Counterflow vs plate Chiller - recommendations?

[kgg_033]

And first: I understand that a plate chiller IS a counter-flow chiller.
For the purposes of my question, by counterflow chiller I mean the pipe inside of a pipe/hose type.
Curious to know what everyone recommends given these two options.
I just bought a 10 gallon pot in order to do full boils for 5 gallon batches, so it's obviously time to advance past the ice bath in the sink method.
For now, the chiller I purchase would need to be gravity fed - however I intend, down the road, to add a pump for whirl pooling.
Plate chillers seem to be more wallet friendly, especially some of the stuff from Duda Diesel. However, I have read a lot about them clogging with hop material, retaining sludge, difficulty to clean, etc.

I welcome all thoughts! Thanks!

 

[303Dan]

Just my two cents, but if you are planning to whirlpool through the chiller, I would go with the CFC for reasons you already know (clogging). I whirlpool through a pump and then my CFC then back to my whirlpool port and it's smooth sailing. And I've done some heavy hop whirlpools too. Full disclosure, I have a Blichmann HopBlocker in my boil kettle, so I can't comment on how it would go with no filtering device in the path.

 

[Duda_Energy]

A good hops filter is everything. Yes, the plate chiller takes more time to clean - but for a batch 10 gallons or more the time it takes to chill and clean is still less than the time it takes the CFC to chill. Only doing a 2 gallon batch? Go with the CFC.

But then, I'm at bit biased towards plate chillers, so take my advice with a grain of salt~

 

[303Dan]

A good hops filter is everything. Yes, the plate chiller takes more time to clean - but for a batch 10 gallons or more the time it takes to chill and clean is still less than the time it takes the CFC to chill. Only doing a 2 gallon batch? Go with the CFC.

But then, I'm at bit biased towards plate chillers, so take my advice with a grain of salt~

How fast can you chill with your plate chiller? All the experience I have is with my CFC and I can chill in one pass from sub-boiling to 65 degrees F in about 15-20 minutes. Just need to throttle my pump to the right speed while I monitor the thermometer on my chiller output til I hit my desired pitch temp.

Dan

 

[ImNoExpert]

I don't have a plate chiller. From what I've read they are usually more efficient in cooling the wort faster. But for my money, that small efficiency loss is totally offset by the ease of use and care of a CFC. An easy brew day is a happy brew day for me, and a clogged plate chiller would probably ruin my day.

I circulate my wort too which is why I love my CFC. It has never been the source of a problem on brew day.

 

[303Dan]

I don't have a plate chiller. From what I've read they are usually more efficient in cooling the wort faster. But for my money, that small efficiency loss is totally offset by the ease of use and care of a CFC. An easy brew day is a happy brew day for me, and a clogged plate chiller would probably ruin my day.

I circulate my wort too which is why I love my CFC. It has never been the source of a problem on brew day.

Agreed. It's the best solution for me and my process for the same reasons you stated.

 

[kombat]

How fast can you chill with your plate chiller? All the experience I have is with my CFC and I can chill in one pass from sub-boiling to 65 degrees F in about 15-20 minutes.

In the winter (40° F groundwater), I can chill 5 gallons of wort from boiling to 65° F in 2-3 minutes. Seriously. I run it full-speed through the chiller, with the valve wide open, pumping with my Chugger, and as fast as I can fill the fermenter, that's how long it takes to chill the batch.

The summer is a little different story, because the groundwater tends to sit around 70° F, so I have to throttle the flow a bit, and even then I can only get it down to around 75° F, in about 5-6 minutes. I then let it cool the rest of the way in my fermentation chamber.

I love my plate chiller. It's true that they don't play well with hop debris, but there are several solutions to that (hop sock, hop spider, whirlpool, etc.). I use the whirlpool method, and drain my wort from my kettle via a pickup tube that drains from the outer rim of the kettle (while the hop debris and trub collects in a cone in the center, thanks to the whirlpool).

 

[Duda_Energy]

How fast can you chill with your plate chiller?

It all comes down to how fast your water is and how cold your water is. Also, how large of a heat exchanger you get. We have a $1350 industrial sized brewery chiller that can chill a 10 gallon batch in 31 seconds - but that also requires a well pumping out water at 25 gallons a minute - won't work in the garage.

For the typical homebrew $150 unit, with 10 gallon per minute water at 58 degrees, you should be able to pitch 10 gallons to 70 degrees in about 2 min 45 seconds.

 

[Homercidal]

I would recommend checking out a dual-stage immersion chiller (Liek Jaded brewings offerings). They don't have clogging issues like a CFC, and you can clean them easily and can see how clean they are. They are also just about as efficient as most CFC Chillers.

You can also use a pump to recirculate the wort, but the pipe is short and easy to clean as well.

Just my 2Cents. I have used the same CFC I originally built years ago and it works "fine", but after a few batches the inside always gets gunked up somehow. I run a brush through it and black gunk washes out. An IC also won't leave water sitting on the inside.

 

[dye4me]

Ive had a few chillers over the years blichmann therminator was my favourite plate chiller. but like most plates you never know if its clean. Ive baked boiled pressure cooked and CIP my plate chiller but you still get crap coming out. Ive switched to a jaded style cleanable counterflow. just finished my third brew on it and I love being able to see and clean inside the cooling surface.

 

[Queequeg]

I have a plate chiller and it chills amazing fast. I recently had a friend with me for his first brew day and he was astonished that I could chill a 6.5 gallon batch from 208F to 58F in 5-10 mins.

Cleaning then took a while, probably 20 mins with the pump recirculating hot PBW 10mins in one direction and 10 mins in the other.

So IMO plate chillers are not time savers, they are however space savers, since the hot print is small and they do chill supremely fast.

As for the clogging issues, I use a hop spider with no problems.

 

[CA_Mouse]

I have a 400 micron hop screen and have done some very large late and whirlpool hop additions (up to 8 ounces of pellets). Gravity feed from kettle into plate chiller to pump and back to the top of the kettle. 11 gallons usually take about 15 minutes to chill and clean up is pretty easy. As mentioned before 10 minutes pumping backwards through the chiller and then 10 minutes forward has kept mine nice and clean. I just hang it up port sides down to drain and dry until the next brew day.

 

[JaDeDBrewing]

And first: I understand that a plate chiller IS a counter-flow chiller.
For the purposes of my question, by counterflow chiller I mean the pipe inside of a pipe/hose type.
Curious to know what everyone recommends given these two options.
I just bought a 10 gallon pot in order to do full boils for 5 gallon batches, so it's obviously time to advance past the ice bath in the sink method.
For now, the chiller I purchase would need to be gravity fed - however I intend, down the road, to add a pump for whirl pooling.
Plate chillers seem to be more wallet friendly, especially some of the stuff from Duda Diesel. However, I have read a lot about them clogging with hop material, retaining sludge, difficulty to clean, etc.

I welcome all thoughts! Thanks!

So, we are definitely biased-ish, because we clearly sell wort chillers. The difference between our IC's and other plate chillers/CFC's is that we designed our immersion chillers and cleanable CFCs to be as fast or faster at chilling than un-cleanable plate chillers and "normal" CFCs. Also, we are the only manufacturer of homebrewing chillers that will give you a full refund (including all shipping charges) for up to 6 months after your purchase, so you are able to see just how fast our chillers are and how easy they are to clean/sanitize. We are confident that, once you use one of our products, you will never feel the need to 'upgrade' to a non-cleanable plate chiller or CFC.

It all comes down to how fast your water is and how cold your water is. Also, how large of a heat exchanger you get. We have a $1350 industrial sized brewery chiller that can chill a 10 gallon batch in 31 seconds - but that also requires a well pumping out water at 25 gallons a minute - won't work in the garage.

For the typical homebrew $150 unit, with 10 gallon per minute water at 58 degrees, you should be able to pitch 10 gallons to 70 degrees in about 2 min 45 seconds.

Like you said, there's no garage (or home) that has a 25 GPM flow rate. You would also be very hard-pressed to find any residential spigot that can flow at 10 GPM when you take into account the chiller and the associated hoses that are needed to use the chiller. Really, you'll be lucky to get 6 to 7 GPM into the chiller. That being said, the Hydra will chill at pretty much the same speed as the plate chiller that your referencing AND only take 30 seconds to clean...with water only. NOT with the extremely caustic (Lye) or acidic solutions that are recommended to clean any plate chiller to ensure sanitization.

How is a homebrewer moving hot wort through a plate chiller at 4 GPM? Any flow rate of wort moving through a plate chiller (like your referenced) that is close to 4GPM would require the boil kettle to be up around 20ft in the air (using only gravity) or purchasing a food grade pump. The only food grade pumps available that are capable of pushing 4GPM of wort through a plate chiller are about $100 plus shipping. Also, you need to include the cost of all the associated tubing, valves, and fittings for the complete system to work the way you are describing. To match the chilling speed of our brew kettle Hydra ($155) and brew kettle King Cobra ($175) ICs with the plate chiller that you referenced, you need AT LEAST a $300 investment, and that doesn't include the extra time that it takes to "clean" the chiller...

 

[passedpawn]

I've been using a Blichman Therminator since 2009. Still working great to this day. I never make less than 20g of beer on a brewday. I make a lot of hoppy beers. So I'll say that I'm pretty happy with it.

Is it perfect? No. I do worry about clogging, and if I do back-to-back IPAs, I've got to backwash it with hose between batches. I use a hop spider and for other types of beers, no problem.

Cleaning: I fill my system with hot PBW solution and circulate through everything, including the plate chiller, for a few hours. That's all I do. Ignore jaded's comments above regarding lye. That is NOT the recommended cleaning regimen from Blichmann. John Blichmann told me he only uses PBW himself.

I've thought about other sorts of CFC chillers. They probably all work great. I'm not too worried about which one is faster since they are all ridiculously faster than my old IC. Jaded has some pretty nice stuff, but they are pretty largish and that isn't ideal for my system. I was always intrigued by Jamil's chiller. I've got a fat 5500W element in the middle of my keggle that gets in the way of any of the IC chillers.

 

[JaDeDBrewing]

Ignore jaded's comments above regarding lye. That is NOT the recommended cleaning regimen from Blichmann. John Blichmann told me he only uses PBW himself.

Yes, Blichmann says not to use lye. However, Duda Diesel has recommended it in the past

The following is a quote from the linked forum topic:

We clean ours using a lye bath, as lye will destroy everything organic and leave the unit sanitized (just rinse it very well, and wear protective gear)

That is why we brought it up...

I've got a fat 5500W element in the middle of my keggle that gets in the way of any of the IC chillers.

We have a few different options for brewers with heating elements that would like to use an immersion chiller. So far, they have been custom builds, but we hope to have some new products on our website soon!

 

[Natdavis777]

I used a Duda 30 plate chiller in conjunction with a 300 micron hop spider. I dont have to worry about hop debris in my chiller.

I whirlpool while chilling, hence causing cold break material in my kettle. But that is it. Once I see my output temp below 70F, I let the kettle rest for 20 min, the run off into the fermentors. By this time, wort temps comes out @ 62-64F (unless in hot summer months). The only thing I have to worry about is some break material making it to the fermentor, which I am fine with.

If I didnt have a spider, than a CFC or IC would be a better application. But with my current setup, I dont have to worry about that, so a PC works well for me. It just all depends on your setup and process.

 

[Horseshoot]

as for the clogging issues, i use a hop spider with no problems.

+1

 

[T-townaler]

I've been using a Brazetek plate chiller since 2008. Put it together with some quick release stainless steel connectors. CIP with hot PBW circulated with a March pump. Hob blocker on the boil pot. No probs.

 

[JBOGAN]

If you control your hop debris and clean the plate chiller immediately after brew day you should never have a problem. Plate chillers getting clogged and dirty are more user error than product failure. As much as we may not like cleaning its part of every step from grain to glass and that will never change.

 

[eric19312]

I used a homemade CFC for 10 batches and then switched to an upgraded IC. Really thought about the JadeD Hydra but in the end wallet won and I got a 1/2 inch 50' copper from NYBrewSupply. Probably not as fast as JadeD but does the job in my 11 gallon batches in similar time that I was seeing with CFC.

IC is as others have said easy to clean and easy to sanitize. I like that it seems to drop the temperature of bulk wort from boiling to 185F very quickly. That is temp I do my hop stand.