fridge question

[hornaldo]

Hi guys couple of question regarding fridges.

1. Do/can you use a fridge to cool your wort for pitching temp? does anyone do this or have anyone tried.

2. ive seen people say they have modified fridges with temp control etc, do you do this so you can ferment at a certain temp, or do you do this for larger so its close to a true larger.

or is it used just as a fridge to keep your bottles cool, as i was thinking of getting a second hand one so i can do larger, cool wort and keep my bottles in.

how and what would I need to modify if can do any of those option above.
thanks

 

[Leon103]

People use a fridge for all of the above. You can build a Stc or buy a idc(I think that's what's it called) using these you can plug in a heater (greenhouse heater) and regulate the heat.

 

[Steved53]

Hi guys couple of question regarding fridges.

1. Do/can you use a fridge to cool your wort for pitching temp? does anyone do this or have anyone tried.

2. ive seen people say they have modified fridges with temp control etc, do you do this so you can ferment at a certain temp, or do you do this for larger so its close to a true larger.

or is it used just as a fridge to keep your bottles cool, as i was thinking of getting a second hand one so i can do larger, cool wort and keep my bottles in.

how and what would I need to modify if can do any of those option above.
thanks

To add to what Leon103 said:

1/ You can of course use a fridge to bring your wort down to pitching temp. However, the temperature doesn't drop in 5 minutes, so unless the fridge has been modified, you would have to keep you eye on it to ensure it doesn't drop too low.

2/ A temperature controlled fridge can be used to keep temperatures up to ale fermentation temps, or keep it to lager fermentation temps, or to crash chill prior to bottling, or to 'lager' a beer for a period of time. That's the beauty of the conversion - it has many uses.

3/ I wouldn't be tempted to store bottles of beer in a converted fridge (except for a short period of time), as it means you are restricting its use for other things.

There are a number of ways to go about converting a fridge. I would do a search and see what you come up with.

 

[Bigcol49]

Hi! My brew fridge is a large larder fridge (I was lucky - we had 2 fridges when our kids were growing up, but now they have left home, one is spare). I've adapted it to have two shelves. At the moment there is 23 litres wine bubbling away as well as 35 bottles of "lager" conditioning. There is a tubular heater connected to a temperature controller - the cooling cycle isn't kicking in, as the air temperature is so low.
I've also made an insulated fermentation cupboard, for Winter use only, which uses only a heater connected to a temperature controller. This has no problem maintaining a temperature of 16 to 17 degrees, so I can have two beers fermenting in the cupboard and wine and/or bottles in the fridge at 21 degrees.
The bottles that have conditioned are stored on the floor of the old wash house where I brew, and I only keep a couple in the house fridge to keep SWMBO happy.
Of course, come Summer, all this will change as I will only be able to brew one beer at a time - I will need the fridge for cold conditioning after fermentation.

 

[Fil]

imho

Q1) you could But it wont be quick and will tax the fridge, so I wouldnt,
Q2) Yes providing the optimum and stable temp ideal for yeast to flourish will improve the finished product immensely and negate any fermentation issues.. And yes it will also allow you to lager properly if you want to.

a brewfridge is an easy diy job and has recently been made even easier with the arrival of the inkbird controller, but if you have a techy bent you may still want to consider an stc100 ver1.0 controller which can be reflashed with brewfridge software that will allow you to configure stages at different temps and the ramp up/down