markwilliambrown
New Member
I'm looking to make a homemade glycol chiller and feeling out ideas for the project right now. I've seen posts in which window AC units are ripped apart and the cooling coils are set in a glycol bath. That strikes me as incredibly inefficient. Wouldn't it be better to build a counterflow system? Copper counterflow wort chillers are readily available. Wouldn't it be possible to charge the interior coil with freon, and run glycol through the outside coil?
Now, copper does have issues with pitting over time if the glycol breaks down, but I don't think at low temperatures this is much of a concern. Perhaps I am wrong.
I would think that the counterflow chiller could be put inside a small cooler and then filled with an expanding foam insulation. A separate, larger cooler could house the glycol and be pumped through the coil. On the out side of the coil, a manifold of actuated valves could control if glycol is sent to the jacketed fermenter. I would imagine that the return line could just go directly in the cooler, as a large enough counterflow chiller would get the glycol pretty cold, pretty quickly and the excess heat added to the the cooler with the glycol in it would be pretty insignificant.
Thoughts?
Now, copper does have issues with pitting over time if the glycol breaks down, but I don't think at low temperatures this is much of a concern. Perhaps I am wrong.
I would think that the counterflow chiller could be put inside a small cooler and then filled with an expanding foam insulation. A separate, larger cooler could house the glycol and be pumped through the coil. On the out side of the coil, a manifold of actuated valves could control if glycol is sent to the jacketed fermenter. I would imagine that the return line could just go directly in the cooler, as a large enough counterflow chiller would get the glycol pretty cold, pretty quickly and the excess heat added to the the cooler with the glycol in it would be pretty insignificant.
Thoughts?