Project description
I have been making cheese at home for about four years, strictly for my own household, with no selling involved. Right now the wheels sit in an old refrigerator with a bowl of water inside, and the result is exactly what you would expect: the rind cracks on one side, sweats on the other, and twice this spring I lost a whole batch to blue fuzz that came from somewhere I never invited it. I want to stop guessing and build a real ripening chamber, and I am looking for someone who can design it with me and write out the full build and setup, including the parts list and the wiring of the controls.
The load is modest and predictable. I keep between ten and fourteen wheels at a time, most of them two to three kilograms, plus two or three larger ones around six kilograms that I press in autumn. Two climate regimes matter to me. Semi-hard cheeses in the tomme and caciotta family want roughly eleven to thirteen degrees Celsius at eighty-five to ninety percent relative humidity. Bloomy rind cheeses want about twelve degrees and close to ninety-five percent, and they are far less forgiving. I would like the temperature held within half a degree of the set point and humidity within three percent, without the compressor cycling so hard that the air inside turns into a wind tunnel.
The details that worry me most are humidity and airflow. I need a humidifier that does not spit droplets onto the cheese, a sensible way to collect and drain condensate so it never pools under the shelves, and an air exchange scheme that refreshes the chamber a few times a day without blowing directly across any rind. Shelving is the other open question: I am torn between spruce boards, which the cheese clearly likes, and food grade plastic grids, which I can actually sanitize properly. Please advise on both, including a realistic cleaning routine and how to keep foreign moulds and kitchen odours out of the box.
What I expect from the work:
1. A layout drawing with internal dimensions, shelf spacing and the position of every sensor.
2. A specification for cooling, humidification, dehumidification and controlled air exchange, with tolerances stated.
3. Controller logic in plain language: setpoints, hysteresis, ventilation timing, defrost behaviour, alarm conditions.
4. A shelving and sanitation plan covering both wood and plastic options.
5. A commissioning checklist so I can prove the chamber holds its numbers for a week before I trust it with cheese.
I am comfortable with tools and can do the assembly myself. Ten to twelve days for the documentation is fine; I would rather have it thought through than fast.
The load is modest and predictable. I keep between ten and fourteen wheels at a time, most of them two to three kilograms, plus two or three larger ones around six kilograms that I press in autumn. Two climate regimes matter to me. Semi-hard cheeses in the tomme and caciotta family want roughly eleven to thirteen degrees Celsius at eighty-five to ninety percent relative humidity. Bloomy rind cheeses want about twelve degrees and close to ninety-five percent, and they are far less forgiving. I would like the temperature held within half a degree of the set point and humidity within three percent, without the compressor cycling so hard that the air inside turns into a wind tunnel.
The details that worry me most are humidity and airflow. I need a humidifier that does not spit droplets onto the cheese, a sensible way to collect and drain condensate so it never pools under the shelves, and an air exchange scheme that refreshes the chamber a few times a day without blowing directly across any rind. Shelving is the other open question: I am torn between spruce boards, which the cheese clearly likes, and food grade plastic grids, which I can actually sanitize properly. Please advise on both, including a realistic cleaning routine and how to keep foreign moulds and kitchen odours out of the box.
What I expect from the work:
1. A layout drawing with internal dimensions, shelf spacing and the position of every sensor.
2. A specification for cooling, humidification, dehumidification and controlled air exchange, with tolerances stated.
3. Controller logic in plain language: setpoints, hysteresis, ventilation timing, defrost behaviour, alarm conditions.
4. A shelving and sanitation plan covering both wood and plastic options.
5. A commissioning checklist so I can prove the chamber holds its numbers for a week before I trust it with cheese.
I am comfortable with tools and can do the assembly myself. Ten to twelve days for the documentation is fine; I would rather have it thought through than fast.
Other / Miscellaneous Cash, Bank transfer
