The issue is humidity. You can measure it with hygrometers but controlling it is another matter. There are many ways to do it and we have posted several articles about regulating the humidity of your cheeses as they mature.*
In this article, Pedro Collins of Stoke Lyne, Oxfordshire, UK shares his method. Pedro is a home cheese maker with a great Facebook page- The Little Village Dairy. (We will be telling you more about him in the June 1st Moos-Letter.)
Pedro Collins on Humidity
This is the progress Pedro has made in the last few months, beginning with an aging box:
I’ve made a simple device which will raise the humidity required to mature some of my cheeses – a mister, immersed in water, contained in a un-heated propagator, with a hygrometer. By operating the vents, I can regulate the humidity, up to 80-90%.
A few days later: Some slight modifications to the cheese maturing box. Much easier to keep water fresh, I’m able to change it daily to reduce the chances of contamination. Before, I filled the base of the propagator with water, made it a bit of a fiddly job when changing water.
I’m hoping to to incorporate the mister into a wine cooler which will drain excess water and allow me to regulate both the temperature and humidity, using a humidistat.
This is my next project – converting a wine chiller into a cave, well something that resembles a cave in that, I should be able to create an environment perfect for maturing my cheeses.
A week later: Impatient as I am, I couldn’t wait for my chiller. So as a temporary solution, I’ve set the fridge on it’s lowest setting and put the mister in the bottom. With a little tweaking, I’m getting 85 percent humidity and a temperature of between 6 and 9 degrees C (43-48 degrees F). Two days and already there’s a significant improvement.
Once I get the wine cooler, which I can set at 8 degrees C (46 degrees F) and the mister connected to a humidistat, I won’t have to manually operate the mister to keep a constant humidity.
A week later: Thanks for the wine cooler Michael, the integral fan makes this perfect. (Pedro’s friend gave him a wine cooler.) Still waiting for the digital control unit, once that’s connected to the mister, I’ll be hands free, well apart from turning the cheeses.
2 days later: Humidistat set up, thanks Greg. (Pedro’s neighbor is an electrician who looked the wiring on the controller over before Pedro plugged it in.) Working a treat, a constant 85% humidity, or what ever the cheese requires, brilliant piece of kit and it only cost £15 ($21).
Final touch: Bit more tweaking. Made a box for the mister from a 5 litre (1.3 gallon) plastic container. Chopped the middle out, drilled some holes in the top, joined it up, top inserted into bottom. This almost eliminates liquid water from the mister, splashing over into the cooler.
Controlling Humidity in Your Cheese “Cave” – Steve Murtaugh adds salt and water to his small refrigerator to control the humidity.
How to Make a Cheese Cave – Jon Little uses a Top Fin Air 8000 Aquarium Pump and the Tropicaire reptile humidifier and air exchanger in his dorm sized refrigerator.
Pedro Collins says
Yea already done and working. The mister cost me £15
Pedro:
That unit is readily available on eBay for around US$20 and requires minimal wiring. Whilst it reads humidity, it will require a humidifier and dehumidifier to work as we want it. Probably could chuck in another US$40 or so to get these things off eBay as well. You could get away with just making manual changes based in these readings, but if you want to make it ‘hands-free’, you will have to throw in a few more dollars.
http://www.shroomsupply.com/docs/wh8040_manual.pdf
Hopefully this link will work. Manual for the humidity control box.
I agree there are a few safety issues. I will be mounting the control box in a housing. The supply to the mister is 12v and the mains supply is fused.
No doubt I will be modifying things over time. The control until also has a temp probe, so It could be used to control temperature as well as humidity.
Currently I am maintaining a humidity of between 83 and 85 percent. I have placed the censor in variuos locations, in the chiller and found the best spot was half down in front of the door. Cheeses are maturing well and I guess only time will tell.
I just thought it worth mentioning as sometimes people underestimate the risks. Fused power boards and low voltage is definitely the way to go.
Some very useful points here, however it should be noted that when taking on these sorts of projects, safety is paramount. Whilst it was mentioned that a qualified electrician looked over the wiring (it is a simple ‘procedure’ to wire up these units), I noted that the unit was not housed in a protective housing. Whether it is the 12V, 230V or 110V unit, it should always be housed correctly. It is easy to do and will prevent electric shocks, particularly when we are dealing with wet environments.
There are also some very similar units used for temperature control.
I use a temp controller (around US$10 on ebay) which is wired in a similar fashion to control my cheese fridge(s). It has a built in delay before turning on the fridge again so that you don’t destroy the compressor. Because the fridge is insulated well, it only turns on periodically and running costs are very low.
I also use the humidifier controller unit discussed in this article. To a powerboard with built in fuse I attach some cheap humidifier units( they sit on top of a bottle and only cost a few dollars a piece)and some cheap laptop fans for around US$3(the sort you sit the laptop on to cool it)- (http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/USB-Foldable-Folding-Cool-Cooler-Cooling-Fan-Pad-w-2-Fan-for-Laptop-Notebook-OK/). These all run off USB plugs so only have 5Volts running through them which is great in terms of safety. I set them into a power plug with USB ports. This power plug then goes into a the powerboard with a built in fuse (better safe than sorry!). The benefit of this system is that when the humidity controller decides to raise the level of humidity, whilst activating the humidifiers it also turns on the fans which circulate the air and equalize the humidity and temperature of the fridge. Happy to send photos and schematics for anyone interested.
As an aside, if humidity is a big issue, in this case having too much humidity, it is also possible to add a DEhumidifier to reduce the fridge humidity level.
You said that you would send photos and schematics to anyone interested in your auto-humidity system. I would very much appreciate anything including advise you can send. Thank you, Mark
Email me your details to TheMilkyWhey@hotmail.com. Let me know what setup you are after ie size fridge, and I’ll modify it to suit your situation.
R