Want to use a Wort Chiller, but can't figure out how.

[Daedalus]

I know how immersion wort chillers work so thats not the issue. I am looking into ways to hooking up a immersion wort chiller to my kitchen faucet or other kitchen water source.

I have a faucet with the built in sprayer attachment so I cannot use the garden hose fitting on most chillers to attach the two together. What I'm looking for is a solution or suggestions on how to make this happen.

Here are some ideas but not hard solutions and I'm looking or different ideas or input:

1) Find some clamp that'll attach to my faucet head and provide a nice seal

2) Tap in to my cold water source under my sink, install a valve, and run it off that

3) Install a "splitter" to the cold water source. Attach the faucet to one end and valve/fitting to the other end

Any ideas?

 

[MileHighHops]

I have this same problem and am curios to hear some suggestions. Luckily we have a deep sink that allows me to cool the wort down below 80 within 20 minutes in an ice bath....but I'd like to switch to AG but without a way to hook up my wort chiller I'm sort of stuck.

 

[IrregularPulse]

I'd put a Y on your cold water under the sink with a ball valve and and piece of hose attached. You could then just keep the hose coiled up and the ball valve closed when not chilling.

 

[JetSmooth]

I'd put a Y on your cold water under the sink with a ball valve and and piece of hose attached. You could then just keep the hose coiled up and the ball valve closed when not chilling.

This is what I thought about doing.

There was a little screw-off aerator on the sprayer faucet, but it was a BEAST to unscrew and put back on. So I gave up.

I just got a big keggle and a CFC from a forumite, so I'm planning on setting up my brews under my desk instead of on, so I'll use the hose bib. If you do that route, remember to use a RV hose for drinking water and not a common garden hose.

 

[Bobby_M]

Yeah, I'd put a tee in the cold water line underneath, add a ball valve style hose bib to it.

 

[edmanster]

Pond pump in a full sink while the tap is still running? No unhook or hooking required.. Drain anywhere you want to use the water(cleaning etc)...

 

[malkore]

Pond pump in a full sink while the tap is still running? No unhook or hooking required.. Drain anywhere you want to use the water(cleaning etc)...

or pump in a 30 gallon trash can. i used to do aquariums and would prepare my water in advance in a big (brand new) plastic trash can, then pump it into the tank after siphoning out the old stuff.

either way, try to keep some of the hottest waste water for cleanup

 

[just2brew]

Do you have a washing machine? I brew in the basement so it's a close water and drain connection. May not work for you, thought I'd bring it up just in case.

 

[topend]

Pond pump in a full sink while the tap is still running? No unhook or hooking required.. Drain anywhere you want to use the water(cleaning etc)...

+1. I have dual sinks and it is perfect. Fill it up with ice water and let the faucet run just enough to maintain water level.

 

[smizak]

I use a pump too, bring the chilling source to the hot wort, not the other way around. Not too crazy about moving 50lbs of boiling hot wort.

 

[Redbeard5289]

The cheapest solution I found to hook up my immersion chiller to my kitchen faucet was this. Buy a cheap water garden hose from box store (lenght not a issue) and cut one of connection ends the garden hose to lenght plus a foot from faucet to immersion chiller (where ever you are going to set your brewpot and immersion chiller in your kitchen). Take the other connection end of the hose and cut it to lenght from the immersion chiller to the sink drain. Take remaining middle section of garden hose and discard. You only need the two ends lengths.
Buy corresponding replacement hose connections from store and put them onto two hose pieces that you just cut. The ones I got were barbed end that fitted into the hose and a muffler clamp held the hose onto the barb.
Also buy a kitchen faucet to garden hose adapter from the store. These are simple dual thread rings that you screw into your faucet by unscrewing the screen filter end of your faucet and screwing in the adapter. The garden hose connection (female) screws into the adapter. You may need some teflon tape to insure a watertight connection. One came standard with the utility sink setup I bought from HD but my LHBS also sells them seperately.
Connect the new shorter hose you made from the faucet to the immersion chiller. Connect the other shorter hose from the immersion chiller and lay it in your sink near the drain. I put my down in the garbage disposal and use the disposal's rubber sleeve to hold the hose in place. if you don't have a garbage disposal you can lay the hose end in your sink and use weight of some kind to hold the hose end down into the drain.

This setup cost me about about $16 ($8 for the hose, $3 ea for the replacement garden hose connections, and $2 for the faucet adapter from my LBHS) and runs just as effieciently as when I do it outside and connect my immersion chiller to the outside cold water faucet. Never had an issue with it for me. Just be sure to keep outta contact with the water is coming out your immersion chiller, its a bit hot.

Hope that helps you out....

Redbeard5289

 

[obie_fl]

I think you missed this part of the OPs post.

I have a faucet with the built in sprayer attachment so I cannot use the garden hose fitting on most chillers to attach the two together. What I'm looking for is a solution or suggestions on how to make this happen.

I have the same type of kitchen faucet and haven't found an easy way to hook up a hose to it.

 

[Redbeard5289]

Sorry, my bad.

I thought he was trying to connect his chiller to a standard kitchen sink sprayer. Thanks obie fl for the clarification.
My apologies!

Redbeard5289

 

[binkman]

No outside water faucet?

 

[flyingwmelon]

I go the pond pump to vinyl tubing to chiller method. The pump was around $25.00 at Harbor Freight. With all the extra fittings and such it ended up about the same cost but without the hassle of plumbing in another connection on my sink. Cools 5 gal of wort down in about 15 min with ice in the sink for the last 20 degrees or so. I forgot what the gpm on the pump is but I think around 50 or so.

 

[obie_fl]

Sorry, my bad.

I thought he was trying to connect his chiller to a standard kitchen sink sprayer. Thanks obie fl for the clarification.
My apologies!

Redbeard5289

No apologies required. I picked up on it because I literally had just finished installing a new kitchen faucet when I came across this thread, so it was fresh in my mind. I brew mostly outside but may have to go the ice and pump route for my IC as the ground water here is already warming up.

 

[dorklord]

I've got a kitchen faucet with a built-in sprayer, and I just unscrewed the aerator tip and put on a garden hose adapter. It was a PITA to get off the aerator, and the faucet still likes to switch to 'spray' all the time for no reason (it did that before, though).

Its usually a PITA to get the aerator of a standard faucet, too. Oh, and I leave the hose adapter on, I just unscrew the actual hose when I'm not using it.

Right now, I'm trying to figure out how to attach a water filter to the faucet as well!

 

[Turner5]

I just use my bathroom sink instead.

 

[twardnw]

No outside water faucet?

this

When I brew inside, I just run the hose in through the kitchen window

 

[dnichols]

I was trying to figure out the same problem and messed with a bunch of different adapters from Home Depot and finally found this baby at my local hardware store. Only takes a minute to put together.

below are five pics more to come...

 

[dnichols]

continued... can be used to attach garden hose or an additional adapter for plastic hose. I use on my CFC.

 

[Daedalus]

Update on something I finally got figured out.

I am using a 550 GPH pond pump in my sink full of ice water. I was able to rig up a reducer that converted the large pump output to one that fits my tubing for my chiller.

Works GREAT!

 

[nittanybevo]

Update on something I finally got figured out.

I am using a 550 GPH pond pump in my sink full of ice water. I was able to rig up a reducer that converted the large pump output to one that fits my tubing for my chiller.

Works GREAT!

+1
This is how I do mine too. Plus, you don't have to continuously run water, you can recirculate and keep adding ice packs/frozen water bottles/ice to keep the water temp down. Adding salt in the ice bath helps too because it depresses the freezing temperature of the ice. Salt pellets from a water softener work really well, but table salt works too. Just don't get it in the wort.