DocBrown
Well-Known Member
My wife took me down to our LHBS for Valentine's Day and told me I could get what I needed to start brewing my own beer. Little did she know what an obsession this would become!
We live in north Alabama, and temperatures are in the 90s fairly often, which means our house stays around 77F during the day. I tried various methods of cooling the closet where I keep my fermenters, with some success. I bought some foam insulating board and built a small enclosure around my fermenters, along with a 2liter bottle of ice and a computer fan to keep the air circulating. That can get the temperatures down around 70F for 12 hours or so, but that's not quite good enough. So I've been keeping my eyes open for a cheap refrigerator.
(Note: All images with descriptions are in my user gallery.)
I managed to find a decent (read: working) one on Craig's List for $25:
The inside is pretty spacious and should easily fit three fermenters in the bottom portion:
The bottom portion will be the fermerator part of my build. I have plans to eventually experiment with the freezer portion as well. If I can get the temperatures fairly stable up there as well, I'm considering trying to put some kegs up there. I can fit 3gallon kegs upright or 5gallon kegs tilted to one side. Once I get around to that part I'll post pictures of it as well. For now I just have the fermerator in place.
The shelving in the door doesn't really buy me anything at this point and takes up about 4 inches of space that could hold fermenters instead, so it's got to go!
Next to figure out the refrigerator wiring. This one has a thermostat mounted in the back in between two interior illumination lights. The wires you see hanging down should go to a door open switch, which wasn't in the refrigerator when I got it. The connection works though, so I'll put a new switch in later. On the warmest setting the refrigerator stays around 50F, so I had to replace the temperature controller.
We live in north Alabama, and temperatures are in the 90s fairly often, which means our house stays around 77F during the day. I tried various methods of cooling the closet where I keep my fermenters, with some success. I bought some foam insulating board and built a small enclosure around my fermenters, along with a 2liter bottle of ice and a computer fan to keep the air circulating. That can get the temperatures down around 70F for 12 hours or so, but that's not quite good enough. So I've been keeping my eyes open for a cheap refrigerator.
(Note: All images with descriptions are in my user gallery.)
I managed to find a decent (read: working) one on Craig's List for $25:
The inside is pretty spacious and should easily fit three fermenters in the bottom portion:
The bottom portion will be the fermerator part of my build. I have plans to eventually experiment with the freezer portion as well. If I can get the temperatures fairly stable up there as well, I'm considering trying to put some kegs up there. I can fit 3gallon kegs upright or 5gallon kegs tilted to one side. Once I get around to that part I'll post pictures of it as well. For now I just have the fermerator in place.
The shelving in the door doesn't really buy me anything at this point and takes up about 4 inches of space that could hold fermenters instead, so it's got to go!
Next to figure out the refrigerator wiring. This one has a thermostat mounted in the back in between two interior illumination lights. The wires you see hanging down should go to a door open switch, which wasn't in the refrigerator when I got it. The connection works though, so I'll put a new switch in later. On the warmest setting the refrigerator stays around 50F, so I had to replace the temperature controller.