diy wort chiler

Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

feenaughty

Active Member
Joined
Dec 6, 2010
Messages
33
Reaction score
0
Location
nichols
Is 1/4 in x 20 feet soft brass pipe to small ? Seen some for $16. figer half the price of 1/2in pipe and I could make a nice wort cooler with a small water pump to move ice water for under $40.what do you guy think thank you tom f
 
For a 5G batch it will probably be adequate. I would step it up to 3/8 if you can afford to get a bit more surface area. The pump with ice water will help but I wouldn't switch to that till you got it down a bit with tap water.

Jason
 
feenaughty,
I will sell you my used IMC (immersion chiller) made from 25 feet of 1/2" copper tubing with 10 feet of 1/2" braided hoses clamped on and it has a fitting for the garden hose. $40.00 includes shipping. Let me know if you need some pics.
 
I was also thinking of trying to make a diy chiller. Haven't priced out copper tubing and don't know how easy it would be to work with (coil) or fit to a pump. After it's all said and done the PITA factor plus cost of materials might push me towards just buying one. Used for $40 sounds like a pretty good deal! Haven't priced new ones yet. If I decide to give it a shot I'll post the results. Cheers!
 
Haven't priced out copper tubing and don't know how easy it would be to work with (coil) or fit to a pump.

It is very easy, but recommend getting something like this just to make it a little easier: http://www.google.com/products/cata...=X&ei=aXuMTeqgI8zAgQfLh9GfDQ&ved=0CCoQ8wIwAA#

After it's all said and done the PITA factor plus cost of materials might push me towards just buying one.

Seriously...took the materials out of home depot bag: had wort chiller in about 7 minutes. Very little PITA feeling.

Used for $40 sounds like a pretty good deal! Haven't priced new ones yet. If I decide to give it a shot I'll post the results. Cheers!

With the military discount (10%) at Home Depot, my own cost $36. ($25 for 3/8 copper), $2 tubing, $4 hose fitting, $2.50 clamps, and tax. Take the deal.
 
I have a 40ft copper immersion chiller, but I plan on converting that to counterflow as I build my single tier rig. I am just not a HUGE fan of immersion chillers if you can go a different route, especially if you are doing 10g batches and have 70f-75f tap water like me.
 
Since I have warm tap water I was thinking of fabricating a chiller with a tank that sits on top of the coil that I could put ice in, then have the outlet lower height than the bottom of the tank so gravity would feed it through the coil then another tank to collect outlet water with a fish tank pump to send it back to the top tank. Keep adding ice to top tank and send
pump outlet down a drain in case of overflow. Think it could work? Don't mind my 5 minute Photoshop drawing skills :)

image-3083427511.jpg
 
Back
Top