Tequniques for chilling wort to low 60's with immersion chiller?

[ja09]

Wondering if anyone has any tips they'd like to share? I'm having a hard time getting wort below 82* with an immersion chiller in the summer. Thinking of putting the glass carboy in an ice bath to chill it further. Not sure if that's a bad idea w/ glass?

I've been putting the carboy in my ferm chamber to chill, but that takes a few hours. I pitched the last one really hot around 78* in the chamber, which I know is a poor idea, but I thought it'd probably chill before vigorous fermentation started. Not sure if it did or not, but the beer turned out great with no off-flavors (that I notice). Thanks

 

[negativereaction]

Glass carboys + quick temperature changes = instant death. Or close enough to it to make no difference. Don't dunk it in an ice bath. You risk the thing splitting or cracking. You can use a pre-chiller (search for different solutions for that) to run the water that reaches your IC through an ice bath first. That is a safe method that mostly avoids dying. Mostly.

 

[cody6173]

I have the same problem with warm tap water here in Louisiana. One thing that I've started doing that seems to help is to use another IC in an ice bath as a pre-chiller. It seems to work pretty good for me the only drawback being you have to buy/build another IC. Also, once I get my wort below 80 or so I go ahead and transfer to my primary and put it in the swamp cooler for a few hours before pitching my yeast. An old t-shirt over the carboy and frozen water bottles in the swamp cooler should get you down into the 60's in a couple hours.

 

[Gduck]

One suggestion is to get a large cooler or bucket (10+ gallons) and fill it with ice and water. Start your chilling as normal and once it gets close to 100 hook the chiller up to a small immersion pump in the cooler and recirculate that chilling water (pump sucks it in to chiller, outflow of chiller goes back in to large bucket).

The downside is the added cost of a small pump you can submerse in the water, but they aren't terribly expensive. I think I paid about 20 bucks for the one I used to use. I was able to get temps down under 60 even in the summer, pretty quickly too.

 

[sfgoat]

I have the same problem with warm tap water here in Louisiana. One thing that I've started doing that seems to help is to use another IC in an ice bath as a pre-chiller. It seems to work pretty good for me the only drawback being you have to buy/build another IC. Also, once I get my wort below 80 or so I go ahead and transfer to my primary and put it in the swamp cooler for a few hours before pitching my yeast. An old t-shirt over the carboy and frozen water bottles in the swamp cooler should get you down into the 60's in a couple hours.

+1 to this I just use the two IC method with the first in an ice bath and the second in the wort. Works great.

 

[cluckk]

I use the ice bath with the pre-chiller and it works fine for me in winter, but find it very difficult to get below the mid to upper 80's in warmer months--which here in South Texas is most months. For those times I get it down to where I can, rack into a Better Bottle, place that into my swamp cooler and fill around it with water and frozen jugs (like I do to control fermentation temps). When it gets down to temperature, I pitch.

 

[ja09]

Thanks everyone! Searched for pre-chiller, and no offense, but something like this just seems like a huge hassle: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/super-efficient-pre-chiller-318718/

What about just buying a better bottle and doing an ice bath once it hits the 80's? Seems much quicker/easier since I'm usually pressed for time.

Maybe this just gives me the excuse I was looking for to buy a plate chiller & pump

 

[Gduck]

What about just buying a better bottle and doing an ice bath once it hits the 80's? Seems much quicker/easier since I'm usually pressed for time.

Maybe this just gives me the excuse I was looking for to buy a plate chiller & pump

Certainly is a easier way of going about it, just submersing a better bottle in an ice bath. Lot less effort on your part.

As for a plate chiller, you know you don't really need the pump, you can just gravity feed. The slower it goes through the plate chiller the closer to your ground water temp it'll take the wort down. (though I do use a pump, but I got that before I got the plate chiller... was tried of lifting heavy buckets).

 

[ja09]

Certainly is a easier way of going about it, just submersing a better bottle in an ice bath. Lot less effort on your part.

As for a plate chiller, you know you don't really need the pump, you can just gravity feed. The slower it goes through the plate chiller the closer to your ground water temp it'll take the wort down. (though I do use a pump, but I got that before I got the plate chiller... was tried of lifting heavy buckets).

Thanks a lot. Do you think 1 pass through the blingman plate chiller is enough to bring temps down to tap water? With/without pump?

 

[eric19312]

I've been putting the carboy in my ferm chamber to chill, but that takes a few hours.

This is what I've been doing since ground water heated up. Chill to just under 80 with my IC, give it a shake to oxygenate, into the fermentation fridge. Chills to 68 in about 3 hours, pitch and shake it up some more. Down to 64-65 when I look at it again in the morning no problem.

I've heard several webcasts from basic brewing radio regarding "no chill" techniques which probably have helped me relax about the burning urgency to get the yeast pitched. These guys sometimes go for months between boiling the wort and pitching the yeast with no issues.

 

[grathan]

I would get a pump either way unless your stirring constantly.

You don't mention your ground water temps.

 

[ja09]

These guys sometimes go for months between boiling the wort and pitching the yeast with no issues.

This sounds interesting. I've also relaxed about sitting w/o pitching yeast.. BUT.. the two times I've had leftover wort that I was going to experiment with, I left overnight and by 24 hours it was fermenting something nasty. My sanitation is good, so I was thinking wild yeast since I brew outside.

 

[Gduck]

Thanks a lot. Do you think 1 pass through the blingman plate chiller is enough to bring temps down to tap water? With/without pump?

It should get you pretty close to your tap water temperature. If you use a pump you want to restrict the outflow so that it's trickling out in order to maximize the heat reduction. Right now, for me using a pump, I'm getting it down to about 4 or 5 degrees of the tap water. I'd imagine with gravity it would be roughly the same.

 

[Rehlgood]

Just stir the crap out of it. By the time it hits mid to low 70's you're good to go. This will oxygenate your wert very well in the process.

 

[ja09]

Just stir the crap out of it. By the time it hits mid to low 70's you're good to go. This will oxygenate your wert very well in the process.

This and a better bottle/ice bath seem to be the easiest and cheapest ways to chill fast, but stirring the crap out of it for 15-20 minutes sounds awful to me personally.. I'd rather buy a plate chiller or sell my equipment :cross:

NOTE: I use pure o2 to oxygenate - my tap water right now is 69.2 here in Minneapolis - I use a 50' 3/8 immersion chiller and can't chill below ~ 82* in an acceptable amount of time - and I hate the fact my spell check didn't pick up my terrible spelling in the title

 

[Nefariouss]

It's been mentioned in other threads. But you can use ice to chill it the last bit. Either bagged ice or making your own with plastic tupperware. Someone mentioned the thin plastic stuff from like dollar store. Use the quart size ones. Fill up 4 and freeze the night before then pop in 4 frozen ice blocks for 1g of added water.

I plan on trying this method next brew session because I too deal with the hot summer water issue in Houston. Plus I don't want to build another chiller or use a pump.

 

[E_Marquez]

Submerged pump going to Pre chiller in an ice water bath and chiller in the wort for me..
Stir the hot wort occasionally to disrupt the hot wort thermal layer that forms around the coils..
After the wort gets below 100deg or so,,,move the chiller output from dumping on the ground to dumping right back in the ice water bucket...

In mid summer, central texas heat... last batch went from flame out 212 deg to 60 in under 18 min.

I use a full container of cubed ice from my refrigerator ice maker, and three 1/2 gallon jugs of frozen water in the pre chiller (I use a large igloo water cooler)