a little keezer advice

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jzelina

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Looking through the keezer build threads, I got a lot of great looks. Planning to start my build soon, but have some questions that hopefully some folks can shed some light on. First and foremost: I have a Haier 7.1 freezer. The book specifically states not to build the freezer into a cabinet, and to maintain four inch clearance on all sides. Is this common with the chest freezers. I have not read many threads about overheating freezers, so I war wondering how much of an issue that truly is. Building the cabinet eight and four inches larger really would not make that much size difference, but not sure if its necessary. Next is the coffin build, wish there were more pictures of the inside of the coffin. Trying to come up with the best "plumbing". I like the PVC channel, but looking at all options and insight on how well your build went and if you would do it different after the fact. So if anyone has a suggestion, I would appreciate the help
 
So some people do not care or do not know about their keezer maintenance and put the flat piece wood directly against the side of the freezer wall. This is bad for the longevity of the machine because it needs to vent the hot air it creates in the process of cooling the unit. They say those things in the directions to give you an idea of what it takes to make sure the unit will last. If you dont follow them it might shorten the life of your machine. Most just add in an inch or two to be safe and have an open back then call it good, many go further and add a fan too, then still others go the whole way and build a very complex system...

I am in the kiss method camp myself.

Have you seen this thread?
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/show-us-your-sculpture-brew-rig-46578/
There are many inside photos there just keep looking...
 
jzelina said:
[...]The book specifically states not to build the freezer into a cabinet, and to maintain four inch clearance on all sides. Is this common with the chest freezers.
Click to expand...

Pretty nearly universal for anything that still actually works. "Modern" chest freezers use the cabinet skin as a radiator for the condenser loop, so you need to preserve the ability for the skin to shed heat to preserve the life of the compressor.

That said, the "book" expects totally passive airflow, hence the four inches. You, otoh, can provide active airflow, which if done well can let you cut that gap down to a couple of inches or less...

Cheers!
 
Thumbs up to the previous posts. I built a collar but have seen coffins with two holes into the cabinet holding the taps and a computer fan pushing air up into it. I don't really see the need to do this, I can't imagine that an ounce or two of room temp beer will have any effect on the final product but if you are going to do it might as well over do it.
 
Pretty sure day tripper was not talking about keeping the beer lines cool. He was talking about keeping space for the metal skin of the freezer that dissipates the heat that is generated from the compressor. If you put something right up against it that will insulate and not allow the heat to dissipate, causing the compressor to work harder and die prematurely.
 
Chris, I was speaking to the OP and "trying to come up with the best plumbing" for the coffin. I assumed that the OP was speaking to the beer lines, but I'm not 100%.
 
OP: I think you've gotten your answer to the first half of your post. What are you having difficulty with in terms of the coffin build?
 
Thanks for the replies all. I did ask about both the "vent" space around the cabinet, and got good answers. It looked like most folks had just an inch and a half 2x4 gap between freezer wall and cabinet, so I wondered if anyone had issues with that The plumbing around the taps. there seems to be a lean toward getting cold air to the taps and lines to keep the foam down. So I am looking at what others came up with. Trying not to re-invent the wheel so to speak. I was looking to get insight on if just insulating the tap box was enough, or if the air channel some built was necessary, and if so who did "you" do it, and if you'd have done it different if you had it to do over again. Again many thanks for the replies.
 
I insulated the inside of my coffin box and have a cheap PC fan blowing air up into the box and another pushing air back down into the freezer and have had 0 issues with foaming.
 
Some splice wires. I bought one off amazon that plugged into an outlet. 15 bucks.


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew
 
day_trippr said:
Pretty nearly universal for anything that still actually works. "Modern" chest freezers use the cabinet skin as a radiator for the condenser loop, so you need to preserve the ability for the skin to shed heat to preserve the life of the compressor.

That said, the "book" expects totally passive airflow, hence the four inches. You, otoh, can provide active airflow, which if done well can let you cut that gap down to a couple of inches or less...

Cheers!
Click to expand...

The book also assumes your plugging it in and leaving it like a standard freezer, where the freezer could theoretically be on for an hour or more to maintain its sub zero temps, which would cause it to overheat easily.

With the temp controller, no freezer is going to have trouble maintaining 40F or so...my Haier 7.1 from Costco turns on once every hour or two for a few minutes.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
AC Fan: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B009OXTWZI/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

I have a few pieces of wood on the floor of the keezer, then wire shelving cut to elevate the kegs off the floor. From tehre I have the fan on teh wire shelving with flexible ducting running up to the top of the kegs and pointing at my lines. This way I am pulling the cold air from the the bottom (heat rises) and recirculating throughout the keezer. If I were to build a coffin I'd do the same thing and run the duct up into the cabinet with a hole the other size for an exit.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
i use a similar AC fan.. i got the variable speed one since i can tame it down a bit.. i can actually hear the fan pretty easily when it is on and the keezer isn't.. this way i just have it spinning a bit quieter and its not annoying
 
Last edited by a moderator:
My first keezer build I glued wood paneling directly to the freezer using construction adhesive. That freezer had a very hard time keeping beer below 50F. I rigged up pc fans and heatsinks on the compressor motor in a feeble attempt to keep it cool, and by the time I decided to rip the wood off, it was already too late. She died slow and painfully.

The keezer I have now is a Haier 7.1 with nothing but a collar. When running, you can feel heat radiating from the skin.
 
I insulated the collar. Works like a champ. The fan IS loud, but I have it in the basement so it doesn't matter to me. There are potentiometers you could run on the power cord to control speed, but that's a diy hack. Not sure if you're into it or not.


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew
 
Again thanks all who replied. Still working out a design/ acquiring materials, but your input helped a lot.
 

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