Having just started in the home arena, I have noticed many fellow brewers use small chest freezers for home brew refrigerators. Why is this?
BVB
I like the kegerator setup of a chest freezer better than a regular fridge. If it is for just keeping bottles, I think the fridge would work better. Maybe they got the freezer first but are saving up for the kegging system.
I can’t speak for others but in my case the chest freezer works great for 4 cornies and it was pretty cheap. Also easy to put a collar on it to mount taps and easy to add an external temp controller to.
Before I started kegging I had a small dorm fridge to keep bottles in. Basically the same reasons. Cheap, easy and low maintenance. Sold it after we replace the fridge in the kitchen. Brought the old kitchen frdige downstairs with dreams of using it to lager. Last time I looked in it, it was full of pop and juice boxes. :
Paul
What are your intentions? Keeping beer cold for serving or for fermenting?
One big plus for chest freezers is that when you open it up, all the cold are doesn’t ‘fall out’ as it does in a fridge. If you go the extra mile & mount taps, then this isn’t really important. But if you’re opening it to use picnic taps then it’s a consideration.
Always remember the flip side is that we are using the chest freezer as either an ferm chamber or fridge chamber. It was not designed for that and eventually it will break. At what rate I haven’t a clue. I’ve had my 14 CF chest freezer for 13 years and it still works. I bought a 22CF Kenmore freezer back in '04 and the compressor died in '06. Go figure!
If you’re using a chest freezer at ridge temps, that should extend rather than shorten the life span of the unit. You are stressing the mechanical components less than if you were trying to freeze it.
What kills compressors is short cycling. Just make sure you have the control adjusted properly to prevent this.
more detail, please!
Most external digital 'fridge thermostats has a ‘differential’ adjustment. If you set this very low, it will keep really tight control of the temp, but the compress will cycle on and off frequently. Setting it higher should extend compressor life.
How about “fuzzy logic”? Is this the same as “differential” adjustment?
Most of them also have an anti-short cycle delay which lets you program a minimum interval between cycles.
I have two chest freezers or “keezers” as some call them, one is in the process of being converted into a kegerator and the second one I use for a “fermentation control chamber”. I use a Johnson digital controller to regulate the temps. Most chest freezers need to be fitted with a collar in order to maximize the space and allow for the height of corny kegs. I prefer the chests over refrigerators because they can fit more kegs and…IMO are easier to maintain.
Looked hard at the freezers… but between getting one and the thermostat setup it was too much $$. They’re flying off the shelf on Craigslist here…
So, I got a Sears fridge, up/down, freezer down. This way you don’t have the hump in the bottom of the fridge. Took out all the shelves and it will fit 6 cornies easily, pin or ball with plenty of head space for plumbing. Taps are going in the door, there’s no risk of running into refrigerant lines in the door.
Craigslist, $50 out the door, no additional electronics required.
Jeez. No-ones giving stuff away around here like that. How many cf?
Yeah, I’d probably switch my serving fridge from the keezer to one of those if I could get one for next to nothing! My main issue with fridges has been the freezer on top, which makes the taps too low and the tendency to push the taps open if you open the freezer when there is a handle on the faucet.
The popular digital controllers, that many of us here use, have settings to adjust the deadband. Say you have it set for a +/- 2 degree deadband. That means if your setpoint is at 50F the controller will not turn on the compressor until the temperature is at 52F and then leaves it on until the temperature drops to 48F.
Be warned that terminology varies with different manufacturers. Some will call it total deadband so +/-2 is 4 degrees total. Some will not center it about the setpoint, so a 50F setpoint may not turn on until 54F and then back off at 50F. I’m using 4 degrees total deadband as an example, because that’s usually a pretty safe setting to prevent short cycling. Hope this helps.
thanks, all, that does help a lot. the problem is, I’ve got an older analog johnson that doesn’t have that capability.
I’ve been using a 1 degree differential for about 2 years now without issue. I work form home a lot, and the freezer doesn’t cycle very often at all.
The other thing to consider is that depending on the design you have to lift the keg pretty high to get it over the collar on a chest freezer. Based on the way I mounted mine that was a hassle and once in a while I’d accidentally knock open a tap while lifting the keg into place. Not a lot of fun.
Also, you can end up with a lot of condensation in the bottom of a chest freezer. They’re simply not designed to deal with condensation, which happens at fridge temps, so you get a pool of liquid that soon goes funky. Some people use desiccants or towels with some luck but for me it was a pretty big hassle. I had to periodically pull out all the kegs and clean things up, which is difficult due to the height of the collar.
All of this convinced me to switch to a front door fridge like this:
http://www.katom.com/598-TBB2448GS.html?CID=GoogleBase2
Keep an eye on CraigsList for restaurants that are going out of business. I picked up mine for $500. I don’t have to override the temperature settings at all (saving me from using a temp controller and worrying about short cycling a compressor.)