Femerntation chamber to cold

Blancaster · Post by **Blancaster** » Sun Jan 04, 2015 11:47 am

I have a chest freezer with a temp controller that I use for fermentation. It is in my garage. I have the temp probe attached to the side of the carboy covered by a folded wash rag and held on by a bungee cord. The temp controller is set at 68F. It is also picking up the temp off the side of the carboy at that same temp. But the liquid crystal thermometer isn't even showing a reading.... Because the wort is to cold. How is this possible? The thermometer is adhered to the carboy approx the same height as I have the probe attached on the other side.
It is sitting on the bottom of the chest freezer and I guess the cold from the garage is allowing the bottom of the cooler to be super cold even though the walls of the cooler are not. This is causing my carboy/wort to be super cold. I put a lava lamp base in there (covering the top with fool to prevent light exposure) it is keeping the cooler warm.. Except for the bottom. I made this batch Thursday and fermentation has not even started.
I can feel the carboy from bottom to top and can feel a big temp difference between the bottom and the top.
Here are my questions. How can I keep the bottom of the carboy from getting over chilled from the bottom of the cooler? I tried putting. Folded towel and it did nothing.
And
Wtf is the probe not picking up a more accurate temp of the wort through the side of the carboy? (Carboy is PET)
I have since brought the carboy inside to warm up and hope fermentation starts before an infection does. But I have no way to control the fermentation temp in the house.

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msjulian · Post by **msjulian** » Sun Jan 04, 2015 2:28 pm

If you have the room, put the carboy on one of your milk creates and more the probe as low as you can on the carboy. It almost sounds like the probe is not working or wired correctly.

Blancaster · Post by **Blancaster** » Sun Jan 04, 2015 2:32 pm

That's a good idea! Not sure about the temp controller. Dutch wired it up for me, and it has always worked before. Maybe it just fried out.. Weird

msjulian · Post by **msjulian** » Sun Jan 04, 2015 2:43 pm

Try it in your hand. Set the controller to 75 and see if you can get it cycle by warming it up and cooling it down.

msjulian · Post by **msjulian** » Sun Jan 04, 2015 2:52 pm

If your looking for 65 - 70 deg in your garage you will need to use a heating pad in the freezer. I use one in conjunction with the temp controller on the fridge. I set the heating pad on med and the temp controller on the desired ferm temp. You will need to find a heading pad that does not have an auto-off feature. I found mine at CVS.

My basement is around 60 deg in the winter and I have to use the heating pad to keep things in the ale range. Your garage will be too cold to hold the temps you are looking for.

Blancaster · Post by **Blancaster** » Sun Jan 04, 2015 3:23 pm

Do I put the carboy on the heating pad? Or just lay it in there next to it? It won't melt the plastic?
Can you text me a pic of yours and the brand?

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msjulian · Post by **msjulian** » Sun Jan 04, 2015 3:45 pm

I just taped it to the wall of the fridge where I knew I was not going to interfere with the freon lines.

msjulian · Post by **msjulian** » Sun Jan 04, 2015 9:11 pm

Here is what I do...

image.jpg

I got it at Walgreens.

Blancaster · Post by **Blancaster** » Wed Jan 14, 2015 7:02 am

I believe that I figured out the problem in my fermentation chamber. The temperature controller seems to be about 20° all. I suppose this is why it was displaying 68° and the temperatureof the liquid crystal thermometer didn't even register because it was colder than 40°. I have increased the temperature controller to 86° and the liquid crystal thermometer now read 66 to 68° For right now I am continuing to use the base of a lava lamp with a 60 W bulb in it covered with a piece of tinfoil to block all light. It seems to work very well now that I have increased the temperature controller to 86°. I was looking at me instructions and it appears thatI can calibrate this thing however it only has a + -10° For calibration

SkyBrew · Post by **SkyBrew** » Wed Jan 14, 2015 7:23 am

excellent!

msjulian · Post by **msjulian** » Wed Jan 14, 2015 10:16 am

I would double check the controller against your new digital thermometer. You should be able to fill a glass with tap water (temp not too important) and put the probe and therm in and see if they match.

Blancaster · Post by **Blancaster** » Sun Jan 18, 2015 5:33 pm

So I bought a STC-1000 and ditched the knockoff controller. I wired it to an electrical outlet so I can have cold and heat. I also bought a 16" stainless thermowell that fits in those orange carboy caps. https://www.brewershardware.com/16-Stai ... owell.html the temp probe goes down the thermowell and this thing is keeping super accurate temps now!! Plus can hook a blowoff tube to it also!
More or less I made one of these for half the cost
http://www.morebeer.com/products/hood-t ... ys-15.html

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Blancaster · Post by **Blancaster** » Sun Jan 18, 2015 5:36 pm

I used a piece of rolled paper towel in the open end of the thermowell to keep air temp of the cooler out of it. Think I'm going to pick up some of those squishy earplugs and plug the end for a better seal.

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