fast chilling tips?

[robbyice]

I want to streamline brew day. I want to make all things efficient and quick.

I started chilling my wort in an ice bath alone which took hours so I switched to a nice copper immersion chiller. My housewater in the wintertime is cold enough to make the a 30-40 minute chore for ales.

Recently on my last brew day, it was 90+ outside and I was hoping to chill to near lager temps.. it took well over an hour to get my 5 gallons of wort down to 75-80F, which still wasn't good enough.

Im planning on using a recirculating system from now on with a pond pump in a rolling ice chest with icewater. Ill dump the first 5 gallons which are too hot and would melt the ice.

I don't really want to go to a plate chiller but was curious if they are worth it. Also, how much would a recirculating arm on a chiller with a pump help?

any other tips?

 

[d3track]

Cooling water temp and wort movement are the keys, even a plate chiller isn't going to cool below water temps.

 

[kh54s10]

I do something similar. The water temperature mid summer is near 70 degrees or higher. No matter how long you go it will not go below the temperature of the water. (obviously)
So I built a 2 piece IC. I made a 20' coil and used it in the winter, come summer it was not efficient so I made another 20' IC with a tighter coil. I start cooling with both coils in the wort. When close to the water temperature going in, I take the smaller coil and put it in a bucket of ice water, I add ice as it melts until I get to pitching temperatures. Stirring the water and the wort also helps transfer the heat.

 

[Rockn_M]

I use to use an immersion copper chiller and it took 30-45 min to get things cool enough to transfer from the boil container to fermentation bucket and then I would have to wait for my fermentation chamber to cool it to pitching temps.

Then I used a counter flow chiller and it makes all the difference. I was skeptical at first, how can 25ft cool something from boiling temps to water temperature in a matter of seconds. But they work! Right now my ground water is around 85-90 degrees and the counter flow chiller gets the wort to around 90 degrees in a few seconds. It has saved me a bunch of wasted time.

In my opinion a counter flow chiller is the way to go!

 

[robbyice]

how long does this system take to cool to pitching temps in the summer?

 

[Rockn_M]

how long does this system take to cool to pitching temps in the summer?

It will only cool to the temperature of water your pumping through. The hot wort goes in one end and then you hook up a water source like a hose or ice water pump to another connection and the wort comes out about the same temperature at the other end of the water you are pumping through and the water that you are pumping through the counter flow chiller will be hot.

So if you just use ground water it will get to whatever that is. If you have a large bucket of ice water I bet the wort will get pretty cold.

It usually takes a few minutes for me to pump 5.25-5.5 gallons of wort through the counter flow chiller.

 

[d3track]

I use ice water and whirlpool, and I got to 55* in 40 min on a 90* day. That's a 3/8" 50' chiller though so the flow rate of the water is a little slower through the tight diameter copper.

 

[ScrewyBrewer]

In winter my counter flow chiller cools wort down to 65F with ease using tap water but in summer it only goes down to 75-80F. That's when I put the fermentors in the chest freezer for about an hour to get them down to 65F before pitching the yeast.

 

[casualbrewer]

I just put like 40 lbs of ice in a bug circular tub. Then I put wort kettle on top of the ice and start spraying water around my kettle to get it to sink down into the ice water. From there I just keep stirring the wort until my temp gets down. Took like 15 minutes to get down under 60 degrees...

 

[IslandLizard]

Chill down with regular water until it won't go much lower, around 20 degrees above your domestic water supply. Then start recirculating ice water in a bucket/tub with a small pump.

Otherwise you're simply wasting good ice on hot wort.

 

[FuriousE]

A couple of things are important with an IC: First, you need to turn the water running through it on to full blast. A lot of people think that they need to slow it down or they waste water, when in fact the opposite is true. The other important point is to constantly move the chiller around in the wort (or move the wort around the chiller).

A lot of people say that adding a pre-chiller to an ice bath works well, but I've always understood that pumping ice water through the chiller is more effective than adding a pre-chiller, although I've never tried either.

Here's a thread to a chiller I built, along with the results: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=478756

 

[IslandLizard]

... I've always understood that pumping ice water through the chiller is more effective than adding a pre-chiller, although I've never tried either....

It depends on the temp of the return water.

 

[Teromous]

The plate chiller is worth it if you're looking for speed. There are plenty of work-arounds if your ground water is too warm. I've used ice bath immersion, regular copper wort chiller, and plate chiller. The plate chiller has been the best of all three even when the ground temp gets too warm in VA.