Cooling Tables? Are there other options?

I am beginning to find myself making large batches of caramel slabs -- about 50 pounds a day. To accomplish this I make about several small batches that will fit into the frames that I have. It is time for me to invest in some bigger equipment. I feel as though I could benefit from a cooling table. They are pretty expensive though. I am wondering if there are any cheaper alternatives ( $2k or less) that would allow me to cool a big batch of caramel?

updated by @daniel-herskovic: 04/16/15 06:32:46AM

Daniel, just browsing through the old forum posts and I saw this. Hallot Parson, who is on here on The Chocolate Life, built a cooling cabinet for use at his company Escazu Chocolate. I know if he didn't post a picture, he at least posted information on how he built it ( I believe it was made with a speed rack, a freestanding a/c unit and sort sort of metal to make the cabinet walls). Try looking for him and browse through his discussions. There are many home built equipment ideas on this site which I love, I don't think most people on this site have tons of extra cash to blow on equipment. Good luck!

Daniel -

Funny, I was just thinking about this over the weekend.

There are some inexpensive (under$1k) glycol recirculating chillers used in the beer world to cool the lines that go from the kegs to the taps. If you built a chocolate cooling slab (like this one: http://www.dr.ca/chocolate-cooling-slab.html ) and filled that with glycol, and then pumped the glycol from the chiller through a pipe - like a radiant heated floor - then you would not have to freeze the slab, and the glycol chiller would take it down to 55 or whatever temp you set. Total cost could be under $2k depending on the size of the table. Size gets to be the real issue here, and that's dependent on batch size.

:: Clay

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clay - http://www.thechocolatelife.com/clay/