Creative ways to cool wort... - Page 2

BruBrus · 01-22-2012, 02:16 PM

I also drain the outdoor pipes in winter and just turn them on for wort-chilling and drain them again when finished. Our valve is easily accessible in the basement and it's only wasting a few cups of water (which could be reused). Gotta bring the hose in/out though, because it always seems to freeze up outside no matter how thoroughly I drain it.

Newton · 01-23-2012, 02:59 AM

I take a large tub and fill it with ice water and snow. I put the boiling hot brew kettle right in the tub and use a copper coil wort chiller with a utility pump. Ice water is sucked out of one end of the tub and the return tube is on the other end of the tub. Its a closed loop system. I slowly stir the wort and it chills to 50 degrees (Im brewing lagers these days) in less than 15 minutes. Its actually a more effient system than what I use in warmer weather. Ice and snow are readily available in MN right now, so thats what I use

mewithstewpid · 01-23-2012, 03:04 AM

Pour hot wort over 8-16# ice. Cools mine from near boiling to 65 in 20 seconds

PKLehmer · 01-23-2012, 11:25 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BruBrus

Gotta bring the hose in/out though, because it always seems to freeze up outside no matter how thoroughly I drain it.

I learned this lesson yesterday, spent two hours in the basement trying to push hot water through the hose to melt it.

I've been turning the outside water on and off as well. It's amazing how well my new cfc works with 40* tap water. I'm sure it'll be a different story in the summer though.

Northcalais40 · 01-23-2012, 12:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bigdongsr94

I am wanting to make a brew room in my basement. There is water there but the only drain is the sump so I want to use my immersion chiller copper coil to chill beer differently. From a kettle valve, run the wort thru your chiller with the chiller in an ice water bath. I am sure someone's prob done it like that. Anyone have any info on how well that works. Chiller built into a bucket full of ice. Chiller is 20ft copper and will dump directly to primary. A restriction at end of chiller can control rate and therefor the chilling efficiency.

This is exactly what I do. It is much more efficient and I can't believe everyone doesn't do it. The caveat is that you ice melts quickly. I use three bags of party ice from the gas station. You also need a drain on the bucket to make room for more ice.

Your wort chills in 5 minutes for a 5 gal batch with 3 gal water and 3 bags of ice. No brainer.

bigdongsr94 · 01-23-2012, 01:05 PM

Thanks northcal. Although it wasn't my thread I was hoping for such a response. How long is your coil? What diameter?

calpyro · 01-23-2012, 02:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jeffb666

Anybody know any creative ways to cool wort inside?
Its getting cold out, and I turn my outdoor water off this time of year,
so I cant run the plate chiller. I also have no way of hooking up my hose to an inside sink to do it that way. Any ideas are greatly appreciated!

The most practical and probably cheapest is to find a faucet from one of your house's sinks and put an adapter on it for your chiller.

If you want to build something to recirculate ice water, a sump pump works pretty good. However, it uses a bit of ice if you don't pre-chill the wort with tap water and then switch to ice at the end.
I recommend putting a stainless mesh screen around the intake of the pump to keep ice/slush from clogging the intake of the pump.

I use this method to get wort chilled to Lager pitching temp (50 degrees) in the summer when the water temps are pretty high. If you are interested in lager brewing, this setup can serve double-duty.

See the photos included. I added some of my chilling system to perhaps spur some ideas. I use double 35' immersion chillers, running in parallel with a 64 RPM gear motor attached to a stainless steel paddle to circulate the wort past the chiller. I use it as a combination HERMS/Immersion chiller.

On tap water alone, my setup consistently chills wort from boiling to 140 degrees in three minutes and down to 65 in 12-15 minutes depending on water temp.