Weizenheimer
Well-Known Member
If you brew outside, how can you cool your beer to 80 degrees when it's 100 outside? I have an immersion chiller but I'm concerned it may not be enough. Any suggestions?
Hot beer, hot weather
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Choguy03
Well-Known Member
you could try using a 5 gallon pail and fill it with ice and water mix. Let is sit till most of the ice has melted. Until most of the ice melts, that water is still actually cooling. Make a siphon by putting the ice bucket up high and the out spout on the ground. I think that should work. Or a pre-immersion chiller in a bucket of ice water.
Use a prechiller. A smaller version of your wort chiller, dumped in a bucket of ice water. THis then connects to your normal chiller.
Shaggy
Well-Known Member
I'll be carrying my hot wort from outside into my basement then using my IC there connected to my slop sink.
I'll also transfer into carboy there and now that temps are up in Chicagoland, will ferment down there as well.
I'll also transfer into carboy there and now that temps are up in Chicagoland, will ferment down there as well.
bwitt
Well-Known Member
+1 on the prechiller.
On a 95f+ day I can get to 80f with the IC hooked up to the garden hose. Then I hook up my prechiller between the hose and IC and can get it to 65f.
You could also get a cheap submersible pond pump from Lowes or Home Depot and recirculate the cold ice water from the bucket through your IC and back into the bucket.
thebikingengineer
Well-Known Member
While the pre-chiller is likely your best option another route would be to make a Saison. They will ferment up around 90-100 and so wouldn't mind a warm pitch.
Professor Frink
Well-Known Member
Instead of a prechiller, I bought a cheap pond pump from Home Depot. I run ice water from the pond pump into my immersion chiller, works great.
Ryanh1801
Well-Known Member
I use my IC until the wort is in the low 100 and then stick it in a rubermaid container that is filled with water and 2 bags of ice. This method gets the wort down to the high 60's pretty quick.
arturo7
Well-Known Member
Be careful which Saison you select. Not all can handle 90+. I found this out the hard way.
Even when the ambient temps are 100f the water in underground pipes is not 100F.
80F is easy enough with my waterhose powered IC; getting lower than that takes measures like the ones mentioned above.
JeffPhD2005
Active Member
Those large plastic toy tubs with the nylon handles that you can buy from WalMart and 4-5 bags of ice. Just put the kettle in and place ice around the sides with salt and water, just like making ice cream. In addition to the pre-chiller and chiller like described above I can cool the wort in about 10-15 minutes to pitching temps.
my 2-cents
my 2-cents
Desert Monkey
Well-Known Member
I use this same exact process and get the same results. It's 100+ out here for the whole summer, and so long as I'm in the shade it's a good deal.
illin8
Well-Known Member
Did this on Friday night...filled a cooler with 20 lbs of ice, filled with water and let it sit. I used the IC (25' of 1/2" copper) with the garden hose & faucet for the first 5 minutes...cooled it to less than 100 in 5 minutes. I then hooked up the IC supply lines to a Flowtec pump drawing the ice water out of the cooler through the IC and then back into the cooler. The ice surprisingly didn't melt as quick as I thought it was and had it down to 65 in about 5 minutes.
Hoosierbrewer
Well-Known Member
If you do not want to use bags of ice, I suggest ice cream buckets or gallons from milk. You can freeze them and then add to your water in a plastic container to get the temp lowered to the sixties. You can then use the same process to keep it there. It will take a couple of additions a day, but if you do not overfill and break the plastic on the jug or container, you can re-use.
stblindtiger
Well-Known Member
Resurrecting an old thread... for a question.... With the heat wave in full effect the last few days, I'm having this same problem. I will eventually buy some more copper tubing and make a second IC to pre-chill the water running through my IC.
In the mean time, I've been getting the wort down to about 78 degrees and that is as far as it will go with the use of the IC. Then I just rack the wort out into a carboy, and stick it into my temp controlled fermentation chamber overnight to get it down to pitching temp.
The next day I rack it into a new bucket, aerate, and pitch.
I realize I'm risking an infection with two transfers, but this has really helped get rid of a TON of trub. I try and transfer a little bit of trub when I rack it from the carboy, but I'm wondering if this is a bad way of handling brewing in the heat?
My last beer was a pale ale and had a fair amount of late addition hops to the boil. When I transferred out of the carboy after getting it to pitching temp, I left a ton of hops behind as well. Is this a bad thing? Could I just dry hop later on to fix that?
Thanks!
In the mean time, I've been getting the wort down to about 78 degrees and that is as far as it will go with the use of the IC. Then I just rack the wort out into a carboy, and stick it into my temp controlled fermentation chamber overnight to get it down to pitching temp.
The next day I rack it into a new bucket, aerate, and pitch.
I realize I'm risking an infection with two transfers, but this has really helped get rid of a TON of trub. I try and transfer a little bit of trub when I rack it from the carboy, but I'm wondering if this is a bad way of handling brewing in the heat?
My last beer was a pale ale and had a fair amount of late addition hops to the boil. When I transferred out of the carboy after getting it to pitching temp, I left a ton of hops behind as well. Is this a bad thing? Could I just dry hop later on to fix that?
Thanks!
SwampassJ
Well-Known Member
Try a cheap submersible pump (Harbor freight has a few for really cheap). Take some tubing and hoseclamp it to the out port on the pump and on the other hose clamp a male or female adapter? to fit your IC chiller. Now fill a cooler with lots of ice and enough water to submerge the pump and let it rip. (Note, this is most effective when the wort is somewhat cool/warm, if you do it from the start it's just going to eat all of your ice.
stblindtiger
Well-Known Member
Thanks Swamp... that sounds like a pretty easy way to do it too!
But will letting the wort sit overnight to cool down to pitching temp, racking it off the trub the next morning, and then aerating and pitching the yeast hurt the beer (i.e. strip flavor/body from it)?
Thanks!
But will letting the wort sit overnight to cool down to pitching temp, racking it off the trub the next morning, and then aerating and pitching the yeast hurt the beer (i.e. strip flavor/body from it)?
Thanks!
SwampassJ
Well-Known Member
I doubt it. A lot of people on here do no chill brewing where they just leave it in the pot overnight and I've done a few where I just pop them in the chest freezer fermentation chamber at 45 overnight to drop the temps. Sometimes waiting that extra hour to get to lager temps with the chiller isn't worth the hassle of delaying cleanup till dark.
Old thread, but it's getting to be that time of year again.
My immersion chiller sucks. Even in winter I can quickly chill the wort down to about 95° but it takes forever to get much below 85 or 90°. (I think I get most of that last 5° by wiping the outside of my kettle down with a cold wet rag. The metal is pretty thick and heavy and it holds a lot of heat) Then I transfer it to a brew bucket and add a couple of 1L bottles of ice and leave it for an hour or so. That's enough to get to pitching temperature.
I've ordered a pack of Voss Kveik yeast. Supposedly you can pitch that at 95 or 100° and it likes it. Also Hot Head yeast, but the flavor profile of the Voss strain looked interesting and I want to try it with Cascade hops.
My immersion chiller sucks. Even in winter I can quickly chill the wort down to about 95° but it takes forever to get much below 85 or 90°. (I think I get most of that last 5° by wiping the outside of my kettle down with a cold wet rag. The metal is pretty thick and heavy and it holds a lot of heat) Then I transfer it to a brew bucket and add a couple of 1L bottles of ice and leave it for an hour or so. That's enough to get to pitching temperature.
I've ordered a pack of Voss Kveik yeast. Supposedly you can pitch that at 95 or 100° and it likes it. Also Hot Head yeast, but the flavor profile of the Voss strain looked interesting and I want to try it with Cascade hops.
If you agitate the wort it helps your IC drop the temps. It can be as simple as moving your IC around the pot while things are cooling.
Other then that you can put sanitized foil over the top of the carboy and let it cool. I did this the other night for a Porter that was around 88°F. Just placed it in my ferm chamber, set it to 67°F, and pitched ~9 hours later.
Other then that you can put sanitized foil over the top of the carboy and let it cool. I did this the other night for a Porter that was around 88°F. Just placed it in my ferm chamber, set it to 67°F, and pitched ~9 hours later.
I always chill in chest freezer before pitching yeast - usually only a few hours, but often I just leave it until the next morning. Unless it's dead winter here, I can't get to pitching temps with my chiller.
Anway, it's never been a problem.
Anway, it's never been a problem.
I stir the wort the whole time the chiller is in. It still takes forever -- probably just not enough tubing surface area.
I'm a big fan of the Kveik strains (Hothead, Voss, Hornindal) and they all do well in the 90's. They also work very fast at that temperature. Voss should be nice with Cascade. I did a pale that I DH'd with Sorachi Ace and Azacca. It came out very citrusy with a bit of saison-like funk. Of the 3 strains, Hothead is the cleanest IME. With that strain, I get tropical fruit without any funk at all.
