Outdoor fermentation chamber for winter?

[Trail]

Hey, guys, a question for you -

I spent the end of the week putting together a temp controller box and sawing the shelves out of a minifridge. I've also got a Brewers Edge space heater on the way.

The problem is, my fermentation area is an unheated enclosed porch. It has four walls, a roof, and a floor, but it's totally uninsulated and is at outdoor temperature throughout the winter - sometimes as low as -10. The space heater is rated to allow fermentation of a "60-65" beer from ambient temps as low as 42... which is about 50 above the theoretical nadir of my hellish wintertime requirements.

Is there a more powerful heating solution I could use that won't melt my minifridge? I can't bring the rig inside, as my house is small and the only room which is out of reach of the kids is already far too full of SWMBO's precious things which can't be moved.

 

[BigFloyd]

http://brewstands.com/fermentation-heater.html

It doesn't take much to keep the inside of a fridge or freezer warm. A 60 watt bulb inside of the paint can should be plenty. I'd certainly want to rig it up to a temp controller like an STC-1000.

 

[Trail]

Brilliant. I'll give that a shot, thanks.

 

[DurangoMatt]

I have a story that is related. I live in the mountains of colorado and in the winter we have a lot of single digits nights. We are on well water and when it got really cold we had problems. We installed a single light bulb inside the well hut (four walls, roof and totally uninsulated, sound like your setup) and that single bulb keeps the hut in the 30s.

 

[b-boy]

A reptile heater works well too. I live in buffalo, NY. My fermentation chamber is in my garage. I have a 100 watt ceramic reptile bulb that does a fantastic job of keeping my temps in the 50-60 range year round.