the middle. Have a look at Boerderij_Kabouter's side by side to see how he did it.

 

Yes that is the freon line. If you have a friend or known someone who can evxcuate the freon then you can relocate the line so that it is not in you way.

 

Thanks man. I can make it to where the doors seal. That's the easy part. The moving of the freon line is the hard part.

 

For some frezion reason they have a line running up the front! Don't cut into it. I was lucky that my friends could fix it, otherwise that would be an expensive mistake. Let me know if you have questions, I can ask the experts and get right back to you.

 

+1 to gromitdj's post....I hope you stopped and didn't go any further on pulling that part out where the door seal against the divider....although you didn't hit the freon line it still an important part of the fridge there (i.e. where the doors meet and seal).

 

For me it was necessary to rip out the front divider to get a demijon in there. The front doors are close enough that with a little weatherstripping they seal tight when I close them.

 

Necropost

I want to convert a side by side for beer cellar (or else dry cure chamber).

Any way to make both the freezer side and the fridge side operate at the same temperature?

Seems like they all have the refrigerant line in the central partition, this might entirely nix the plans to someday convert for a dry cure chamber, as I would want to use dowel rods for hanging the product.

TD

 

I would think so, as I believe a damper is used to port freezer temp to the fridge side, and the damper controls the fridge temp.

For hanging your dowels, glue some "sleepers" to the inner liner, ( wood), with notches in them to hold your dowels.