Wine Cooler Humidor

[El Capitan]

After a lot of researching I have finally pulled the trigger on setting up a thermoelectric wine cooler humidor.

For the Aussie members I have posted the link below to a unit I think is good the value for what it offers:

CyberCool Wine Cooler

I have also ordered 5 pounds of 65% RH beads with bags.

The icing on the cake will be a way I can remotely monitor RH and Temp in the upper and lower zones with this bad boy:

Oregon ECO Climate Monitor

It's all arriving next week and I will post some pics and on how it's performing once I have set it up.

Cheers,

Mark

[sharks]

Sounds good Elcaptain.

I am in Melbourne aswell and with the seasonal weather we get here I went with the wine cooler also.

Its been more like Queensland weather as of late. Thanks to Rob (canberra) who was a wealth of info

and helped me greatly. You wont turn back

Sharks

[El Capitan]

Sounds good Elcaptain.

I am in Melbourne aswell and with the seasonal weather we get here I went with the wine cooler also.

Its been more like Queensland weather as of late. Thanks to Rob (canberra) who was a wealth of info

and helped me greatly. You wont turn back

Sharks

Thanks Sharks, glad to hear from someone else in the area that has one working well. I think if I ever moved back to North Queensland I would have to set up a unit more like PigFish recommends to over come the higher year round ambient temps. But the cost and my lack of skill lol makes the thermoelectric wine cooler option so attractive in Victoria.

[Dbone]

That's some project you're getting into! The payoff is always worth the effort though. I don't have experience with these units, but from what I can see it looks like it'll do the job just fine.

There is not much air circulation with the wine coolers, the unit looks pretty sealed. Passive humidification should be sufficient. Cant wait to see your updates, best of luck!!

[CUBANO]

I've had a wine cooler for over 2 years, best investment you can make to keep your CCs at a comfortable temp.

[rp99pts]

1 pound of beads for that size humidor is plenty....Extra won't hurt but not really needed. I had a 38 bottle set up before my Arisitocrat and with the fan running constantly, it puts out some humidity as well. I rarely put water into the pound of Heartfelt beads i used...

[PLUSH]

I have 2 Avanti. 5lbs of beads is a whole lot. I use 2 lbs in each.

[El Capitan]

Thanks guy's for your encouraging and informative comments. The wine cooler finally arrived yesterday after sitting being waited to be delivered in the Allied Express (never use this transport company!) warehouse for 15 days!

Just going through a period of airing it out and I will post pics tomorrow when it’s all set up.

Cheers

[adic88]

Thanks guy's for your encouraging and informative comments. The wine cooler finally arrived yesterday after sitting being waited to be delivered in the Allied Express (never use this transport company!) warehouse for 15 days!

Just going through a period of airing it out and I will post pics tomorrow when it’s all set up.

Cheers

Looking forward to it!

[ZAZ]

Looking forward to it!

+1

[El Capitan]

Ok finally finished setting it up and I'm very pleased with the end result. Just in time for the first hint of summer Melbourne is finally getting later this week.

Front:

Internal:

Remote sensors display:

Starting at the top left is the outdoor temp and humidity, under that to the left is the room temp and humidity. The temp and humidity on the right is the upper section of the wine cooler interior and under that is the lower section.

Now for the fun part.....filling it up!

[dicko]

I'm mirin' the set-up!

[Dbone]

Congratulations Captain. I love the tinted glass front and digital readout in blue. Nice selection of smokes you got there. What are the two SLB's?

Lookin like you're already getting tight for space mate

One bit of advice with the cooled units. When it's hot and humid out, even with central AC, when the warmer damper air outside is exposed to the cool dryer air inside your cooler's RH is going to spike. When you open the door to reach for a stick that is. Something like taking a coke can out of the fridge, it always gets condensation dripping off of it during the summer. The beads help absorb the extra moisture, but just something to be aware of brother.

When the time of year comes that it's very hot and humid for me, I tend to grab a handful and keep them in my desktop. This way I'm opening my cabinet once a week, instead of once or twice a day. It's my theory this keeps the environment within the cabinet stable. I still always keep a few sticks in my desktop year around, but during the fall / winter / spring I don't go through the extra effort of making sure to keep the door closed as much as possible. I find it much easier for the cooled units to add moisture, opposed to taking moisture out.

[thechenman]

Congratulations Captain. I love the tinted glass front and digital readout in blue. Nice selection of smokes you got there. What are the two SLB's?

Lookin like you're already getting tight for space mate

One bit of advice with the cooled units. When it's hot and humid out, even with central AC, when the warmer damper air outside is exposed to the cool dryer air inside your cooler's RH is going to spike. When you open the door to reach for a stick that is. Something like taking a coke can out of the fridge, it always gets condensation dripping off of it during the summer. The beads help absorb the extra moisture, but just something to be aware of brother.

When the time of year comes that it's very hot and humid for me, I tend to grab a handful and keep them in my desktop. This way I'm opening my cabinet once a week, instead of once or twice a day. It's my theory this keeps the environment within the cabinet stable. I still always keep a few sticks in my desktop year around, but during the fall / winter / spring I don't go through the extra effort of making sure to keep the door closed as much as possible. I find it much easier for the cooled units to add moisture, opposed to taking moisture out.

To add to Dbone's post...be sure that your cigar boxes are not touching the walls of the fridge in case condensation does develop. You don't want your boxes getting wet and moldy...

[rp99pts]

Also, if you have a wood store by your pad, get some 1/4inch spanish cedar planks to put in the shelf grooves. it will make a world of difference and get that great spanish cedar smell going...

[ZAZ]

Nice cooler/setup you got there. Thanks for posting pics!

[bob25]

Looks really good.

Can I ask where did you get this nice looking remote sensor ?

Does it need to be calibrated ?

[El Capitan]

Congratulations Captain. I love the tinted glass front and digital readout in blue. Nice selection of smokes you got there. What are the two SLB's?

Lookin like you're already getting tight for space mate

One bit of advice with the cooled units. When it's hot and humid out, even with central AC, when the warmer damper air outside is exposed to the cool dryer air inside your cooler's RH is going to spike. When you open the door to reach for a stick that is. Something like taking a coke can out of the fridge, it always gets condensation dripping off of it during the summer. The beads help absorb the extra moisture, but just something to be aware of brother.

When the time of year comes that it's very hot and humid for me, I tend to grab a handful and keep them in my desktop. This way I'm opening my cabinet once a week, instead of once or twice a day. It's my theory this keeps the environment within the cabinet stable. I still always keep a few sticks in my desktop year around, but during the fall / winter / spring I don't go through the extra effort of making sure to keep the door closed as much as possible. I find it much easier for the cooled units to add moisture, opposed to taking moisture out.

Thanks Dbone for the great advice. That's a very good idea so I will give that a try with one of my spare desktops. Generally since moving to Melbourne I've noticed that we have very dry/low rh summers and much more wet humid winters. I plan to switch off the unit in winter and just use it to control humidity.

With regards to the space, if you build it then the extra boxes of cigars will come! No way my wife is going to let me put any more of these things around the house, so I may just need to smoke more.

Ohh and the SLB's are JL 1's and H Upmann Mag 46's.

[El Capitan]

To add to Dbone's post...be sure that your cigar boxes are not touching the walls of the fridge in case condensation does develop. You don't want your boxes getting wet and moldy...

Boxes now moved away from the walls. You may have just saved me from making a costly stuff up there Chenman!

[El Capitan]

Looks really good.

Can I ask where did you get this nice looking remote sensor ?

Does it need to be calibrated ?

Hi Bob,

I got the remote sensor from this link: http://shop.boztek.com.au/index.php?main_p...products_id=672

I’m sure they could send one to you in Israel; they have a very fast turnaround on orders. I have also noticed the unit is available on Amazon. I ordered an extra interior sensor for my setup.

Unfortunately you can't calibrate the unit or the sensors, but they seem to be within 3-4% of my super accurate Credo RH gauge (which I can live with) and the temperature readings are all spot on.

Cheers,

Mark

[Cig]

Nice job. I've been contemplating doing one of these for a while. Just haven't gotten around to it yet.

[bob25]

Hi Bob,

I got the remote sensor from this link: http://shop.boztek.com.au/index.php?main_p...products_id=672

I’m sure they could send one to you in Israel; they have a very fast turnaround on orders. I have also noticed the unit is available on Amazon. I ordered an extra interior sensor for my setup.

Unfortunately you can't calibrate the unit or the sensors, but they seem to be within 3-4% of my super accurate Credo RH gauge (which I can live with) and the temperature readings are all spot on.

Cheers,

Mark

Thanks for the info Mark.

[sharks]

Lookin sweet mate

Sharks

[ufaman808]

I have a wine cooler set up here in Hawaii. I mainly use it as a temperature stabilizer. Humidors are loaded in there and I have beads but mainly to absorb moisture. During the hot months (summer) the thermo electric unit puts out alot of condensation! So much that it pools inside the cooler on the bottom! Just a friendly reminder if you put boxes on the floor of unit make sure your raise it up. My humi got a little water damaged. Good luck all and Happy Smoking!

[El Capitan]

I have been asked by a member to provide an update on the performance of this set-up:

Happy to report the system is still working well. I have found that the lower compartment over cools on mild summer days and unless the room temperature is above 23C the lower compartment will cool down to 14/15C unable to hold the ideal 18C. I think this is because the lower compartment is designed to chill white wine and the upper compartment is for red. The upper compartment holds 17/18C consistently and the 65% heartfelt beads regulate the RH to around 67% most of the time. The cigars from the upper compartment feel and smoke perfect.

Now that we are well into winter in Melbourne I have just turned the unit off and this works really well.

I think if you are in a warm climate the Cybercool will work very well, but you need to avoid opening the door too often as you can get some minor condensation which was causing my cigars stored in the lower compartment to become over humidified due to the bigger temp differential from ambient. But the more I think about it I was mainly storing singles in a desktop which had its own humidifier in the lower compartment, so this may have been the real problem more than the lower temperature.

Because I also have a passion for pipes I now store my sealed tins of pipe tobacco in the lower compartment and my boxes of Cubans in the upper.

Two things I learned:

1. You can never have enough beads (said by many a brother here)

2. Credo Hydrometers are so much more accurate than anything else on the market

Some other questions I have been asked:

How many boxes will fit in the upper compartment? About 10 with a little creative stacking.

Heartfelt beads and mesh bags purchased here http://www.heartfeltindustries.com/default.asp

Credo digital hydrometer was purchased from Baranows in Melbourne, but it looks like they are out of stock.

Cheers,

Mark