DIY chiller

Can someone point me to directions on making a wort chiller. I got 50 feet of 3/8in copper tubing. I searched this section but couldn't find anything with details. It looks simple enough, but not sure about fittings needed. Thanks.

If you're looking to make a CFC (counter-flow chiller), I'd say this thread is the one you want. If you were thinking of making an immersion chiller it's pretty simple. A hose with an ID that fits snuggly over your copper pipe, then hose clamp it. One of those hoses needs to connect to a water source so a garden hose adapter or something that threads onto your kitchen faucet. Not too much to it.

I use an immersion chiller right now and I like to use dishwasher supply lines for my hoses just because they handle the hot temperatures of the initial water flow.

To form the coil, wrap it around a pot or something similar. I was already kegging at the time I made mine, so I wrapped it around the corny.

Figure out what circular object fits inside your kettle. Wrap coil around it and attach fittings. Then bend your in/out lets but bevery careful not to kink the tube. I used garden hose with compression fittings. Cost me about 10 bucks for the stuff.



Dan

With 3/8" OD tubing, you can grab some 3/8 reinforced clear vinyl hose at Lowes or Home Depot, push it on and clamp it. Then you can use hose to barb fittings which unfortunately are kinda pricy if you can't find a plastic version in the garden hose section.

Another trick is to use 5/8" garden hose but first slide a short ring of 3/8" thinwall hose onto the end of the copper as a reducer. Then push the 5/8" on top and clamp it. The benefit is you definitely know you can use the cheap $1.50 male/female plastic hose connectors.

So many people put the hose connections directly on the copper chiller but then you have to use two garden hoses to move the water in and out. If you're chilling pretty close to your water source, you might as well just have a few feet of hose connected directly to the chiller. This is especially true on the output side. I only have 5 feet of output hose and I let it dangle into a 22 gallon rubbermaid tub. I use this for cleanup after the brew.

Willsellout said:

Figure out what circular object fits inside your kettle. Wrap coil around it and attach fittings. Then bend your in/out lets but be very careful not to kink the tube. I used garden hose with compression fittings. Cost me about 10 bucks for the stuff.



Dan

Click to expand...

I made one last week doing pretty much the same thing. I was planning on buying two soldered connections to the 3/4 inch hose fittings, but one turned out to be a compression fitting. Still worked though.

Here's the thread:


https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=25571

One other 'mistake' I made was assuming that 3/8 copper reducers would fit on 3/8 inch copper tubing.

Luckily my wife and I go camping a lot, and like throwing Crawfish boils, so we have one of the 150 qt. Catering coolers. All I had to do was unwind the 50' coil a bit and tighten up the coil a bit. We then throw about 40 lbs of ice into the cooler and fill it up with water. We are just using vinyl hose with hose clamps.

1/4" copper fittings sweat right on to 3/8" OD soft copper, FYI.

I decided that I would go one step further and make a CFC.

Mind me asking what you paid for your copper? How many feet?

I paid $40 Cdn for 50 feet of copper.

What's the exchange rate right now? Six months ago I paid 72 US$ for 50 feet of 3/8 tubing and price has only gone up from there. The Canadian border is only 4 hours away, if I need to make a large copper purchase it may be worth the trip.

0.8675 Canadian dollars for one US dollar. Good for me to buy stuff from you, not so good for you to buy stuff from me.

I did pay $80 Cdn for 75 meters (about 225 feet) of 14/2 copper house wiring last summer. That might be a better benchmark for copper prices in Canada. The tubing I bought was sitting on a dusty shelf in a rural lumber store so the price may have been an error or not representative of what it's worth now.

Just for interest sake, one of the reasons that the Canadian dollar is getting so high compared to the US dollar is the price of commodities like copper. We have a lot of resources to export so when the value increases it drives our dollar up relative to the currencies of those who buy our goods. Copper is through the roof right now.

50' of 3/8 in newhampshire right now is $49, All HD have the same price i checked a few here and some in MA. I bought the 20' for $22.

It's been awhile since I checked my local prices, I will have to do some snooping.

This is funny. I've developed a Counterflow Chiller that I could happily make and sell all day long for $60 or so. Think there would be much interest?