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Unit Cellar

Unit Cellar

Wine Cellars - Advice for the Home Owner

More and more home owners these days are thinking of installing their own wine cellar. While it can be a good investment should you decide to put your house on the market most simply want to enjoy the process of caring for and enjoying wines that they have carefully chosen with family and friends. This article will discuss some of the most important factors to consider when building a wine cellar.

The best advice is to always consult a wine cellar professional. There are a unique set of challenges that every cellar presents that need to be identified during construction. A cellar professional will help you to address these and help ensure that you end up with the most efficient cellar environment possible.

Aside from hiring a professional probably the first thing you need to do is determine exactly why you want a wine cellar. Most people intend on using their cellar to simply store their wine collection however some have more elaborate plans which can include such things as tasting parties. If you fall into the second category make sure to map out exactly how the space will be used.

There are a number of important factors when it comes to the actual construction of a wine cellar. Things such as insulation and moisture barriers come to mind. Perhaps something that is not commonly known though is that wooden construction is much better than concrete. We have a tendancy to think of a wine cellar as a "cave" which makes us think of stone or concrete however concrete walls are not appropriate for a wine cellar, as they actually absorb cooling. Your cellar requires framed walls with the proper insulation.

Now we come to the main purpose of the wine cellar; maintaining the ideal temperature and humidity so your collection can age properly. We are talking of course about a wine cooling unit. There are basically two types; self-contained and split system.

Self-contained or through-the-wall cooling systems are the most cost-effective and easiest to install. The downside of through-the-wall cooling units is that they take up space inside the cellar, and noise from the cooling unit can be heard inside and outside the wine cellar. WhisperKOOL makes a full line of self-contained cooling units which are capable of efficiently maintaining the ideal temperature and humidity in cellars up to 2,000 cubic feet. One of the most popular is the WhisperKOOL 3000 which is designed for rooms up to 1,000 cubic feet.

One final thing that you should consider is what type of display or rack system you need. There are very reasonably priced simple pine display racks or you can look into custom built racks in a variety of sizes, materials and finishes which may better complement the look and feel you are going for.

Hopefully after giving some thought to the points above you will gain a better understanding of what you want as far as a wine cellar and how to achieve it.

About the Author

For additional information on the WhisperKOOL 3000 or any other WhisperKOOL cooling units please visit http://whisperkoolreview.com/

Beer Cellar Question to Pub Landlords out there---?

Hi Folks

I'm a Landlord who is wondering if I should turn my cellar cooling unit off or not.

My cellar is not below ground but behind the bar on ground level and the cooler normally helps maintain constant 12 degrees. With this cold whether, it has dropped to 8 degrees. I know it is not doing any cooling but it is helping change the air in the cellar which I presume could have an effect on the ale?

All your knowledge or thoughts on this would be appreciated.

Thanks in advance- Chris

I'm not an expert, but I've talked to enough to have a suggestion on this one. I even talked to a local brewer a few days ago about it. He brews lagers exclusively and keeps then in a refrigerator before handing them over to his distributor. You don't want to turn it completely off, just raise the temperature a bit to bring it up to 12. This will help you save on energy coast while not risking quality of the beer stored in it.

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