Throwing my breaker with new equipment

[BadNewsBrewery]

Can you figure out how the cooling coils are run? IE, do they run the full length of the entire chiller, or are they primarily on one side or the other? I'd be great if the latter, then you could build an insulated wall internally and maybe put a fan in that wall and a heater in the chamber. Then use a 2-zone temp controller to heat / cool the area and you've got yourself a 2-zone chiller. You could use the temp-controlled zone as a fermentation chamber, and the rest of it for storage and laggering.

 

[dmarc85]

Yes, actually I plan to do some research on this. I believe the coils are mostly on the left side since the right side is always 2-3 degrees warmer. 2-zones is an awesome idea


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[raouliii]

FWIW, these commercial units are usually designed for ease of repair and component access. They have few, if any, components embedded in the walls. They have compressor modules (compressor, condenser, fan) located in the lower compartment and evaporator coils mounted in the upper compartment (behind the lighted sign). The evaporator fans (maybe three for this unit) continuously blow across the evaporator coil with the cool air blowing down the rear of the interior. The refrigerant lines are usually located behind a panel that runs from bottom to top on the rear interior wall. The wiring harness also runs from bottom to top behind a panel. The factory thermostat is usually of a constant cut-in type where the sensing bulb senses the temperature of the evaporator coil and not air temperature. This is done for reliability and defrost purposes.

I'm not sure how one would create zones with this type of system. I guess it might involve physically dividing the interior as well as dividing the airflow through the evaporator, if it's not already done. And controlling individual evaporator fans using an air temperature thermostat to control the higher temperature compartment(s). The drawback to this may be the tendency for portions of the evaporator to build up ice when the compressor is running for the cold compartment but the evaporator fan is not running for the warmer compartment.

 

[dyqik]

If it does work like you describe, I'd think you could box in the outlet (and inlet maybe) for the air from the evaporators and route it to one side of the fridge only, then do the Son of Fermentation Chamber style fan on the wall to control the warm side. Might be a little ugly, but it should use the full evaporator and prevent icing.