Split Air Con

The Singing Stalker

Well-Known Member
Next year, if time and money allows I am thinking of getting rid of my double drinks chiller and building a new walk in chiller, also I want to be be able to cool the meat prep area. In the height of the last heatwave, it was nearly 30 degrees on occasion. Ok, so I wacked a load of insulation into the roof space and that has helped a lot, but still.

So, would something like this be suitable? Anybody able to advise?
Area of prep room 12 cubic meters
Area of chiller 3.5 cubic meters

 
Interesting idea but not one that I think is practical for running permanently for the chiller side of the arrangement.

Some background. I bought a "spare" London 2012 Olympic Village 9k BTU Midea inverter split air-con unit that year and installed it in our family room: it covers the kitchen, tv seating area and dining room. Much too large a volume for the capacity but at £200 and some venison for the guy to vac it down, prove leak-proof and release the gas, it was a bargain not to be refused. Staggered to report it's still going strong (with no maintenance) 13 years on and that it will pull that huge volume down to comfortable temperatures with ease. Better still, having installed the solar PV last December, it runs for free - was bliss in the recent heatwaves 🤗 At SWITBO's direction, I repeated this last year for our main bedroom and linked dressing room. This time I upped the capacity to a 3.5kw Mitsubishi dual inverter split unit (£580) - works bloody brilliantly.

So coming back to my musings, I think you will be better off investing in a separate smaller monobloc that continually runs at a lower rate for the walk-in chiller and if really necessary, a separate split unit to cool your prep area, run as and when needed. As we have discussed before, I do all my butchery in the kitchen and that's covered by the downstairs air con. Yes, my skinning area does get warm in Summer, but the carcass is still cool from the chiller when skinned and I bring its primal joints into the kitchen, or place them in a separate game fridge for later processing. Moreover, in doing it this way, there's some redundancy; if your single system goes down, you'll loose both the chiller and the prep area.

Just my musing................... :coat:
 
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Not sure if this is helpful info or not, but my larder is approx 20ft long by 8ft wide. A section at one end (about 4ft) is partitioned off to form the chiller area, so chiller is therefore 4ft × 8ft. There is no door on the chiller, but one of those rubber strip curtains.
There is only one refrigeration unit, and that's in the chiller.
The chiller area stays at 1.5 - 3.5°C, and the rest of the larder where I do my butchery is at around 6 - 7°C provided I keep the main door shut.

(I should just add that the whole unit is insulated).
 
Not sure if this is helpful info or not, but my larder is approx 20ft long by 8ft wide. A section at one end (about 4ft) is partitioned off to form the chiller area, so chiller is therefore 4ft × 8ft. There is no door on the chiller, but one of those rubber strip curtains.
There is only one refrigeration unit, and that's in the chiller.
The chiller area stays at 1.5 - 3.5°C, and the rest of the larder where I do my butchery is at around 6 - 7°C provided I keep the main door shut.

(I should just add that the whole unit is insulated).
Tim - do you know what size your monobloc is please?
 
@VSS Most certainly does, thank-you :tiphat:

That's a hell of a starting current and steady state draw is quite high. Running costs are a major factor in deciding what I do on the chiller front going forward. Frankly, for my current (and likely) ongoing needs, I think I'll be staying small!
 
@VSS Most certainly does, thank-you :tiphat:

That's a hell of a starting current and steady state draw is quite high. Running costs are a major factor in deciding what I do on the chiller front going forward. Frankly, for my current (and likely) ongoing needs, I think I'll be staying small!
Costs about £35 per batch of deer, so if I've got a full compliment of 7 fallow in the chiller it's not too bad.
 
Costs about £35 per batch of deer, so if I've got a full compliment of 7 in the chiller it's not too bad.
It's down to our MO - with your park deer you have much more "controllability" on your throughput. Like many stalkers, my chiller occupancy is quite variable dependent upon the deer and me being in the same place at the same time. As a consequence, whilst I was up to a month ago running the chiller 24/7 with deer coming in and being processed, I've not taken an animal for 2 weeks now. Adding the solar PV has made me less grumpy about the running costs but I currently have 2 freezers and a fridge/freezer running in addition to the chiller. Running costs quite quickly add up.

Anyway, back to the original thread and my apologies to the OP for going down a rabbit hole.
 
It's down to our MO - with your park deer you have much more "controllability" on your throughput. Like many stalkers, my chiller occupancy is quite variable dependent upon the deer and me being in the same place at the same time. As a consequence, whilst I was up to a month ago running the chiller 24/7 with deer coming in and being processed, I've not taken an animal for 2 weeks now. Adding the solar PV has made me less grumpy about the running costs but I currently have 2 freezers and a fridge/freezer running in addition to the chiller. Running costs quite quickly add up.

Anyway, back to the original thread and my apologies to the OP for going down a rabbit hole.
I think freezers are a bit like firearms. You start out with the good intention of only having one or two, but somehow they mysteriously multiply!
I'm running 4 chest freezers, 2 upright freezers and one fridge/freezer at the moment, so when the chiller is running as well my wife can be found hovering around the electricity metre like an anxious hen with a delinquent chick.

(Oh, and I've got another 6ft×4ft walk-in chiller as a backup 🙈)
 
I think freezers are a bit like firearms. You start out with the good intention of only having one or two, but somehow they mysteriously multiply!
I'm running 4 chest freezers, 2 upright freezers and one fridge/freezer at the moment, so when the chiller is running as well my wife can be found hovering around the electricity metre like an anxious hen with a delinquent chick.

(Oh, and I've got another 6ft×4ft walk-in chiller as a backup 🙈)
Ain't that the truth? I currently have two upright fridges and a small chest freezer in my butchery, a further three elsewhere in the barns, and two drinks chillers (thankfully not all running cutie same time) And then, of course, there's our domestic American fridgefreezer, and the small chest freezer for the dog food. No wonder I'm £140/month in electricity 😱
 
I think I need to move. Out the back is my wood store. Something like 15 cubic meters at least.
If I expand any more with chillers or freezers, she will cut my nads off, not that they get much use these days, but I am still fond of them, but that aside. Only one double freezer for processed food and and a small one for waste product.
Also, up to now, I have not really had access to fallow, but that might change this year and I would definitely need another freezer then, or drop them into the game dealer.
 
Ain't that the truth? I currently have two upright fridges and a small chest freezer in my butchery, a further three elsewhere in the barns, and two drinks chillers (thankfully not all running cutie same time) And then, of course, there's our domestic American fridgefreezer, and the small chest freezer for the dog food. No wonder I'm £140/month in electricity 😱
It's definitely the truth! I'm out in the shed now, and I've just spotted two more fridges (one big, one small) that I'd completely forgotten about!
Thankfully only brought into use when holding a lot of fresh stock in the run up to big event.
 
I think it's an illness, personally. We need help, not scolding 😆
I need help as well....2 chest freezers, 2 upright, 2 fridges and a walk in chiller...not good.

Need to clear some space as well as we have 5 pigs off to the abattoir shortly..but just keeping 2 ...but fruit and venison needs eating 😅
 
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