stainless VS copper wort chillers

after years of doing extract/grain brewing using the old method of cooling wort by dumping it upon two gallons of ice cold water in a carboy submerged in ice water & rock salt ....i'm now gearing up to do BIAB and am wondering if the 1/2" stainless tubed immersion chillers are as efficient as the smaller 3/8" tubed copper immersion units now being sold. it seems nobody is producing a large copper 1/2" chiller due to the price of copper.
i would like to use an immersion chiller so the cold break trub can be left in the pot.

thanx for any feed back....

GD

I have a friend the BIAB, and uses a SS immersion chiller, he picked it up off amazon for like $50.00. He loves it. If I still used an IC, I would get SS, instead of copper, but I like pretty. Just my thoughts.

thanx for the reply....

looks like it'll be a stainless.

just an addendum: i plan on scrounging a washer machine pump which is belt driven. taking a garage sale cooler and about 10' of coiled 1/2" copper tubing and pumping rock salt water -7.5 degrees though the chiller via the pump using an old electric motor. a ball valve will be in there somewhere or something like an ols gate valve to adjust flow.
i just remembered today about a 300GPH pond pump that i believe will work out much better than using a washer pump which has to be primed and driven by a seperate motor.
no, i didn't dream it up, but saw this work on you tube under red neck chiller.

cheersl

GD51

I would go for a 1/2 over a 3/8, regardless of the material.
The narrower diameter will restrict the water flow more, slowing down the throughput.

(just remember - with an IC, stirring = way more cooling)