Freezer for fermenting and aging

[premington]

I'm toying with purchasing a freezer that I can use with a temperature controller to get more refined fermentation temps and also use for aging, lagering, and cold crashing. I have a cheap freezer now, but the cooling coils are built into the shelves, which means they can't be removed. Ideally, I'd like a compact freezer that's economical, but I need to be able to remove the shelves so I can get my primary in there.

Does anyone have any recommendations on brands and models that might work for my use?

If you're doing what I'm thinking of doing, which freezer do you have? Do you have any suggestions?

 

[bajaedition]

I bought a cheap chest freezer, I measured the total height of my fermentor with air lock and checked to see if it would fit. drawback is getting the brew in and out. It is a magic chef. Is my keezer now
I used to use a freezer that I bought at a garage sale for over 15 years, it was good because all I needed to do was build a bottom shelf to hold the carboy, drawback to that was only 1 beer fermenting at a time as the carboy took up so much space.
Now days I have a 2 door commercial sliding glass door refrigerator, I just hung a thermometer in it and adjusted the temp. does not need a controller. I just crank up to 50 degrees to lager and down to 38 to store or age. Drawbacks none, benefits fits many kegs or fermentors.

 

[booth74]

Costco 7.1 model typically 100-130 bucks
Ink bird controller
heat wrap
Thermo well



That has been my setup, I do a fair amount of lagers and it works great.

 

[premington]

Thanks for the replies... I thought I'd get a lot more than this. But it would require people to go to their fridge/freezer, look up the make and model info, and then write it here, which is a little bit of a PITA, I suppose.

 

[MrBJones]

Costco 7.1 model typically 100-130 bucks
Ink bird controller
heat wrap
Thermo well



That has been my setup, I do a fair amount of lagers and it works great.

Would that freezer be a good candidate for a future conversion to keezer?

 

[kh54s10]

What is more important than the make and model number is the size. a 5 cubic foot chest freezer will hold one 6 gallon sized fermenter. A 7 cubic foot one will hold 2.

 

[premington]

What is more important than the make and model number is the size. a 5 cubic foot chest freezer will hold one 6 gallon sized fermenter. A 7 cubic foot one will hold 2.

Yes! That's very true. I haven't figured out exactly what size I'd need to get my primary into a fridge/freezer. So this post is helpful towards having me narrow down models.

 

[kh54s10]

Take a look here: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=377518

 

[premington]

Take a look here: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=377518

This is excellent... Thanks for posting this here. Super helpful thread!

 

[booth74]

that is a good one for a keezer, I have one right next to it I use as a keezer