I've seen the little freezers at Sams and Home Depot come back in stock at least temporarily.
I'm gonna share my low tech, highly effective "Did my freezer thaw?" method...
Get a shot glass, 35mm film canister (I know) or something of similar size. Fill it with water and freeze it. Once frozen, place a penny on top. Whenever you open your freezer, the penny should be on top of the ice. If the penny is 1/4 of the way down or more, you need to consider that at some point your freezer stopped working and started to thaw. If your penny is on the bottom, it would be a good idea to pitch the contents, because it thawed significantly.
I'm gonna share my low tech, highly effective "Did my freezer thaw?" method...
Get a shot glass, 35mm film canister (I know) or something of similar size. Fill it with water and freeze it. Once frozen, place a penny on top. Whenever you open your freezer, the penny should be on top of the ice. If the penny is 1/4 of the way down or more, you need to consider that at some point your freezer stopped working and started to thaw. If your penny is on the bottom, it would be a good idea to pitch the contents, because it thawed significantly.
Looks like some of the mid-sized ones were in stock earlier this week.
I've been trying to keep my eyes open for a small one, but no dice.
I put a WiFi monitor on both of my freezers. I get alerts on my phone if the freezer reaches my set point.
Here's what I've been using for several years, works good, no problems.What brand/model are you using? Do they work well?
What brand/model are you using? Do they work well?
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I’m using InkBird ITC-308 units. Technically, it’s a temperature controller. I used one to convert a chest freezer into a kegerator to keep the beer kegs at 40*F. For the freezers, I just set it at -40*F so it’ll always stay on and run normally. The InkBird will shut off power once it reaches the desired temperature.
I love these things. My chest freezer was originally purchased to ferment lagers, but with the ‘Rona I thought it’d be best to have another freezer. Simple change of a setting and I have a freezer again.
Right now my chest freezer is -9*F and my upright freezer is -15*F. I can monitor the temperature as long as I have internet on my phone. It’ll send alerts if the temperature gets outside of your set range.
I'm gonna share my low tech, highly effective "Did my freezer thaw?" method...
Get a shot glass, 35mm film canister (I know) or something of similar size. Fill it with water and freeze it. Once frozen, place a penny on top. Whenever you open your freezer, the penny should be on top of the ice. If the penny is 1/4 of the way down or more, you need to consider that at some point your freezer stopped working and started to thaw. If your penny is on the bottom, it would be a good idea to pitch the contents, because it thawed significantly.
Neat device for $40 and less. Does the constant on/off power to the freezer seem to degrade compressor longevity? Do you have to drill to mount the wired probes or mount them somehow else?
No, when it hits the threshold, it just sends power to the outlet to turn the device on. For my freezer I set it so low that it’s “on” 24/7. But by “on” it has power at the outlet, not necessarily running.
For my beer kegerator, the InkBird does cycle the unit on and off to maintain the low 40s temperature, but there’s a compressor delay setting so you can set the minimum time between on/off cycles.