CFC...straight to the fermentor or back in the kettle?

[BrewKnob]

Thinking of getting a CFC for my 20 gallon system. Never used one...is one time through enough or do you cycle through the brew kettle? I have a whirlpool built into the boil kettle and a pump (digital B3 sculpture). Thinking of taking my old immersion chiller and a 10 gallon cylindrical cooler for a prechiller...so water temp shouldn't be an issue even in August.

Thoughts?

I'm thinking there might be an advantage cycling through the brew kettle...the whirlpool works very well in settling out the trub into a little pile in the middle.

 

[rkhanso]

WARNING: I've not actually brewed with my new BIAB system and homemade CFC, but I did a "practice brew" a couple weeks ago.
I went from 205F water in the kettle to 70F in one pass into a bucket. My cooling water was very cold since it's still winter here in Minnesota.
I had a pretty good rate of wort flow and was still able to get 70F output. Here's a link to the thread that has a super-short video showing the flow-rate (I didn't measure it though). The link is under the picture.
I'm going to do one more trail run to measure all the losses so I can have a better first brew day - and use the CFC with a single-pass to see if it's still up to the task. By then, it'll be 40-50F outside temps here in MN, but still cold ground-water.

 

[BrewKnob]

Does the outside of the CFC get hot?

 

[milldoggy]

I whirlpool to 140, then into fermator. You can do with out it, just adjust your flow. I like to drop the wort temp below 140 to stop the hop action and also do whirlpool hops.

 

[BrewKnob]

Right now I do an immersion chiller with whirlpool. Have an output and intake with a whirlpool jet that becomes the pickup when I transfer to fermentor. Thinking of just plugging in CFC to whirlpool circuit. Then, when cool, transfer to fermentor allowing whirlpool to do its thing.

 

[Toejam792]

I really like my CFCs for 10 gallon batches. Will work great for 20 gallons just take a little longer.

I have a all copper CFC i bought it used but I'm pretty sure its the morebeer one. I could get the wort into the fermenter in the mid 60s in one pass with 45-50 deg ground water. I would have to throttle the wort output back quite a bit to get it into the 60s.

I recently bought a stainless CFC from aliexpress and now run my wort threw both. I have a y on my garden hose so both CFCs get cold ground water. I can now run my chugger pump almost wide open. I waste a lot less water also. I'm working on getting connections so I can run my hose water threw my old immersion chiller that I put into an Ac glycol bath. I'm hoping I can run my chugger pump wide open into the fermenter after that upgrade.

I whirlpool threw both chillers to sanitize them for the last 10-20 mins of the boil, so you can still do that to get trub piled up.

 

[Staticsouls]

I use a cfc to cool down to whirlpool temps, and from there my wort goes from kettle to fermenter in one pass.

 

[kh54s10]

I don't have a CFC, but for me I would not be cool my wort to pitching, even with recirculation. It has been cloudy and rainy for 2 days and my tap water is all the way down to 78 degrees. So, I need to use a pre-chiller.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/forum/threads/no-wonder-i-am-having-trouble-cooling-my-wort.647897/

 

[trav77]

I like to recirculate back into the kettle via a whirlpool arm. Once it's at pitching temp I'll have a beer and let the trub settle out for 30 mins or so. The whirlpool arm helps get trub into the centre so my side pickup doesn't get much of it and the resulting wort is pretty clear going into the fermenter. There are varying opinions on whether or not this really matters. On my last couple of brews when I went direct to the fermenter I picked up a soapy off-flavour that I decided was likely oxidation of fatty acids from trub, so I decided to go back to trying to get clear wort.

 

[BrewKnob]

I like to recirculate back into the kettle via a whirlpool arm. Once it's at pitching temp I'll have a beer and let the trub settle out for 30 mins or so. The whirlpool arm helps get trub into the centre so my side pickup doesn't get much of it and the resulting wort is pretty clear going into the fermenter. There are varying opinions on whether or not this really matters. On my last couple of brews when I went direct to the fermenter I picked up a soapy off-flavour that I decided was likely oxidation of fatty acids from trub, so I decided to go back to trying to get clear wort.

I've been dropping the gunk out prior to pitching the yeast.