Fermenting Chamber

They say hindsight is 20/20. If I could do it again I would have bought a bigger freezer for fermenting. This 5 cubic foot one does a good job for lagering one carboy, but I could have used storage for multiple carboys. I have seen several good designs that use Styrofoam to make separate chambers for maintaining different temperatures. An external temperature controller is used to turn the freezer on and off to regulate the temperature.

Freezer $160 at Sams Wholesale, temperature controller $50.

My First Fermenting Cooler

The Texas heat can create some real problems for us here. On this batch of amber ale brewed on 12/15/01, we had a warm spell and the temperature in the kitchen reached over 75º. This means the carboy could have reached in excess of 80º during the high fermentation. I had a Spaten clone in the freezer fermenter and I don't like the off flavors created in ales fermented over 75º so I needed a quick fix. I had an old igloo cooler so I removed the lid. The 6.5 gallon carboy barely fit inside. The packing from the freezer fit perfectly over the top. Cut holes in it for the carboy and a couple of gallon jugs of extra wort I was experimenting with. Then set a gallon jug ice from the deep freeze inside. Added 2-3 inches of water to help disipate the heat. It's hard to keep the temperature regulated but it worked because the carboy's strip temperature read 68º the next morning and the beer tasted great when I transferred it to secondary. Yet another project is to build a bigger insulated chamber connected to the freezer fermenter. Or, I may sell the 5 cubic foot one and get a larger one. If your in the Houston area, make me an offer.... :-)

After the Amber Ale batch I modified the cooler to hold two 6.5 gal carboys. Now I have to use 16oz plastic bottles of ice as the gal jugs no longer fit. I add 2 to 3 of these each morning and that keeps the temp down at around 65ºF.

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This page was last updated on July 4, 2002