Water pump for immersion chiller

Greetings all,

As a home brewer in DC and with the summer heat I have had a hard time getting my wort down to pitching temp using my immersion chiller. My tap water is simply too warm. So i was thinking I could use my tap water to star the process and then use a submersible pump to move ice chilled water through my immersion chiller. This would both help to get the wort down to a suitable pitching temp and since I am recirculating the water there would be less water usage as well. I was thinking about a 250 gph submersible pump. Thoughts?

Thanks

I think mine is a 300 gph fountain pump, and it's fine with my 50' immersion chiller.

Yep, should be fine. You may even want to choke it down a bit at the beginning after switch from tap water.

I use a shurflo pump mounted to the lid of a five gallon bucket. I fill it with tap water and run that for a few minutes until it gets heated, dump it and do that a few times before adding ice. I usually use about ten pounds to get it to pitching temp.
Here is a link to the pump I use.

This sounds like an awesome idea. I saw a ton of them on Amazon that seem pretty affordable. What do you think would be the minimum acceptable flow rate?

I use this tiny pump to recirc ice water from a bucket. Works fine. http://www.harborfreight.com/lawn-garden/pumps/92-gph-miniature-submersible-fountain-pump-68389.html

I use tap water to start then when things slow down I hook up the pump and ice water to get the last few degrees.

Why do you need to start with tap water and then switch to pump?
I want to buy a 520 litre/h, it will be enough? In the same price range is a 600l/h pump.

You don't have to, it is just more efficient. The difference in temps between boiling and tap water are enough to cool boiling down quite a bit. If you use ice, it just melts the ice and you need to get more. Starting with cool water to get down to maybe 100, then using ice/cold water to get it down to the 60s, works really well, without using a lot of ice.

Now i get it... you talk about recirculating the water, i was thinking to run the water through, and get the hot water to use it for cleaning afterwards.
Any ideea if the 500-600 lph pump will work (130-160 gph, i think)? I have a 50' rib cage chiller, 3/8" OD copper.

I ended up buying a cheapo aquarium pump, i believe it is about 150 gph. I have been running tap water through the IC until the wort temp hits 100 or so. After that I hook up the pump and recirculate ice water. Works really well and conserves some water. I typically use the initial outflow water for cleaning and such.

orford said:

I ended up buying a cheapo aquarium pump, i believe it is about 150 gph. I have been running tap water through the IC until the wort temp hits 100 or so. After that I hook up the pump and recirculate ice water. Works really well and conserves some water. I typically use the initial outflow water for cleaning and such.

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What kind of immersion chiller do you have? As i said, i have a 50' rib cage chiller, so i am afraid that a ~150 gph won't be sufficient...

grv said:

I think mine is a 300 gph fountain pump, and it's fine with my 50' immersion chiller.

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This. It even pumps up 5 feet then through the IC. Just enough power to push it nice and slow.

bionut said:

What kind of immersion chiller do you have? As i said, i have a 50' rib cage chiller, so i am afraid that a ~150 gph won't be sufficient...

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150gph should be fine if its a strong enough pump. I'd concentrate more on the head (vertical ft/resistnace) it will push than the gph. Pushing through a 50' chiller, a pump rated for 150gph/20' head will likely give you better performance than a 300gph/7' head.

Well, it seems that those cheap pumps have the vertical head proportional with the gph... how 300 gph with 4' head sounds?

Before I got a plate chiller I used to do the same thing. I used a cheap, like $7 submersible water fountain pump from harbor freight and a stock tank. The tank is used to water livestock and is available at a tractor supply for around $30. I got one about the size of the bathtub my wife no longer allowed me to use. I would put 10lbs of ice in it with water and leave the coil in a bucket of sanitizer returning to the tank about 5-10 min before my boil was done. Then I would submerge the kettle in the tub, add the coil, and put the return out in the yard to waste until the hot water coming out cooled. At first I just recirculated but it melted the ice . I now have plenty of cold water in tub to not have to recirculate and it worked great.

mhobs126 said:

Before I got a plate chiller I used to do the same thing.

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How much faster does the plate chiller chill?