I scored a $40 kenmore 15 cf chest freezer on craigslist a few days ago. I built a temp controller with one of those $15 delivered chinese units from ebay. It works fantastically. The biggest issue I had with the freezer is the internal post style hinges. I am a welder/metal guy not a carpenter but this is what I came up with. I drilled out the collar and inserted 3 inch lengths of 3/8 pipe.I then drilled into the sleeves in two spots for 1/4 inch bolts to hold the pins in place. So far so good. Any recommendations for glueing and sealing the collar? Will the door gasket seal work ok on the wood or should I paint/seal or use some type of tape on the top? Any reccomendations for good priced hardware? Shanks/taps/faucets/couplers and hoses? I think I will start with just a couple taps and expand as needed or wanted in the future.
I wanted to upgrade to perlicks esp.the flow control one but buying a 4 tap system just gets too pricey. I may upgrade later. Whats a good distance between centers on the faucets? 3" or 4" Im thinking keep them close together to get the smaller drip tray? Will a fan be needed to keep tems more consistent throughout the keezer?
3" is standard. if you have the room use 3" center to center. you don't need a fan. chest freezers are efficient, all the cold stays put right where it belongs because cold air is heavy. a liberal bead of silicon between the collar and freezer will work to hold the thing together. you can use painters tape on both sides of the gap and run your finger down the excess that squeezes out. after it sets pull the tape and the bead will be perfect. the door gasket will work fine, if your collar is level and plane. I recommend that you go to a specialized retailer for the hardware. Micromatic is one choice, and the product is good, but they are really expensive, just unjustified expensive. home brew suppliers, both online and retail will have all of it, but they also tend to mark up a bit. you can search this forum for more info. we have discussed benefits of different makes and models quite a bit. pro tip- stainless steel mortar troughs (aka mud pan) work fantastic as drip pans. neodymium magnets work perfectly to hold them in place. looks like a nice utility rig you have there. Cheers.
I ended up going with keg connection. He shipped quick with tracking,so far so good. My local HD has that mud pan. I think the 12" one will work well. neodymium magnets will need to be glued to the stainless pan right? I can tear apart a few more old hard drives if need be. I am also looking for a bottle cap catcher to put below an opener I mounted on the side. These troughs may work? I can cut one down and weld it up maybe.
i have never heard anyone complain about keg connection. i imagine they are as good or better than the next guy. and they do support the product which is important. the trick with the mudpan is to get Marshalltown and not a cheap Chinese knock off. the Marshalltown is fantastic. as beautiful as a stainless steel tray can be anyway. this is one of the greatest keezer hacks you can score. the magnets don't stick to quality stainless, but they do stick to the steel shell of the kegerator like glue. so you place the magnet inside the pan, and the pan against the kegerator. voila. amazon has the magnets in every dimension, cheap. two per pan will do, but 3 or 4 is better. belt and suspenders. i used hard drive magnets at first but decided i needed a dozen or so and bought them. i bought a bottle catcher and a steel bottle opener from my wholesaler (i do installs). they catcher has holes for drilled mounting, but you don't want that. just use magnets. mounted the same as the drip trays. mine is very similar to the stainless pan and matches well. be aware that bottle caps will stick to the magnets though. you can use construction adhesive, though my mount came off eventually. so it goes. Cheers.
Awesome,thanks for all the info. Hopefully it will help me from making any costly mistakes. I have thought of wrapping the keezer in Alum. diamond plate/tread-brite. I just feel it may make the freezer work harder to keep cool as the sides of it get pretty warm.
a diamond plate keezer would be just about the most bad ass rig out there. aluminum and steel are great heat conductors. maybe try one plate, see how hot the get. if it feels as warm as the freezer wall then probably ok. and we are running the thing at 38, not -10 like is capable of. so the compressor is seriously over sized. i say go for it, and post pics. Cheers.
It is slowly coming along. I got my home brew pliny clone and a 1/6er of Racer 5. Supposedly tomorrow one of our local breweries will have kegs of my favorite local brew. Panic IPA brewed by Track 7.
Added a cap catcher that I built at work today and got a cheap drip tray at home depot. I also got another new homebrew keg.
