Top-freezer Roper fridge fermentation chamber

Hey all,

I just came into possession of a Roper top-freezer style fridge. Model RT18BKXKQ01 if you want to play along at home.

I've read a LOT about cutting into the walls of fridges, and watching out for coolant lines, etc etc etc. But I also saw this awesome Side by side fermentation chamber build and thought it'd be nifty if I cut the floor out of the freezer, and build some shelves into this one.

Call me crazy, but I don't think there's anything in the freezer floor of this fridge. Or the walls. In fact, it looks like the evaporator is in the freezer, on the back wall, with a fan to circulate the air.

What do y'all think? Is it worth cutting out the floor to see what's in there, and maybe gain some more space inside?

Here's the parts diagram of the mechanics of this fridge. This makes me even more confident there are no coolant lines in the floor. I expect a bunch of wiring, though...



Cheers!!!!

 

Here's a photo of the fridge. I took out the liner in the door, and it can fit a Sankey in front of the hump! I'd love to build a shelf and fit a couple carboys above that....

 

Well, there were no "OMG You idiot!!!!" posts, so I guess this isn't all that bad of an idea... I think I'm going to start hacking away at it tonight. Ill take pictures and post updates here...

My plan is to connect the doors together (to form one door), and carve the freezer floor out alltogether. I should end up with one, large compartment.

Then, I'll build some wooden shelves, so I can put a couple of carboys on each level. My goal is to keep at least one Sankey and one carboy in there. Preferably two or three carboys.

Anyone have any thoughts or input?

 

I'm interested to see how this turns out. Post lots of pics!

 

Will do! Hopefully it won't be an epic failure. Regular failure is always an option, though.

 

Looks like you are good to go. Can you see the evap. in the freezer?

 

can't see your fridge picture though...repost?

 

Yup, the evap is right behind a single plastic panel. I'l take some more photos and post a little later today.

This system is actually very, very simple it looks like.

 

OK, so I carved out a hole between the fridge and freezer. HEre are some photos of the affair tonight. How's this for photos.....


The fridge with the evaporator exposed, and the door shelves removed.


Close up of the evaporator


Plastic removed. Let the foam carving begin.



I know there are wires in there somewhere, so I carve carefully.



Wires located.


I sanded down the foam with a wire brush drill bit. This crap goes everywhere.......



Opening complete.


Next up, I'm going to build a wooden shelf in there, so I can fit a couple of carboys below, or a sankey, and something above.

 

Hm, this thing works pretty well. It just took it two minutes to drop the temp in the fridge-chamber from 55 to 49. And the eBay aquarium controller works pretty well, too!

Tomorrow -- shelf building.

 

OK, I built a little shelf to sit things on the compressor hump...



I need to build a shelf above all that, but honestly, I don't think it'll work as well as I had imagined.

Thats ok. I can fit two carboys in there. Or a carboy and a bucket and a corny.

It's time to lager.

Cheers!

 

Pictures?

 

Are they not showing up? Ive got quite a few in there... Most of the photos are in my gallery here..

http://www.homebrewtalk.com/members/scsi/albums/fermentation-chiller/

 

The pictures are good to go. I am glad it worked easily for you!

 

Yeah, its not perfect. Not the most ideal solution in the world.

However, it's cheap, and will allow me to lager at least 10 gallons at a time. I'm OK with that :-D

Maybe in the future I'll score a side-by-side and set it up like you... Which was my first plan. The fridge didn't pan out, so top-freezer it is. Awesome job on that, by the way.

 

Slightly off topic but can I not see the pictures b/c I'm not a paying member? I certainly couldn't access your gallery but I thought embedded images I could still see?

 

I can't see them either.

 

Interesting.... I thought everybody could see the gallery images, only paying members could post them. Hmmmmm.

I just tried a different computer that was not signed in to this site... The pictures in the thread showed up, as did all the advertisements *shudder*... I couldn't access the gallery link, I hit a paywall.


Not sure what's going on here.

 

Old thread I know.I've done the same as the OP.
Now id like to remove the piece In the middle, were the two doors meet.
And make one big door.
Any one know of there's coolant lines

 

Very cool.