Too hot to Brew ?

[koshari]

This is the way I think too. I'm a tight ass home brewer so I save electricity by choosing yeast strains to suit the ambient temperature. I do now have a temp controlled fridge for emergencies, but in my early days, an unplugged broken old fridge was used like a coolroom/esky with frozen two litre milk bottles of water added as needed. Both are handy free solutions

It would use more energy to freeze bottles and put them in a cabinet than control a cabiner to 20deg for 2 reasons. Firstly your using a lot of energy freezing the bottles in latent energy as the water changes state to ice. Secondly running a freezer requires a far greater diff temp between the setpoint and ambient temp meaning your insulation losses are greater. And the diff temp losses are a squared function meaning the higher the diff temp the efficiency gets worse.

 

[Garfield]

Love it, love it, love it!

I know what I'll be doing next weekend

The keener you get the more fridges you will want, I would advise anyone who has the room build a fermenting room big enough to ferment your beer, and condition your beer. Use a reverse cycle inverter air con and you will barely notice any difference in your power bill.
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[Garfield]

It would use more energy to freeze bottles and put them in a cabinet than control a cabiner to 20deg for 2 reasons. Firstly your using a lot of energy freezing the bottles in latent energy as the water changes state to ice. Secondly running a freezer requires a far greater diff temp between the setpoint and ambient temp meaning your insulation losses are greater. And the diff temp losses are a squared function meaning the higher the diff temp the efficiency gets worse.

In my case, by choosing yeast strains to suit the climate, I rarely ever needed to adjust the temperature. The frozen bottles were a back up (which I keep in the freezer at all times for other uses anyway) so very little energy required to only occasionally refreeze them.

It also required no additional equipment, which could be the backyard hack that our OP was after.

 

[Plyplema]

That's the route I went, I decided to embrace the warmth in Brisbane and use saison and a kveik yeast (especially). Hefeweizen and other Belgians can also work. I still have a fridge but it only fits 30L and I usually have 2 going at once. I guess it depends on your preferences but I prefer the stronger yeast flavours than a clean ferment anyway so this works well.

 

[geoffi]

I have a bar fridge (white plastic fermenter fits in well, SS one bit tight) that cost $40.00 but saw one on the road the other day...
I bought inkbird 308 controller ($55.00) no wiring needed.... works well...

but even if you dont turn fridge on or get a controller... it will still be good insultation from temp changes, and with some ice packs or swap out with frozen water bottles each day, will be OK or at least better.... hot brewing is no good... I know

I fermented for years in a non-working chest freezer, just rotating frozen bottles of water. Even in the middle of summer I had no trouble maintaining steady temps for ales. More of a challenge with lagers, but still achievable, and in winter no problem at all.