Second guessing my cellar...

Well, one thought would be to turn the temp down to, say, 50F thereby causing the motor to cycle more often. This might pull more moisture out of the unit. But if you really have a bad seal you might be fighting a losing battle. How about caulking around the seal...?

In any event, moisture does not directly affecting the aging process per se - except as it pertains to such things as the life of a cork in a cork-and-cage bottle closure. Or, rusting caps.

 

Having it at 50F wouldn't even be that bad either. That's still pretty damn close to ideal cellar temp. I think that the ideal humidity for a wine cellar atleast, can be as high as 70%. Not sure how much it would differ for cellaring beer, but a bit of humidity doesn't hurt, & is in fact a good thing.

 

I would use a jar of "damp-rid", or I use a little fridge size dehumidifier in my upright freezer cellar, balances out the humidity levels really well.

 

This won't work, assuming the OPs fridge is like 99% of all mini fridges out there. Moisture is collecting on the condenser system which lines the walls of the fridge or the freezer tray if he has one. Regular fridges don't have this issue because the condenser is external or part of the freezer in a separate compartment.

Every time the OP opens the fridge, more moisture gets into the system. I've had this exact same problem with 2 mini fridges I used to use for cellaring.

That won't fix your problem. Switch to a wine fridge if possible (or a different full-size unit.) Alternatively, you can just keep towels in there to soak up the water and replace them every couple of weeks. The only risk is water dripping on caps which, over time, may rust them out. And mold/mildew concerns. I had to replace my mini fridges with a big unit and it was a great call.

 

You may well be right. My line of thinking was more that constantly running the unit in the defrost mode at 57F is not a good approach. And I agree - a wine refrigerator is a better option. That's what I use.