Fast, simple external cooling method

According to the "Mythbusters" the fastest way to cool down a six-pack, or wort or fermenter, is to use ice + water + salt. They got a room temp six-pack down to 35.9 degrees in 5 min. So next time try adding salt to your sink full of ice and water. I'm not sure what the amount of salt should be but salt is cheap so pour on a lot.

I wonder if this would help with a wort chiller much. Maybe it would save the amount of ice I put in it.

except salt + water + copper tubing = corroded copper

I use this method with my brew pot in the sink. It really seems to help keep the water/ice cold longer. I guess I use about 3-4 tbsp of salt total.

I don't have any sort of chiller yet, so (inspired by this mythbusters episode as well) I bought 20 lbs of ice for about 3 bucks, went home made an ice bath with the 20 lbs, cold tap water and just took the salt shaker and shook a good amount of salt in the water. My hands went numb agitating the ice, and my wort chilled down to about 70 degrees faster than ever. I was also wondering the effects of the salt water on my SS pot though, anybody know?

Lurpinator said:

I was also wondering the effects of the salt water on my SS pot though, anybody know?

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Stainless steel is in reality corrosion resistant steel. It's not corrosion proof, but it won't corrode easily. A little bit of salt water won't hurt it unless it sits in it for a long time (or dries on it). A quick rinse and you'll be good.

Thinking of secondary chilling methods for my full-boil aluminium pot: how badly does salt corrode aluminium? Does the protective layer of aluminium oxide protect it effectively?

As a wort chiller it shouldn't be in the salt water long enough to make a difference. Just make sure and rinse the pot off ASAP.

Well as it stands now it takes 30 minutes for me to cool my wort. You think that will be too long assuming I don't get any better time with the salt? Of course I would rinse right after...

I'll have to try salt next time. i just bought 16lbs. of ice, and put half in one sink, half in another (both with water, of course), put the pot into the first until the ice was melted, then into the second. After that, it was 74 degrees, total time < 10min (starting from boiling).

stainless steel pre-chiller on your wort chiller with the ice + water + salt will definitely help chill your wort faster. my buddy has one but i've been too lazy/busy to work on mine.

Bah. If you're going for the "fastest" way to chill something like your boil pot, or a six pack, is to use a dry ice/acetone bath.

Mythbusters is pretty sloppy in my view. When they started out they were great, but now they are just acting silly and blowing stuff up. It's not very fun any more. I remember when they said it was "impossible" to create a gunpowder-driven engine. I can prove, with almost no constructing anything, that this is blatantly false. Take a fully automatic machine gun/assault rifle, attach an arm to the bolt, and use the arm to turn a turbine. Voila. As long as you have ammunition and you hold down the trigger, you will generate power via a self-sustaining gunpowder-powered engine.

The idea is for fast, simple and cheap. I'm sure the dry ice and acetone would work but who has that readily available in their kitchen? Plus the acetone is very strong smelling and not something you want going down the drain. Let alone explosive. I'd rather kill my brain cells drinking the end product and not by cooling the wort :cross:

yeah, i think this is more of a home thing. ya know, for HOMEbrewing

i have access to acetone, but nah...i don't want to set anything on fire that close to my beer.

HBHause said:

The idea is for fast, simple and cheap. I'm sure the dry ice and acetone would work but who has that readily available in their kitchen?

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And acetone is extremely carcinogenic (unfortunately for me - we used to run around the lab waving our acetone covered hands).

i would hope people wash their equipment after they use it, including flushing the lines of thier wort chillers.

think of an ice cream maker. you add ice cubes and rock salt.

for our purposes we need contact so adding water to the mix allows for good contact coverage. the salt allows the water to become colder then just ice water. this will allow for faster cooling,but it wont allow for less ice to be used. took me 30 to 45 min in an ice water bath. that included draining and filling the sink again with ice and water and salt. you will also want to stir the wort to ensure contact with the outside of the pot.

using the salt water to use a pre-chiller would work as would recirculating the water, but you will go through ice as well but you'll be cooling faster using an IC with recirculating ice water after you get the temp down as low as you can using no pump.

Thanks for the tip. I use the ice bath method myself. This will come in handy.

Does adding salt to ice and water cause a temperature drop? Yes. This is how old-fashioned ice cream makers lowered the temperature of the ice cream below water's ordinary freezing point. A mixture of rock salt, ice, and water packed in the bucket around the ice cream mix can bring the temperature down as low as -21°C.

Why does the temperature drop? Energy is required to snap the hydrogen bonds that hold the ice together. The melting ice draws that energy from the surrounding solution as heat. - http://antoine.frostburg.edu/chem/senese/101/solutions/faq/why-salt-cools-icewater.shtml

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Just a little something I found that may help others understand why this works.

That's good info, thanks.

noisy123 said:

And acetone is extremely carcinogenic (unfortunately for me - we used to run around the lab waving our acetone covered hands).

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Yes, but isopropyl alcohol works pretty well for this too. The freezing point is a bit higher, but you can still chill a beer really fast when you plunge it into -25F slush.

I have actually done this. I was chilling metal specimens for a low-temperature test, and used the leftover alcohol to chill a beer in about a minute and a half.