AC unit

[hopbrad]

I just bought a 5000 btu frigidaire for my cold room build (model fra052xt7). It has manual controls. The power pops on and off regularly so i needed this style or a digital with auto restart. This one seems to do the trick.

Im looking for a few pointers to minimize problems.
1. Can I hook up a Johnson Controller to set a temp without touching the AC unit's temp probe? I dont know what temps are on the manual knobs, it says 1-Cool, 7-Coolest.

2. Should I put a fan near the ac unit to keep the coils from freezing up? where would i put this and aim it at what?

3. Any other tips? I just saw the coolbot thing, a bit expensive and all the reviews say it doesnt work well with frigidaire units.

 

[Wolfbayne]

What size is your cold room going to be? You could hook up the Johnson to control it but I would look at a temp unit that would prevent the compressor from kicking on and off every 2 mins or you'll blow the AC.
How are you planning to monitor the Temps from the area itself or the vessels?

 

[hopbrad]

What size is your cold room going to be? You could hook up the Johnson to control it but I would look at a temp unit that would prevent the compressor from kicking on and off every 2 mins or you'll blow the AC.
How are you planning to monitor the Temps from the area itself or the vessels?

The room will be either 8x8 or 10x8. just depends how we outfit the door. 7ft ceiling.

If the unit can get the room to the mid 60s with no controller, ill be fine with it. Temps outside reach 90+- mid day.
Most of the yeasts I use are ok if they get in the low 70's. s-05 for my american ales. Belle saison, t-58 and the wlp 500's when i use liquid belgian yeasts. If im doing anything special ill use my cool brew bag.

what other temp unit would you recommend to not blow out the unit?

 

[catdaddy66]

When I bought a mini fridge to ferment my batches it didn't have temperature readings either. I had to adjust manually and I would leave two thermometers in fridge and checked each day until I got close to the range I needed. Certainly that approach has it's drawbacks but in the short term it may help. As for the Johnson control I think it would work but an STC-1000 would be less expensive for sure. Hope that helps and good luck!

 

[Wolfbayne]

The Johnsons are good controllers, but I like the added safety of the STC's. They wont cut off and on and fry your equipment. I think they are programmable from 5 to 10 min separations, but you would have to review the manual. I use STC's on my commercial fridges for fermenting but I do center monitoring of my beers to ensure beer temp verses air temps.

As far as the room and different yeast...you're not concerned that area cooling is not going to work well with all the different heat(s) coming from active fermentation(s) changing the temps?

Good luck on the build. Please post some pics of the finished project.

 

[hopbrad]

i think im going to go with the STC controller so I dont blow out the AC unit. The cold room is about 1/3 of the way done. ill post pics soon.

 

[Orthobrewsky]

You can open up the AC unit (unplug first, of course) and take a look at the thing that the upper knob (thermostat knob) was connected to. There should be be two wires connected to it. If you remove the thermostat and securely connect those wires to each other, it should run all the time regardless of temperature. I have a different brand, but it is a similar manual control setup and this is what I did.

 

[Orthobrewsky]

By the way, I'm using mine as a fix for an upright freezer which stopped working. I cut a hole in the back for the AC unit and have been using it that way for a couple of years. Being a small space, it is plenty powerful. I'm using it right now for a lager. If my garage is warm and I want to get to low 40's or below, I have to have a little fan in there blowing on the front of it to keep the coils from freezing over, but I can keep the temps below 40.