One very happy brewer

I wish to give a Big shout out for the people of Spike brewing And Jaded Brewing I ordered a 20 gallon brew pot from Spike and A Jaded hydra from Jaded. They both arrived in 7 days on the same truck in perfect condition. I know who I will recommend in the future. Thanks again!

Have you used the Hydra yet? Been contemplating buying one. Ive seen the performance results, but Im curious about water savings. I have a standard, no frills 25' immersion chiller and I know the Hydra is supposed to chill faster, I just wanna know how it does in the water savings department (being from CA and all)

Kev I have not used it yet. I am not concerned with the water being saved as my yard will use it. It will be 3 weeks before I brew again!

kev211 said:

Have you used the Hydra yet? Been contemplating buying one. Ive seen the performance results, but Im curious about water savings. I have a standard, no frills 25' immersion chiller and I know the Hydra is supposed to chill faster, I just wanna know how it does in the water savings department (being from CA and all)

Click to expand...

The most important aspect of chiller performance is temperature of the cooling water!

If your tap water is not that cold in CA, much greater efficiency would be realized adding ice to your process with a cheap pond pump and recirculating ice water using your existing chiller.

Exchanging less water use for some electricity to make ice....

If your tap water is 70 or above, the best chiller in the world won't get you to pitching temps of mid 60's. Another option is to chill below say 90-100 and finish chilling in a ferm chamber prior to pitching.

If you want to be really green, try no chill....

wilserbrewer said:

The most important aspect of chiller performance is temperature of the cooling water!

If your tap water is not that cold in CA, much greater efficiency would be realized adding ice to your process with a cheap pond pump and recirculating ice water using your existing chiller.

Exchanging less water use for some electricity to make ice....

If your tap water is 70 or above, the best chiller in the world won't get you to pitching temps of mid 60's. Another option is to chill below say 90-100 and finish chilling in a ferm chamber prior to pitching.

If you want to be really green, try no chill....

Click to expand...

Ya I've contemplated the pump. I actually chilled down to 90 this weekend and used my ferm chamber to do the rest. It's not so much about being green. It's the fact that water is so dang expensive here haha.

wilserbrewer said:

The most important aspect of chiller performance is temperature of the cooling water!

If your tap water is not that cold in CA, much greater efficiency would be realized adding ice to your process with a cheap pond pump and recirculating ice water using your existing chiller.

Exchanging less water use for some electricity to make ice....

If your tap water is 70 or above, the best chiller in the world won't get you to pitching temps of mid 60's. Another option is to chill below say 90-100 and finish chilling in a ferm chamber prior to pitching.

If you want to be really green, try no chill....

Click to expand...

My water was 64 degrees monday and this is winter. I do use the ice water thru the chiller to get down the last 25 degrees and it does the job fine. I just moved to the larger 10 gallon batch and thought that the better chiller would get me to 90 quicker that my old 25 ft chiller.