Chilled wort too fast!?

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Lazy8s

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So this is my 3rd brew. The first two I wasn't prepared to chill my wort so I sat around for hours waiting for it to get to pitching temp in an ice bath. This time I was determined not to fall victim to the same trap. Did I buy a wort chiller? Of course not! Instead I boiled 3gal of water last night for about 15min then put it into a clean, sanitized container and froze it. So today I boiled 1.5gal of wort (I made a .5gal starter) and was ready to beat the system. When the wort finished it was about 210-212 degrees according to my hanging thermometer. I put my massive ice cubes (1gal each) into the primary bucket and poured my wort in slowly(ish); it took about 30sec. I wanted to make sure I didn't spill but I wanted aeration. I noticed a tiny drop splashed up on me and instead of burning it was chilly. I grabbed my thermometer and my sanitized spoon. As I splashed the wort over my ice blocks I took a temp and it showed 60degrees!! I almost had a heart attack!! Less than 90seconds after boiling I had 60 degree wort with f'in ice cubes still in it! Luckily I live in Florida and it is 90 outside so I closed the lid, placed on the air lock and put it on my back porch. There are still ice cubes about 30min later and the outside of the bucket is frosty. So what do I do now? Did I do any harm? Did I achieve an amazing cold break the likes of which Old Man Winter would be jealous? I'm just sitting around waiting for it the ice to melt and the wort to warm up to the 65-70 degrees called for by the wyeast 3944 propogator pack.

Hope I've provided some more laughs for you guys!
 
I don't think there is such a thing as cooling the wort too fast, so you have done well. You said you're waiting for it to warm up, so what temp is it at now? Keep in mind that it's the fermentation temp that's important, not so much the pitching temp because active fermentation can raise the temp of your beer by upwards of 5 degrees quite easily. So if you wait for it to get in the 68-70 range you may actually end up fermenting closer to 75. So, plan your pitching temp accordingly and shoot for a few degrees lower than your target fermentation temp.
 
I am so jealous. Took me over 45 minutes to get to 75F with my wort chiller and 20 lbs ( aka $6 ): ) of ice. Had to put it in my fermentation chamber and wait all day before pitching yeast. I hate brewing in the summer with 85F+ tap water.

I don't see anything wrong with your method. As long as you insure the containers are sanitized and the water distilled.
 
Well I am glad to hear I didn't mess anything up! If anyone is looking for a technique for chilling to lager temps I think I have found it! My wort is at 48 degrees and rising. I am no thermics expert but when I add 200+200+32+32+32 I get 498. Then when I divide by 5 I get just below 100. I'm not certain how I would up with below 50 degree water.
 
mosquitocontrol said:
Took me over 45 minutes to get to 75F with my wort chiller and 20 lbs ( aka $6 ): ) of ice.... I hate brewing in the summer with 85F+ tap water.
Click to expand...

What the... are you friggin serious? That's just plain ridiculous. I get 45-50*F year-round. You should consider a pre-chiller
 
Lazy8s said:
. I am no thermics expert but when I add 200+200+32+32+32 I get 498. Then when I divide by 5 I get just below 100. I'm not certain how I would up with below 50 degree water.
Click to expand...

Well, the calculation is a little more complicated than taking an average. There was a discussion here earlier about just that and I'll see if I can find it. But you also have to take into account the volumes at each temp.

EDIT: here it is. Not sure how accurate it is and whether or not using a solid (ice cubes) like you did has an impact or not, but I'm sure it does change things a bit.


Beer_Guy said:
You must do a weighted average based on volumes of the liquid combined.

Doing a weighted average based on volume you get:
2 gallons of wort at 100*F (38*C)
Plus 3 gallons of cold water at 45*F (7*C)
Will result in a total of 5 gallon at 67*F (20C*)

2 at 100*F + 3 at 45*F = 67*F
and
2 at 112*F + 3 at 45*F = 72*F

or (for our *C friends)

2 at 38*C + 3 at 7*C = 20*C
and
2 at 45*C + 3 at 7*C = 22*C

[Figures were rounded for simplicity.]

Here is a link to a simple spreadsheet I made to do the calculation for you.

http://community.mrbeer.com/images/fbfiles/files/Temp_Calculator.xls
[Right Click and "Save Target as..."]
Click to expand...
 
Reno_eNVy_446 said:
What the... are you friggin serious? That's just plain ridiculous. I get 45-50*F year-round. You should consider a pre-chiller
Click to expand...

The tap water on cold is warm to the touch. It sucks. Which is why I hate summer brewing. All I have is an apartment sized fridge freezer which is packed with food so I need to buy ice. I chill it to 95F or so with tap water, then move my pump right in an ice bath on the lowest gpm. Thought about a prechiller but figured it wouldn't make a huge difference compared to the pump in the ice water.
 
This is exactly how I used to cool my wort when I was still doing partial boils.

Don't worry, the cooling problem will come back when you decide to do full boils.
 
mosquitocontrol said:
I am so jealous. Took me over 45 minutes to get to 75F with my wort chiller and 20 lbs ( aka $6 ): ) of ice. Had to put it in my fermentation chamber and wait all day before pitching yeast. I hate brewing in the summer with 85F+ tap water.
Click to expand...

that seems like a long time. my chiller took a 12 gallon boil to 75f. in about 20min. in the brutal heat this weekend. the water coming out of the exit hose was crazy hot for 15 min.
 
I finally got my method down to a science...I boil about 3.5 gallons and losing some in the boil I'll need to top off with a couple gallons of distilled water. I store these in my refrigerator and take them out of the fridge when I put my wort chiller in the pot to sanitize (20 min before flame out). I then cool with the wort chiller and when it gets down to 80 degrees I transfer the wort to primary and then use the cold distilled water to top off to 5 gallons. This gets the 5 gallons down to around 70 degrees almost instantly after adding the top off water then I aerate and pitch. Works for me!
 
I've always thought about doing something like that, but I read it's a bad idea to aerate hot wort, and you should cool it a certain amount before pouring it into the fermenter- any truth to this?
 
Lazy8s said:
So this is my 3rd brew. The first two I wasn't prepared to chill my wort so I sat around for hours waiting for it to get to pitching temp in an ice bath. This time I was determined not to fall victim to the same trap. Did I buy a wort chiller? Of course not! Instead I boiled 3gal of water last night for about 15min then put it into a clean, sanitized container and froze it. So today I boiled 1.5gal of wort (I made a .5gal starter) and was ready to beat the system. When the wort finished it was about 210-212 degrees according to my hanging thermometer. I put my massive ice cubes (1gal each) into the primary bucket and poured my wort in slowly(ish); it took about 30sec. I wanted to make sure I didn't spill but I wanted aeration. I noticed a tiny drop splashed up on me and instead of burning it was chilly. I grabbed my thermometer and my sanitized spoon. As I splashed the wort over my ice blocks I took a temp and it showed 60degrees!! I almost had a heart attack!! Less than 90seconds after boiling I had 60 degree wort with f'in ice cubes still in it! Luckily I live in Florida and it is 90 outside so I closed the lid, placed on the air lock and put it on my back porch. There are still ice cubes about 30min later and the outside of the bucket is frosty. So what do I do now? Did I do any harm? Did I achieve an amazing cold break the likes of which Old Man Winter would be jealous? I'm just sitting around waiting for it the ice to melt and the wort to warm up to the 65-70 degrees called for by the wyeast 3944 propogator pack.

Hope I've provided some more laughs for you guys!
Click to expand...


I fail to see the problem in this. I actually envy you. Typically I just freeze 2 liter bottles and toss them into the sink. I end up waiting an hour for cooldown. What you have done is alot more work but quicker.

60 is cool but you can pitch from there. Eventually the yeast will work the temp up anyways.
 
KeithMoonsLiver said:
I've always thought about doing something like that, but I read it's a bad idea to aerate hot wort, and you should cool it a certain amount before pouring it into the fermenter- any truth to this?
Click to expand...

HSA is one of those overblown brewer's myths that has little relation to homebrewer's situations. It's pretty much been shot down like so many other of those brewing boogeymen.
 
So, ice is not a standard temperature.

Ice will always have a *maximum* temperature at normal atmospheric pressure, that is, it's no hotter than 0 C or 32 F. It most certainly can be colder than that, which you might well know if you've ever scraped a windshield in winter (I'm looking at non-Floridians here, *ahem*).

Anyways, if you added ice water (without any solids) then the math could be:

[(2.5 gal * 212F) + (3 gal * 32F)]/5.5 = 113F

But since ice can be a lot colder than freezing temperature, it partially depends on how your freezer is set. Ours here at the lab is set to -20C, which is -4F. If yours is set a little colder, it could be as much as -10F... so let's try that:

[(2.5 gal * 212F) + (3 gal * -10F)]/5.5 = 91F

Still too hot, right? Well, what about the energy of phase change? It requires energy for a solid to go to liquid, or a liquid to go to a gas. That's why your pot of boiling wort heats up quickly, but takes quite a bit longer to actually start to bubble. It needs energy above and beyond the temperature energy to heat it.

A gallon of water is about 3.8 kg of mass. The heat of fusion for ice is ~80cal/g, so to fuse 3*3800=11400 grams of water you need about 912,000 calories, or 912 kcal -- roughly the energy in a fast food value meal!

I suspect that the heat of fusion for phase changing the ice from a solid to a liquid is the true reason it took so danged long to melt. If you don't want to wait that long next time, use liquid water. :)

Cheers!
 
Thanks for all of the input! Last night my wort had actually chilled to about 50degrees by midnight with ice still in it. I left it out (covered with an air lock) and by 8am it was 72. I pitched, and now I have the ambient temp at about 64. Hopefully I will have a great brew soon! I'm hoping the 2.5lbs of honey doesn't slow it down too much. I'm thirsty!
 
mosquitocontrol said:
The tap water on cold is warm to the touch. It sucks. Which is why I hate summer brewing. All I have is an apartment sized fridge freezer which is packed with food so I need to buy ice. I chill it to 95F or so with tap water, then move my pump right in an ice bath on the lowest gpm. Thought about a prechiller but figured it wouldn't make a huge difference compared to the pump in the ice water.
Click to expand...

I'm still not clear, are you stirring almost constantly while running the immersion chiller? It helps a ton. I'd then use the ice water through the chiller last, since the less difference in temperature (i.e. your 80 degree tap water) yields slower cooling of the wort as it cools.

If your efficiency is pretty kick ass, you could always aim for barely 5 gals into the kettle and add a half gallon cube of sanitary ice to help that last little bit without screwing up your gravities. As long as you account for the .5 gal top off it should have no impact on the final beer flavor.
 

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