building my wort chiller

[sorefingers23]

im going to go buy what i need for my immersion wort chiller tomorrow, and i can get 50 feet of 3/8 copper tubing for just under 30$, im just not sure if 3/8 will be big enough to cool down my 5 gallons of wort.

 

[breez7]

50 ft of that will be just fine. build away!

 

[iron_city_ap]

I made mine with 50' and it works great. One thing I used that I haven't seen anybody mention is this stuff called "just for copper". If you don't know what it is, its a glue obviously made for copper. The stuff worked great and was really easy to use.

 

[nickmv]

You should consider splitting it into two 25ft sections. If you do, you could put the first in a container of ice water, which runs to the second in the kettle. It depends on your brew setup. If you just cook the 2.5 gals and add to the cool water later, it works well. I've been able to get a 2.5 gal boil down to 80F in just over 16 mins.

 

[LarryC]

Another thing you might look at is "Shark Bites". They make fittings that don't need soldiered or compression fittings - they're pretty damn amazing.
http://www.sharkbite.com/

 

[Krelja]

I use a homemade 50' of 1/2" copper and it chills my 10 gallon batches to pitching temps in 25 minutes. I was chilling 5 gallon batches with a 25' 3/8" IC and it was fine to get my temps down but it took a little longer than my current chiller. Did you check out BobbyM's tutorial on how to make one? It's definately a good video. Do you plan on making it all one piece or are you going to solder elbows in?

 

[sorefingers23]

roughly how long will it take to cool down 5 gallons of wort with a 3/8 50 foot chiller?

 

[Tlylebrew]

I have to ask when you guys are using your chiller are you bouncing it in the wort? I have about 25' of 1/2" tubing and I can cool 5 gallons of wort down to 75-80° in about 15 minutes, but this is with constant agitation, in addition to my well water that is usually around 55°

 

[Got Trub?]

I have to ask when you guys are using your chiller are you bouncing it in the wort? I have about 25' of 1/2" tubing and I can cool 5 gallons of wort down to 75-80° in about 15 minutes, but this is with constant agitation, in addition to my well water that is usually around 55°

Yes. Agitation is necessary to maximize the chillers efficiency. An alternative for those with pumps is to create a whirlpool chiller:http://www.mrmalty.com/chiller.php. My next brewing project...

GT

 

[lumpher]

main thing to consider is ground water temp. 80F water vs 55F water is no challenge

 

[Krelja]

I was about 15-20 minutes with the 25' of 3/8" Definately move the chiller around in the BK. If you leave it there you can feel the chiller has cold water in and out after a while. Once you start moving it around you'll feel the output get nice and hot then you know its working

 

[Captain_Bigelow]

I have a 25' 3/8" chiller which I picked up off eBay about a year ago. It used to take me 35-40 minutes to chill. Now I have just picked up a plate chiller and hoping to dramatically reduce the times.

 

[OHIOSTEVE]

I bought two 20 foot coils of 3/8 inch copper and intertwined em ( ribcage chiller) I get the wort down to pitching temp pretty fast... even faster since I bought a submersible pump and drop it in a bucket of ice water and pump that through the chiller once the temp gets down to 100.

 

[oceanselv]

I'm not sure the 3/8" will be enough surface area to cool down your wort. The heat transfer is directly proportional to the surface area and temperature differential between the wort and the water. With the small surface area of the 3/8" tubing the delta T for the last 15 feet or so will be very small as the wort temperature will be close to the bath temperature. I would vote for a larger diameter tubing with a shorter length.