Fermentation and cold crash with Maxi and inkbird

[Tomp]

I picked up a very cheap maxi cooler this week (old pub going under - real shame) and am thinking of repurposing it for cold crashing and possibly even for lagering. I have a insulation jacket planned made from plastic pipework and insulation.

Anyone control one of these from an Inkbird? I want to be kind to the compressor so leave it only a 10 minute delay or so, but does anyone have any feedback?

[chris2012]

Yup I did that based on stuff on here I'd seen, with an SS coil I placed in the fermenter bucket and used an inkbird too. You can set a delay with the inkbird.

I used heating wire to do the heating part.

There's also some cool posts on here where people have put a heater in-line with the maxi too.

You can see photos of my very rudimentary setup here - https://www.anfractuosity.com/projects/ ... kbird-308/

I used JG fittings to connect the SS coil to beerline to more JG fittings on the maxi.

[JabbA]

OCRing the Inkbird display, well played that man!

Cheers,
Jamie

[Fil]

its do-able..


but i would suggest if you have the room for a brewfridge its probably a superior and cheaper to run and easier to manage solution. And unless you have invested in a large sized SS fermentor that wont fit inside anything other than a custom built fridge, its often better to buy new fermentors that fit the fridge you get imho.

But some project just cry out to be built so a good source of cheap hex coils is ebay where the square product coils from the larger chest chillers appear for £10-£15 a pop

be mindful they may appear and be advertised as 10mm but are probably 3/8" so wait till you get one before you spend on fittings (i didnt),,

[TheSumOfAllBeers]

All good advice here, if you have a fridge use it, especially if you have crash cooling or lagering in mind.

In practice my setup will hold 4.5-5C

Insulation is really important especially on the coolant lines. Also don't get too ambitious with the power of the python pump.

[chris2012]

Yeah that's a very good point about insulation, I skimped on that which I shouldn't have.

I think I got around 4C lowest fermenter temp too iirc, but that was in a shed in summer.

[johnmac]

You don't need a very big coil. I use one of these cask cooling probes in a 12 gallon batch and it's fine.
https://ssli.ebayimg.com/images/g/iuEAA ... s-l640.jpg