GLYCOL CHILLER FOR WORT CHILLING

[Lynxpilot]

Any reason I couldn't pump hot wort after boil into the fermenter that is equipped with glycol chiller and do the wort chill in the fermenter?

 

[Jag75]

I've never done it, but I've transferred when wort was about 90f and it was fine. 200f + wort might put a massive load on the chiller but I really don't know.

 

[KepowOb]

I think it was on Brew Strong where they talked about it quickly. Might be mixing up my podcasts, but either way, glycol is good at keeping low temperatures, water is better at actually cooling things down.

Also, your glycol is being recirculated. When it's keeping something cold, that's fine, but if your cooling something hot, it's going to keep some of that even as it passes through the cooling side. It might be able to do it, but it might take a long time. That said, I never tried and there are smarter people on here than me, so maybe I'm off base.

 

[deuc224]

I do this now because viking grain is not giving me what i need so im boiling off a lot more wort to hit the FG, so instead of running it thru the CFC, i just throw it in the fermenter and glycol cools it down. Takes about 1.5 hrs to get it from 175 to 65, but i live in el paso and the water here will only get it to about 90.

 

[Golddiggie]

My biggest concern with cooling hot (~200F) wort once in fermenter with a glycol chiller is the amount of strain placed on said glycol chiller for the hours it will be running to do this.

Of course, the water I chill mine with rarely gets above 55F even in the summer time (well water). With the chiller I have, I can get to pitch temperature (or just under) quickly and easily.

For the OP: what type of wort chiller are you currently using? It might be more effective to get the wort to the lowest temperature possible before it goes into fermenter and then use the glycol chiller to get it to yeast pitch temp. Instead of having the glycol chiller doing everything.

 

[Nate R]

It might be more effective to get the wort to the lowest temperature possible before it goes into fermenter and then use the glycol chiller to get it to yeast pitch temp. Instead of having the glycol chiller doing everything

This!
Isn't this how professional chillers work? 2-stage- water for the first round (200° to say 90 or so) then swap to glycol.
You could simply pump cold water using your existing system right? (Maybe from a bucket or sink).
You would get a better cold break right?

 

[Beholder]

It’s a bad idea to put it all on your chiller - instead drop it to a reasonable level (I usually stop around approach temp of 10F). The reason for this is that all that heat dropped in your glycol will push refrigerant temperature high, which will over-pressure your compressor and kill it. It won’t break it right away, but you will be getting a new one sooner than expected.

 

[oakbarn]

In my new Phoenix Brewery (I had a Barn fire unrelated to my Brewery), I plan to use a Glycol Chiller to cool the wort. In the past I chilled water in a Freezer and pumped that though a Duda Diesel Plate Chiller. I am still going to use some chilled water, but it will be recycled through a Plate Chiller that will use the Glycol as the cooling medium. The Chilled water will then go though a different Plate Chiller as the cooling medium for the Wort. Glycol Return should not be that warm as it is only chilling water. I do not think you could use just the Glycol to cool the Wort as it would return to the Chiller at too high a temperature. I have not done this but it the returned Gylcol is too hot, I will chill with tap water until the Glycol can handle it.

 

[deuc224]

Just a thought, are we acting like a glycol chiller isnt a small AC into a water bath? How long do AC units last run constantly? For years and years and years, so does the compressor really work "harder" or is it just on? Genuinely asking cuz i have been thinking this for a while.

 

[Mr. Vern]

so does the compressor really work "harder" or is it just on

A normal refrigeration circuit maintains a temperature rise of only 10-20 degrees Fahrenheit. This is referred to as the Superheat (refrigerant temperature rise across the cold heat exchanger). So, if the heat exchanger is cooling HOT fluid it will most certainly overwhelm the refrigeration circuit unless it was designed for that duty. Chillers are not designed for direct batch cooling, they are designed for roughly 10-20 rise on the water loop.

Why is excessive heat a problem? Consider the refrigeration compressor which is a hermetically sealed motor & pump often referred to as a "tin can" compressor. It uses cold return gas to keep the motor cool. This is called a "Suction Cooled" refrigerant compressor.

Ill say it again because it is important... It uses cold return gas to keep the motor cool. With high return temperature the motor will start to heat up inside the tin can.

Most thermal overloads activate at 130F +/-, the motor will cycle on overload if you are lucky, and fail prematurely when exposed to high superheat conditions.

And that is only the cold side of your refrigerant circuit. Cooling a 5 gallon batch or wort from boil down to 100F (10 minutes) would be near 2.5 TONS of heat load, your 110V glycol chiller is most likely a 1/2 ton unit.... it simply cannot reject that much heat fast enough.

Head pressure will spike due to the heat it cannot reject, this in turn will increase pressure to your capillary tube "expansion valve", the cap tube is a fixed length and operating at higher pressure = higher temperature (see motor cooling above, you get where I am going)

IMO... You'd do better with some frozen pop bottles at the ready, drop them into your glycol tank and turn off the refrigeration unit (allow the pump to circulate and take the BTUs from the frozen bottles.

 

[oakbarn]

The unit I purchased says not to have the return glycol in excess of 90 degrees F. That is the reason I will cool tap water with the glycol and use the chilled water to cool the wort. My plan is to recycle the water that I am using but will only do so if it does not get too hot itself. If it does, I will drain the water to my garden area and just cool tap water.

 

[Golddiggie]

If the water you use to chill your wort isn't cool enough (year round) there are ways to get it to be cool enough. I recall seeing someone (a brewery IIRC) that had a trash barrel filled with ice water that he set a large IC into that he ran the water to chill his wort through. It would then go into the wort chiller (don't recall the type for the wort) and get it to the desired temperature even when the ground water was warmer.

IMO, that would be better than abusing a glycol chiller. It will also use less power to get the job done. IF you already have an efficient wort chiller (plate or CFC) then you'll have less of a battle to chill the wort. IME, plate chillers (when sized properly) are hard to beat for chilling wort fast.

 

[oakbarn]

If the water you use to chill your wort isn't cool enough (year round) there are ways to get it to be cool enough. I recall seeing someone (a brewery IIRC) that had a trash barrel filled with ice water that he set a large IC into that he ran the water to chill his wort through. It would then go into the wort chiller (don't recall the type for the wort) and get it to the desired temperature even when the ground water was warmer.

IMO, that would be better than abusing a glycol chiller. It will also use less power to get the job done. IF you already have an efficient wort chiller (plate or CFC) then you'll have less of a battle to chill the wort. IME, plate chillers (when sized properly) are hard to beat for chilling wort fast.

I have 2 plate chillers:
1: to chill tap water with glycol as cooling medium
2: to chill Wort using the chilled water as the cooling medium, I talked to the nanufactuer of the glycol chiller and he said it should be fine doing that.

 

[Golddiggie]

I have 2 plate chillers:
1: to chill tap water with glycol as cooling medium
2: to chill Wort using the chilled water as the cooling medium, I talked to the nanufactuer of the glycol chiller and he said it should be fine doing that.

I guess I'm just lucky that my chill/ground water is cool enough (even in the summer) where I can hit pitch temp in less than 10 minutes. For the batch I brewed on Monday I think the total time to chill almost 8 gallons of wort was about 5-6 minutes. That hit about 68F at the end. The only reason it was that warm was I ran hot wort through the chiller for a few seconds (at full rate) before adding the chill water and reducing the wort flow rate.

I plan to run Starsan through the plate chiller before next brew day, then evacuate it by blowing ultra-clean/dry air through it. I'll then put a length of tubing between both ends of the wort loop (also sanitized) to keep it closed off. Doing that should make it ready for wort to chill without needing to run hot wort through it first. The only real reason I'm doing that is the plate chiller is mounted to my brew stand. I'd rather not remove it if I don't need to. With running PBW solution through it this past brew day, plus rinse water, it's clean and just needs to be sanitized before use. I plan to do this moving forward. I actually had the PBW in my BK to clean the element in position so I didn't need to mix up PBW in a bucket in elsewhere to let it soak to get cleaned. That actually worked out really well.

 

[oakbarn]

1 ++ on cleaning plate chiller. We run PBW through it for an two hours then hot water to rinse while we are cleaning any vessel. We just add the chiller in the loop. Between vessels we reverse the cleaning flow. We sanitize for apx 45 min during the boil. Not too hard and adds nothing to any time as we are either boiling or cleaning anyway.
.

 

[deuc224]

A normal refrigeration circuit maintains a temperature rise of only 10-20 degrees Fahrenheit. This is referred to as the Superheat (refrigerant temperature rise across the cold heat exchanger). So, if the heat exchanger is cooling HOT fluid it will most certainly overwhelm the refrigeration circuit unless it was designed for that duty. Chillers are not designed for direct batch cooling, they are designed for roughly 10-20 rise on the water loop.

Why is excessive heat a problem? Consider the refrigeration compressor which is a hermetically sealed motor & pump often referred to as a "tin can" compressor. It uses cold return gas to keep the motor cool. This is called a "Suction Cooled" refrigerant compressor.

Ill say it again because it is important... It uses cold return gas to keep the motor cool. With high return temperature the motor will start to heat up inside the tin can.

Most thermal overloads activate at 130F +/-, the motor will cycle on overload if you are lucky, and fail prematurely when exposed to high superheat conditions.

And that is only the cold side of your refrigerant circuit. Cooling a 5 gallon batch or wort from boil down to 100F (10 minutes) would be near 2.5 TONS of heat load, your 110V glycol chiller is most likely a 1/2 ton unit.... it simply cannot reject that much heat fast enough.

Head pressure will spike due to the heat it cannot reject, this in turn will increase pressure to your capillary tube "expansion valve", the cap tube is a fixed length and operating at higher pressure = higher temperature (see motor cooling above, you get where I am going)

IMO... You'd do better with some frozen pop bottles at the ready, drop them into your glycol tank and turn off the refrigeration unit (allow the pump to circulate and take the BTUs from the frozen bottles.

Thanks a million for the detailed reply, guess ill cool it to tap temps and then throw it in the fermenter.

 

[Lynxpilot]

Thanks all for replies. I'm just going to use a coil wort chiller using our well water. Well water here is about 70F, so it shouldn't be too long.