Behold the mighty BribieChestinator®, a fermenting chest that you can knock up in about half an hour for about $18.
I've had this on the go for a couple of days and monitoring performance.
Tea chest sized packing carton from a removalist, around $5 - recommend a brand new one, they are super robust. Go on.
Roll of 375mm x 25 m bubble wrap from Officeworks $10
Roll of clear packing tape $2
Frozen 1.25L bottles
Optional extra to upgrade to the BribieChestinator Deluxe® - add a kitchen probe thermometer from Target.
Trim one end of the carton so it sits flush on a garage floor.
Just keep unwinding, cutting and sticking on the bubble wrap, bubbly side inwards, until you have 3 layers.
In the test phase it's holding between 18 and 19.5 degrees over a 24 hour period using a FV of "green beer". Temperature measurement by an Infra Red laser thermometer measured on the 3 sides of the FV away from the bottles then averaged. I'm doing a number of field trials whether I should swap one bottle every 12 hours for less temperature swing, although at this stage of the fermentation swings aren't going to do much damage.
Based on previous long experience with dead fridges and bottles, I'm hoping that a 24 hour charge will do the trick.
I don't intend to use it to do a fermentation from scratch, just to finish off brews that have been started in my single Kegmate style fermenting fridge. Hence the initial use of the "green beer" that's just about finished attenuating.
However next move will be to actually use it for a full fermentation, may be of interest to newcomers who haven't got a Ferm fridge yet, or anyone like me looking to double their capacity during Summer. Using it as a straight fermenting chest it would probably need an extra charge of ice to overcome the exothermic stuff happening in the first few days.
Oh, and the tea chest sized carton will fit anything up to a 60L (with a bit of a squeeze). Using a SS Brew Bucket lends itself to blue freezer blocks as well.
In the "shoulder" brewing seasons such as Spring and Autumn when night time ambient in your garage, laundry, shed etc is below 20 it should only require daytime use.
I've had this on the go for a couple of days and monitoring performance.
Tea chest sized packing carton from a removalist, around $5 - recommend a brand new one, they are super robust. Go on.
Roll of 375mm x 25 m bubble wrap from Officeworks $10
Roll of clear packing tape $2
Frozen 1.25L bottles
Optional extra to upgrade to the BribieChestinator Deluxe® - add a kitchen probe thermometer from Target.
Trim one end of the carton so it sits flush on a garage floor.
Just keep unwinding, cutting and sticking on the bubble wrap, bubbly side inwards, until you have 3 layers.
In the test phase it's holding between 18 and 19.5 degrees over a 24 hour period using a FV of "green beer". Temperature measurement by an Infra Red laser thermometer measured on the 3 sides of the FV away from the bottles then averaged. I'm doing a number of field trials whether I should swap one bottle every 12 hours for less temperature swing, although at this stage of the fermentation swings aren't going to do much damage.
Based on previous long experience with dead fridges and bottles, I'm hoping that a 24 hour charge will do the trick.
I don't intend to use it to do a fermentation from scratch, just to finish off brews that have been started in my single Kegmate style fermenting fridge. Hence the initial use of the "green beer" that's just about finished attenuating.
However next move will be to actually use it for a full fermentation, may be of interest to newcomers who haven't got a Ferm fridge yet, or anyone like me looking to double their capacity during Summer. Using it as a straight fermenting chest it would probably need an extra charge of ice to overcome the exothermic stuff happening in the first few days.
Oh, and the tea chest sized carton will fit anything up to a 60L (with a bit of a squeeze). Using a SS Brew Bucket lends itself to blue freezer blocks as well.
In the "shoulder" brewing seasons such as Spring and Autumn when night time ambient in your garage, laundry, shed etc is below 20 it should only require daytime use.
