Sorry if I sound like a jerk, but this has all been covered before and the consensus is that it's perfectly fine to operate a freezer as a fridge by interrupting the power. The freezer coils still operate at their normal temperature. I'm not going to start another endless debate over this. My freezer has run perfectly for nearly a year like this, and plenty of others have operated well in excess of that with the same method.
There is one alternative to the fridgemate that i have come across called a "Growarm". I believe its actually marketed for seed cultivators, but it does the exact same thing and is prewired and precalibrated. It's what i went for mostly cos i don't can't be sure which is the pointy end of a soldering iron.
+1, the only one by the way!
Yep and yep.It was my understanding that the benefits of a chest freezer were that the cold air stayed at the bottom and made the unit more efficient if it was being opened. And that because it was being used as a fridge and only needed to maintain a temp in the range between of -2 to 1 degrees, the compressor would be working less than if it was operating as a freezer?
There is one alternative to the fridgemate that i have come across called a "Growarm". I believe its actually marketed for seed cultivators, but it does the exact same thing and is prewired and precalibrated. It's what i went for mostly cos i don't can't be sure which is the pointy end of a soldering iron.
I too would like to Temp Control my brew. But alas my misses won't allow any more toys for a while, so that means no more fridges, or kegging equipment.
So besides the old evap method, what other ways can I chill my brew to the right temps? I tried looking for the 100 can beer cooler as mentioned on a previous forum advice, but not not find one. I would go the esky option, but as I have 4 eskys already it would be frowned apon for another newer one to be bought.
Any advice would be great.
Cheers
Last time i was at Kmart at the redbank plaza they had the coolers, think they were maybe $20?
Where abouts Prawned? I had a good look in the camping and bbq areas.
I have 2 fridge mates, one for the frigde, one fo the heater. Just a quick question for some of the other fridge mate users, sorry to hi-jack.
Do any of you other fridgemate users have problems with the brew getting too cold, e.g. over chilling. Say I set mine to 17c and they beer put in was 20c I'll come out in the morning to find it @ 14c. I think it must over chill becuase once the brew gets to 17c the fridge turns off but the ambient temp in there would be much lower. Anyone else expereince this? What do you do? How do you fix it?
I'm using a stainless probe that's is actually inside the fermentor and touching the wort.
Sorry I should have been a bit more clear. The temp always reads correctly it's just that the fridge over chills it. So.....say the fridgemate is set to 17c, it would get to say 16c (because of the 1c differential setting) and then switch off the fridge but it continues to get colder because of the ambient air temp in the fridge. This only usually happens when you put warm wort in the fridge say @ 20c-22c and have the fridge mate set to say 17c-18c.
I too would like to Temp Control my brew. But alas my misses won't allow any more toys for a while, so that means no more fridges, or kegging equipment. So besides the old evap method, what other ways can I chill my brew to the right temps? Any advice would be great.
Same thing happens in my fridge and the my probe is in contact with wort. As you said its only when you put warm wort in and it stabilisers fairly qauickly
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