sanitizing & drying a plate chiller

what are some of your methods? directions say do not store away wet, sounds tough to get all the water out with all those small channels.

icu812 said:

what are some of your methods? directions say do not store away wet, sounds tough to get all the water out with all those small channels.

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I've only used mine for my last two batches, and this question is on my mind as well. Many people bake them in an oven, but I don't much feel like heating up my oven for an hour for this purpose. I also have disconnects mounted on it which have rubber parts that wouldn't stand up to the heat.

So far, I'm just draining the chiller as thoroughly as possible, then blowing compressed air through it for several minutes. After a while, the air comes out dry so I hope this is doing the trick. I may rig up an adapter to my heat-shrink gun, so I can blow hot air through.

For sanitizing, I'm just pumping boiling wort through it for a few minutes with the cooling water off. Then I recirculate to the kettle until the wort reaches pitching temp.

NECRO-BUMP

I was about to post a similar question when I found this old post....I have used my blichmann plate chiller 7 times now and have never been able to get it 100% dry on the inside. I have tried baking it in the oven at 220 for a hour and it still does not do the trick!!

I am afraid of mold/bacteria growing on the inside!

Do I need an air compressor to get this thing dry?!?

As long as you get the gunk out and clean it thoroughly before and after each use you will be fine. Just let her hang with the wort ports down to drip dry and nothing substantial will grow in there. Then when ready for use, run hot PBW through her again, rinse, and sanitize, and you will be golden. I have used my 40 plate chiller for about 15 batches now and have been infection free. I let it sit in some starsan for about 20 min prior to use.... Good luck

EDIT: Also I must say, I have never used PBW before about the last three batches to clean with and wow, it works wonders on clearing the plate chiller of gunk....

Agreed, the most important thing is to get any crap out of it before storing ....I use a small fountain jump to flush it with cleaner and sanitize with starsan ...and then attempt to dry it in the oven ...I always pump starsan through it on brew day as well, and then usually run the hot wort through it for a few mins (before turning on the cooling) as well.

I can tell you how the brewpub where I worked did it: Back-flush with water, then recirculate with a sanitizing solution, and lock the liquid in place with 2 valves. When you use it the next time, flush with fresh water, and recirculate hot wort through it before turning on the water.

How I do it at home: Once I'm done using it, I flush with plenty of water (from my well). Then I leave it by the sink and hook up a 1/2" line to it, and every now and then when I walk by, I open the hot water tap to flush it out. When I use it the next time, I flush with fresh water, and recirculate hot wort through it before turning on the water.

MC

Misplaced_Canuck said:

I can tell you how the brewpub where I worked did it: Back-flush with water, then recirculate with a sanitizing solution, and lock the liquid in place with 2 valves. When you use it the next time, flush with fresh water, and recirculate hot wort through it before turning on the water.

How I do it at home: Once I'm done using it, I flush with plenty of water (from my well). Then I leave it by the sink and hook up a 1/2" line to it, and every now and then when I walk by, I open the hot water tap to flush it out. When I use it the next time, I flush with fresh water, and recirculate hot wort through it before turning on the water.

MC

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Are you saying you store it wet? Would this not lead to mineral deposits and corrosion?

conneryis007 said:

Are you saying you store it wet? Would this not lead to mineral deposits and corrosion?

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It's darn near impossible to dry it out, so I keep it wet and run water through it periodically.

MC

Very interesting...I never considered storing it wet! Would it be best to store it full of tap water, star san or pbw?

conneryis007 said:

Very interesting...I never considered storing it wet! Would it be best to store it full of tap water, star san or pbw?

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The brewpub where I worked used iodophor, but I'd prefer a sanitizer (non-chlorine) over a cleaner. But... that's just me.

If you're worried about mineral deposits (I am not - I'm more concerned about hop debris), you could also use a solution of distilled water + your preferred sanitizer.

Keep in mind that we used the plate chiller every week at the brewpub.



MC

conneryis007 said:

Are you saying you store it wet? Would this not lead to mineral deposits and corrosion?

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Corrosion?

On stainless steel?

I store mine full of star-san with the ports capped. I've been doing this for probably 10 batches or so now with no ill-effects. I just flush it with clean hot water before using.

Doesn't the Blichman instructions tell you not to leave an acid based sanitizer in it ? I could be wrong, it's been well over a year since I looked at them.

kombat said:

Corrosion?

On stainless steel?

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Leave your SS BK full of a strong bleach solution for a week or two and then you'll be able to tell us all about corrosion on stainless steel

But...In this case, the concern is the copper that is used to fuse the stainless steel plates together...

Cheers!

So do most people just get as much water as they can out and then not worry about the rest that stays inside?

kombat said:

Corrosion?

On stainless steel?

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It's stainless, not rustless
But I would be more concerned about storing it full of acid sanitiser or cleaner and the copper reacting.

conneryis007 said:

So do most people just get as much water as they can out and then not worry about the rest that stays inside?

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After cleaning, yes, that's all I bother with. I could use my compressor to dry it out further but there's probably all kinds of crap in my compressor tank that I'd rather not coat my chiller with

On brew day I'll circulate boiling water through it from my BK while mashing, then it'll see 5 to 10 minutes of boiling wort before turning on the cooling water side...

Cheers!