50 foot 1/2 inch SS coil

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I bought one of those last year. Had the same thoughts as you.

All I can say is I hope you have better luck than me.

Great product, but I couldn't bend it without kinking. I tried 3 or 4 different tubing Henderson with no luck.
 
You are going to kink it. .020 wall is very thin
This is from experience.

The tools you link will not work and you will get tons of kinks and wrinkles when trying to bend that thin a wall.
 
I wouldn't say it can't be done but it is not easy. I used a borrowed ratchet bender from a friend to make bends for my dip tubes but needed to ratchet down and move a little then ratchet and repeat to get good 90* bends. I used a bucket and allot of patience and strength to bend around a bucket for my heat exchanger coil. They turned out well with little to no kinking but I did kink a few pieces trying to find the best way to bend it. Good luck and take your time it's nothing like bending copper for sure...:mug:
 
you guys are not giving a real warm feeling about doing this.. LOL
 
Then what machine do you have to get in order to make it look good, I am thinking this time about going with copper, but down the road I want to be able to bend SS, not just for brewing, but for my boat too. Thanks
 
You won't be able to bend 1/2" stainless easily. The machine to bend it properly inserts a mandrel inside as it bends so it doesn't kink. I got a quote from Chicago bending to do a 316ss 1/2" 25 foot herms coil and it was over $100. The Ebay link above from ny brew supply ( they also have a website which is a bit cheaper) they said they could not custom bend the 1/2" ss. They did bend me 1/2" copper to my specs For a herms coil and did a very nice job. I would rather pay them to bend it than me kink up a $70 roll of copper.
 
I would recommend just seeing if NY Brew Supply(where I got my chiller) or anyone else, will make it for you. It's not listed on their product page, but i'm quite sure they can do it, being that they are the ones selling the SS tubing on eBay. I personally prefer copper, but if you want the SS route, I'm sure they'll accommodate at a good price. http://www.nybrewsupply.com/wort-chillers.html
 
I am trying to finished coiling mine up.

I ended up buying a 1/2" conduit bender and just going at it slow go. some kinks but nothing terrible.

I still have to coil it down about 1/2 all the way around.

HAHA tried to post from home depot but their site is UNDER CONSTRUCTION..

pics to come
 
Photos

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There is a solution.

I coiled 35' of thin walled 1/2" stainless tubing to aproxamately to a 10" to 11" diameter. Without kinks!

A piping bender will not work as I tried that first. You will most likely need to use 90/45 degree compression fittings once coiled as it is to thin to bend.

I had to spend close to $400 for the tooling to do this. (I had already bought the SS tubing and did not want to use copper) (I am stubborn to boot)

FYI, once kinked, forever kinked. Probaly used up 10' of the tubing trying different methods. With my tooling now I can coil that tubing in about 20 minutes of work.
 
HopsJunkie said:
I would recommend just seeing if NY Brew Supply(where I got my chiller) or anyone else, will make it for you. It's not listed on their product page, but i'm quite sure they can do it, being that they are the ones selling the SS tubing on eBay. I personally prefer copper, but if you want the SS route, I'm sure they'll accommodate at a good price. http://www.nybrewsupply.com/wort-chillers.html
Click to expand...

I tried to get them to make a CFC out of stainless for me. They said NO .
 
BargainFittings said:
All the links are for pipe benders.
They are calling it tube but the stuff they are bending is basically conduit or larger bore 1" + steel tubes

Tubing is a different animal
Click to expand...
Very well said and I agree 100%

Forming the main coil would not be that big of a deal. However, forming the input & output is a whole 'nother ball game. Same with copper - but - copper is much more forgiving (if done properly).

Just my 2 cents..
 
for those that do want to try it. I got my coil from zorotools.com also mcmaster is cheaper than grainger. zoro normally has coupon codes available too.
 
Just had my go at the coiling process. Filled the tube with dry masonry sand and capped both ends with the plastic caps the coil came with and some duct tape for good measure. I really filled the coil well with sand and ended up with two small kinks. One I can live with (no chance of blockage) and the other will be cut off due to distance from wort in/wort out fittings on the HLT/HEX. This would have gone better if I had used a buddy to sit on the keg to provide assistance coiling, as opposed to using my girlfriend to simply sit on the filled corny which I still was moving around quite a bit. For anyone planning their build and curious how tall a 50' section of 1/2" tubing ends up when coiled around a corny, the answer is 12".

EDIT: Air compressor works wonders for pushing out the sand when completed.

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Kal is selling SS Herms coils on theelectricbrewery.com but they don't come cheap. Judging by how hard it is to make your own and how much tubing you could waste, it might be worth it. I think this is one item where you would only DIY it out of stubbornness, or switch to copper.
 
So how much would you charge us to coil it since you have the tooling? FYI I need a 50 coil to fit inside of a sankey keg for a HERMS coil.

Texan said:
There is a solution.

I coiled 35' of thin walled 1/2" stainless tubing to aproxamately to a 10" to 11" diameter. Without kinks!

A piping bender will not work as I tried that first. You will most likely need to use 90/45 degree compression fittings once coiled as it is to thin to bend.

I had to spend close to $400 for the tooling to do this. (I had already bought the SS tubing and did not want to use copper) (I am stubborn to boot)

FYI, once kinked, forever kinked. Probaly used up 10' of the tubing trying different methods. With my tooling now I can coil that tubing in about 20 minutes of work.
Click to expand...
 
A couple of things I learned when building my coil that may help others. I have done extensive testing and determined the following-

I use a Chugger pump to pump through my 40' X 1/2" heat exchanger coil and flow is restricted quite a bit. Approx 25-35%. All fittings, connections and tubing are a minimum 1/2" I.D. accept the heat exchanger tubing is .040mm smaller I.D. I would not have been happy with 3/8". I highly recommend 1/2" tubing over the 3/8" to achieve good flow.

Another way I improved flow through the heat exchanger is to pump into the coil at the top. This reduces head pressure and will increase flow. I was looking for the best flow possible because I use the heat exchanger for cooling as well as mashing and wanted to achieve a whirlpool in the boil kettle after leaving the coil.

I Phone 244.jpg
 
MaxOut said:
A couple of things I learned when building my coil that may help others. I have done extensive testing and determined the following-

I use a Chugger pump to pump through my 40' X 1/2" heat exchanger coil and flow is restricted quite a bit. Approx 25-35%. All fittings, connections and tubing are a minimum 1/2" I.D. accept the heat exchanger tubing is .040mm smaller I.D. I would not have been happy with 3/8". I highly recommend 1/2" tubing over the 3/8" to achieve good flow.

Another way I improved flow through the heat exchanger is to pump into the coil at the top. This reduces head pressure and will increase flow. I was looking for the best flow possible because I use the heat exchanger for cooling as well as mashing and wanted to achieve a whirlpool in the boil kettle after leaving the coil.
Click to expand...
I'm using 50' x 3/8" with a chugger pump throttled back about 10-20% and I have excellent flow. I have a buddy that has 40' x 1/2" running a march 809 that needs to be restricted well over 50% to slow down his flow to achieve sufficient heat transfer. I also pump into the top of the coil, not sure if he does.

What kind of GPM do you think you are achieving?
 
zeus53219 said:
I'm using 50' x 3/8" with a chugger pump throttled back about 10-20% and I have excellent flow. I have a buddy that has 40' x 1/2" running a march 809 that needs to be restricted well over 50% to slow down his flow to achieve sufficient heat transfer. I also pump into the top of the coil, not sure if he does.

What kind of GPM do you think you are achieving?
Click to expand...

During mash I have to restrict the flow as well @ about 80% to achieve good heat transfer and not disturb grain bed. During cool I need as much flow as possible to whirlpool at end of cool. Saves me from having to reconfigure lines after cool to bypass heat exchanger coil and whirlpool just in the BK. I will check my records to see the actual GPM but it was around 25% - 35% less than average when cycling through coil in cool configuration.

Cool Configuration Example - out of BK to pump in, pump out to coil in, coil out to BK whirlpool in. All minimum 1/2" I.D except coil.

It may be the smaller diameter tubing is increasing the velocity but still has reduced volume over the larger tubing. I would be curious to know what you GPM is with the coil in line verses without?
 

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