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barefootbrewer · 03-29-2009, 01:18 AM

Was watching the food network and wondering if liquid nitrogen might be a good way to bring down the temp of hot wort? Anyone done this or have any ideas?

thanks

Duckfoot · 03-29-2009, 01:22 AM

Um... I would think it would be cost prohibitive... Not too mention the danger of having liquid nitrogen sitting around...

Then again, I am not that smart...

Good luck!

BigEd · 03-29-2009, 01:25 AM

Why not liquid helium? It's even colder. Honestly is hardly seems like a practical method. Buy a coil of copper tubing and make a wort chiller.

**jldc** · 03-29-2009, 02:35 AM

I was checking out of the grocery store today, and I noticed a cooler with dry ice for about $2/container. It got me thinking about cooling wort. Not sure how it would work, but there might me something to it. Hmmmmm.

**phrogpilot73** · 03-29-2009, 02:44 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jldc

I was checking out of the grocery store today, and I noticed a cooler with dry ice for about $2/container. It got me thinking about cooling wort. Not sure how it would work, but there might me something to it. Hmmmmm.

A guy on another forum I frequent posted what his experience with dry ice was. He figured he could drop it straight into the wart to cool it quickly. Turns out that the wort was just thick enough to prevent the bubbles from coming out. Blam! Wort everywhere.

GunnerMan · 03-29-2009, 03:36 AM

I think LN2 would be to expencive, it is not too too dangerous but you need a special container, and a supplier. I thought about the dry ice idea and that is a good one, it is cheap and would be easy to put around he outside of the bucket.

Helium is colder yes but even harder to get and harder to make=more expencive.

Dice is the most economical solution, you could also modify an A/c unit to run refrigerant through your wort chiller.

You may end up with frozen wort though with these kinds of systems, not sure if this would adversley affect anything...

barefootbrewer · 03-29-2009, 04:47 AM

Thanks guys, that was the kind of feedback I was looking for. Currently I have an immersion chiller with a pre-chiller setup. I was just thinking that liquid nitrogen is very cold and inert if I remember right. I know Co2 is a bit too dirty to cool homebrew with.

**truckmann** · 03-29-2009, 04:54 AM

Or you could just get a plate chiller. My shirron plate chiller cools my 10 gallon batches down as fast as I can gravity feed through it as long as the water from the tap isn't too warm.

tndave · 03-29-2009, 05:22 AM

Quote:

Currently I have an immersion chiller with a pre-chiller setup. I was just thinking that liquid nitrogen is very cold and inert if I remember right. I know Co2 is a bit too dirty to cool homebrew with.

Today I cooled 4.5 gallons (should have been 5, but I forgot about the 90 min boil and had already dumped my grains) of wort from full boil to less than 80 degrees in 35 minutes, in my kitchen sink with 3 bags of ice and a some cold water and A Lot of stirring. No chiller or pre-chiller. Your set-up should work at least that quick, if not you need to hook up with someone that help you out or better yet describe exactly, in great detail what u are doing right here...

Funny thing, "we" once thought it would be a great idea to cool a couple of kegs (15 gal) with "dry ice" well it turned out to be a large party, and we ran out of beer fairly early...not good. Gold lining was after the frozen beer thawed the next day "we" had plenty to drink....

tndave · 03-29-2009, 05:31 AM

Quote:

I know Co2 is a bit too dirty to cool homebrew with

CO2 or Carbon Dioxide is one of the byproducts of fermentation and the gas that we "carb" beer with...