Brew fridge temperature

[pjc]

Hi All,

I built myself a shiny new brew fridge with an STC-1000, heater etc. I then made some beer, chilled it to around 24C, put it in the fridge and attached the temperature sensor to the side of the FV covered in some bubble wrap. Now, a few days later, the fridge is happily maintaining the temperature of the beer at 20C but the air temperature in the fridge is 15C. Is this to be expected with this set-up? I am surprised that the air temperature in the fridge needs to be as low as 15C to maintain the beer at 20C. This would suggest that previously when I have put the FV in a room at 20C then the beer temperature would have been too high?

I would be interested to hear your experiences.

Pete

 

[Runwell-Steve]

It's possible your fridge had just been on a cooling cycle when you measured the air temp. If the fermenter has got a bit warm then that would trigger the cooling cycle to kick in. Because the cooling cycle cools the air and not the fermenter directly, the air temp in the fridge could drop by at least 10 degrees before the temp of the liquid has dropped sufficiently to turn the cooling circuit off. Hence you end up with an air temp much lower than the liquid temp.

 

[Runwell-Steve]

I only ever measure and maintain the air temperature in all 4 of my beer fridges.

 

[honeymonster]

Fermentation generates heat. I don't have a brew fridge myself, hopefully soon!, but I'd expect that the air temp would have to be a bit lower than the liquid temp in order to keep the temp down.

 

[pjc]

I only ever measure and maintain the air temperature in all 4 of my beer fridges.

So do you set the temperature lower than you want the beer to be ?

 

[morethanworts]

I only ever measure and maintain the air temperature in all 4 of my beer fridges.

So do you set the temperature lower than you want the beer to be ?

My set up is identical to yours* and the wort temperature has been spot on when I've tested it, regardless how busy the yeast is at the time. It has seemed to work very well in the short time I've been using it.

If you've taken the wort temperature (down through the airlock hole) a few times throughout fermentation and you're happy it is staying where you want it, then I'd forget about the air temperature.

*EDIT- actually, not quite. I have a solid board for the FV to sit on, to avoid the bulk yeast getting heated excessively by the heater.

 

[Runwell-Steve]

I only ever measure and maintain the air temperature in all 4 of my beer fridges.

So do you set the temperature lower than you want the beer to be ?

No, I set it at the temp I want the beer, it stabilises and the beer is the same temperature. I don't measure the beer temp any more but when I first set it up I put a temperature probe in the beer as well as the temp probe on the STC1000 in the air and they pretty much remained the same. I'm not over fussy about temperature so as long as it stays between 18 and 20 it's good enough for me.

 

[dennisking]

Like Steve I set mine to the temperature I want the beer to be. When I first set the fridge up I checked the beer temperature a few times and found it to be spot on. Now I don't both unless I take some for a gravity reading.