I have always wanted a cold room, would it not be nice for hunting, making beer, salamis and even cold dried biltong.
R30 000 for a cold room, if! You know people call favours and take some corner cutting, but that is not the problem, space !!!!
Where the hell do a put another room ? I have literally built or occupied every usable inch that does not block access from front to back or block house doors.
The problem is, I am dead when I get home from a hunt on Sunday, as I get older I am finding myself more and more past tired tired, I do not care anymore tired, I want to sleep. I always end up in a panic later about animals needing skinning and finding a butcher that will take animals on a Sunday or holiday, but I can not have a cold room.
Now I was in a cold room the other day, and it struck me, what is a cold room ? A big fridge ? A freezer that is too big to freeze, a freezer with a fan or a fridge with a fan.
Mmmmmmmm????? - why are cold rooms so big? Do you have to have a big room to have a cold room?
All these questions ? Obsessive compulsive me - google, phone calls, more phone calls and chats.
I determined after a chat with my old butcher who gave it up for the timber import trade, that the old standard for a cold room in a butchery was 4 deg Celsius, but a few years back it was raised to 7 Cel. Energy saving and gain versus energy used etc.
All this thinking made me tired, all this tired late night reading led me back to my time out place - the local pub. There right before me was the answer - thank you Castle Lite, maybe a shit beer, buy it solved one problem for me while having a proper beer and a tequila. There before me was a one buck cooler room - it struck me as some one (some lessor male I assume) whined "castle Lite please" - as the doors opened, the fans stopped, two big arsed fan blowing the shit outa wind chill factor xxx.
So I started looking for a bar display fridge, any one, I would fit my own fans and perhaps supercharge the cooling system - dunno, maybe a nitros oxide kit ot fridge turbo kind of thing.
Fuck me gently with a jack hammer mate, those fridges are expensive, moer R12 000 with shitty maybe, maybe not working reconditioned Nigerian back street ones going for R6000. I needed another tequila night I recond - ya know to think about this.(only reason I drink - honestly)
I then started searching for a big old fridge, ordinary big old household upright fridge - dam, they actually small, but the old one, remember them the big old ones? The round edges, off white enamel fridges that kids climbed into and died ? The ones you find on stoeps and under carports all over Africa. I put a add on all the platforms, my status my face book every where, zero zilch, all those old fridges are gone, or big time antique value. - like fkt.
Guess I would go out and have a beer or 3 and think this over - perhaps I would have a tequila - just for a change ya know, like to help relax the thought process.
If it can hang in a upright fridge door opening towards you, why not in an chest freezer on racks across top, will just have to cut animal into 2 or 4 parts when I get home, better than nothing ? Problem is the freezing part, how do I get the freezer not to freeze ? I know nothing about refrigeration, cooling.
More research and learning time, less the beer and tequila for this phase.
One problem left now, same again, where to get a freezer that works cheap enough to be able to destroy it without crying about it if I screw up.
Life can be complicated if you choose to live it fully.
Now not so long ago I had water tanks fitted and the water guy was a nice guy, if you a nice guy everyone is a nice guy, well mostly, sometimes. ( Making Friends Guide 101 For Idiots - tip one reads, "Do not be a doos").
So 3 hrs later it came about his son is 12 and just wants to hunt, he will pay, he just wants some one to teach his boy to hunt........................and shoot, ...................in 1 week end. Long story short, taught kid to shoot Friday afternoon, got him comfortable Friday night with lights and targets in the bush. Saturday he shot some more and it was obvious that he could hit a orange size circle any time everytime. The boy got his animal that afternoon.
His Dad said he owes me one - that one it turns out became a 550 lt Defy freezer that had a leaking door gasket and was just taking up space in the garage. Fetch it and you can have it Treeman, thanks for teaching my boy.
My study's and chats were baring fruit, I learnt that you could put like a temperature control thing on the freezer, and that you could buy little 100x100 mm 220 volt blowers. My mate that does DSTV and CCV stuff knew of a temperature thingee that was on a building site being raised and another mate who gets generous when drinking tequila could get a fan. Rudy knows a guy who does gas and knows enough about electricity to connect the right wires in right places.
Righteee o then.
So this is where I am at with my Chest Cooler Room for one Kudu or Two Warthog, Impala
Made this video for now, the frame will be built for the racks tomorrow, will test whole thing before galvanising the frame. The frame will be made of 25 x 3 mm angle iron with moveable cross bars for hanging and chromed oven trays 8 inch' off floor across floor. I will figure a way still to get cross flow strongly along floor for when a whole smaller animal or halved bigger animal goes in to it. I had it running at 5.5 cel for a day and then at 4 Cel for another. I am now trying to find out if the fan will lower the temperature inside or just move air around and stop hot spots. Will the fan cause or reduce freezing ?
I will likely buy a two part epoxy coating to redo inside of freezer.
20230906_202039_001 by Cody Allen, on Flickr
