stoutaholic
Well-Known Member
I just bought an older plate chiller from another homebrewer, and am trying to figure out how to use it. It should be simple, but apparently I am missing something obvious. Here is the picture of it in action:
The hot water (which would be wort if I were brewing) goes in the top port and come out the port beside it. The cold water goes in the bottom port and comes out the port beside it. The upper half of the plate gets very hot (too hot to touch), and the bottom half gets cold. So clearly the water is flowing into the plate, not just going in one port and going right back out. But here is the thing: There is no heat exchange. The hot water coming out is just as hot as the hot water going in, and the cold water coming out is just as cold as the cold water going in. What the heck? What am I missing here? Either this is NOT actually a plate chiller (though it certainly looks like one), I am doing something wrong, or it is broken in some odd way. If it was simply broken, I would think that the water would just get backed up or something. But there is no sign of blockage. The water flows at a very good rate. In the picture, I am running the water very slowly through the chiller. Any ideas what is going on here?
If it were working correctly, I would not expect half of the plate to be hot and half to be cold -- I would think that the hot water would go in at the top, flow over the cold water traveling in the opposite direction, and come out the bottom. But this is not the way it works.
The hot water (which would be wort if I were brewing) goes in the top port and come out the port beside it. The cold water goes in the bottom port and comes out the port beside it. The upper half of the plate gets very hot (too hot to touch), and the bottom half gets cold. So clearly the water is flowing into the plate, not just going in one port and going right back out. But here is the thing: There is no heat exchange. The hot water coming out is just as hot as the hot water going in, and the cold water coming out is just as cold as the cold water going in. What the heck? What am I missing here? Either this is NOT actually a plate chiller (though it certainly looks like one), I am doing something wrong, or it is broken in some odd way. If it was simply broken, I would think that the water would just get backed up or something. But there is no sign of blockage. The water flows at a very good rate. In the picture, I am running the water very slowly through the chiller. Any ideas what is going on here?
If it were working correctly, I would not expect half of the plate to be hot and half to be cold -- I would think that the hot water would go in at the top, flow over the cold water traveling in the opposite direction, and come out the bottom. But this is not the way it works.
