Beer Forum

Well some of you may remember that I asked about using a halogen light in my fermentation freezer. Well I used it and thought it was a 300W light turns out it was a 500W light. The temp controler is rated for 4.2amps. For those of you that dont know the formula for wattage and amps is P=I*E where P = watts, I = amps and E = voltage. To figure for I take 500w / 110 v and you get 4.5 even if the voltatge is 120 its right at 4.2a. Well the relay for the switch stuck leaving the 500w light on and the freezer on batteling each other. I know I left it for 3 days without checking on it. On day 3 my garage smelled a little odd. When I went to the fermentation fridge the temp controller said 213F, not good. So I attmepted to open the door it was sticking, had to get a knife and cut some plastic out of the way. Inside I found carboy still intact, interior of the fridge melted down. I will insert some pics of the fridge and the airlock. The good news is I brought the beer inside it was at 1.028 still a little high and im assuming all the yeast is dead now. I added some Safale US-56 I had saved for just such an occasion. In a week it brought it down to 1.024 And the beer is drinkable. Has a little sharp burnt flavor to it but drinkable, dont think I will be entering any comps with it though. So just thought I would post this as a warning to everyone.


Melted


Where the light was sitting


This door once had molded shelves


Airlock

Holy shit!

Wow, wait until you get the power bill!

Sorry to hear of your misfortune my friend.

Lennybuzz wrote:The good news is I brought the beer inside it was at 1.028 still a little high and im assuming all the yeast is dead now. I added some Safale US-56 I had saved for just such an occasion. In a week it brought it down to 1.024 And the beer is drinkable. Has a little sharp burnt flavor to it but drinkable, dont think I will be entering any comps with it though. So just thought I would post this as a warning to everyone.

I love that half your post was about salvaging the beer rather than the fact that you could have burnt your house down.

By the way, you might want to chuck that carboy after stressing it like that. They're fragile enough when treated well.

Wow! I'm sorry I missed the original thread. A 65 watt tungsten bulb should have been sufficient and much safer as their fillaments operate at much lower temperatures. Perhaps you missed it but there have been articles in the news fairly recently about colleges banning the halogen lights from dorm rooms because of the fire hazzard. In a setup like this it's always a good idea to have a second separate "controller" that does nothing but ring a bell (or operate some other sort of alarm) if temperature gets out of range.

Holy crap! That's insanity!

Damn!!