For The Love Of Port

I want to set up a cellar in my basement and today looked at one I might buy used from a couple that is remodeling a condo. They had racking for about 500 bottles in a 4'x5' space along with a WhisperKOOL 3000. Now the complicating factor is that I also want to keep my beer in the cellar at a serving temperature of 45 F. If space allows I'll have dual-zone temp. control, or I might just have to live with my wine at 45. But alas, the WhisperKOOL 3000 temperature control only allows setting the temperature as low as 50. So ...

Does anyone have a cooling unit in your cellar that will let you set a temperature of 45 F? If so, what brand and model?

I have a Whisperkool 4200 in my cellar as it holds about 2k bottles, which is the point at which I can manage the contents w/o using some tracking software. Take me in there and name a bottle and I can put my hands on it in 10 seconds or less (99% of the time). That said, a 2 zone chilling unit is very feasible, my friend has one that differentiates between his white and red rooms. I strongly suggest you get in contect with APEX wine cellar builders and ask them your specific question in regards to having 45 degree temp ... which I must say, would be a negative for your Vintage Ports. If you are going to subject them to that type of cold, they will evolve so slowly that a 1994 purchased today would be ready to drink in about 2076. Then again you could drink that to celebrate the USA's tercentennary anniversary!

Eric, seriously ... call Apex, if they don't know ... nobody will, unless you know of beer supply outfits.

I contacted WhisperKOOL and they weren't so helpful. However, looking at their documentation, I think I could remove their thermostat and wire up my own to their unit. Freezing of the unit would be a risk, but I don't think a big one. I contacted one of the other chiller manufacturers and they indicated that their units as supplied wouldn't let you set the temperature that low, but for a small fee they could modify one to allow it. So that suggests no real mechanical issue.

I'm still thinking about the two zone thing. I have to do some basement cleaning and measuring to figure out if that is feasible. I do understand that if I don't manage to do that, I will have to wait for a long time to drink some of my bottles.

Apex has an office/showroom south of Denver. I might see if I can visit them.

So here's a New Guy question: Is there some scientific fact that port should be cellared at 54-55 or is it tradition based on old cellarage methods before we had climate control? Why not let it sit at 60, or 62 and we can enjoy it in 10 versus 25 years? Has anyone tested this out?

Also, I've been poking into more and more nice wine stores looking for new ports to try. Why is it 95% of them leave their bottles upright, shouldn't they be on their side? There's one store that has ports from 1966 & 1970-they've been there a number of years upright on a lit sales floor atabout 68-70 degrees. Based on what I've read here & elsewhere, this cannot be good.

There have been some studies to show that above 55 the bad reactions take place more quickly than the good, leading to a deterioration in quality. As Roy alludes to, below 55 all the reactions take place more slowly, so the wine does not age as quickly.

I would not buy those 1966s and 1970s that have been upright in a store at room temperature. Most of the local stores I buy from have displays where one bottle is upright, and the rest are stored horizontally below. In addition, they have cooler cellar rooms where they keep the older stuff.