Help chilling wort

[magnoliabrew]

I currently use an immersion chiller for wort cooling. Unfortunately the ground water here in CA isn't cold enough to get the wort down to the 70s without burning through at least 50+ gallons of water. Being that we're in a drought and I don't like paying for all that wasted water, are there any other methods or options to cool down the wort properly? Preferably a method that isn't a major expense.

Thanks!

 

[didinho]

no chill brewing could be an idea?

http://www.brewersfriend.com/2009/06/06/australian-no-chill-brewing-technique-tested/

 

[mongoose33]

If I were in that situation, I'd buy a pump and recirculate through a jockey-box type of arrangement where i had ice in the jockey box cooling the water circulating through the IC.

I recently built a beer line cleaner using this pump: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0012UZYMG/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

Terrific flow--I think it would do well as an IC recirculator. A few fittings, some tubing, and you'd be there.

 

[CGVT]

I use another chiller in ice in a cooler as a prechiller to bring my water temp down. It works really well for me. A lot of other people use a pump and recirculate ice water through their chiller. I think most that use a pump cool down with their ground water and then switch to the ice water.

 

[Elkobrewer]

Coil your hose up in an ice chest full of ice this will cool your water down before it gets to your chiller.

 

[magnoliabrew]

Great article, thanks!

 

[sfgoat]

Depending on how lazy I am felling I will either do no-chill method or just transfer the hot wort directly into my HDPE brew bucket and then throw that in the ferm chamber and let the ferm chamber (temp controlled freezer) do the chilling for me. Still takes a while but not as long as no-chill. I haved used just about every chilling method out there and neither I nor any competition judge have noted a difference in taste for my beers without chilling.

 

[magnoliabrew]

Appreciate all the advice. This no chill method is intriguing.

 

[catdaddy66]

I use a swamp cooler and a minimum of 6 frozen 2L bottles to cool my brewpot and wort. It takes about 30 min to cool to pitch temps which isn't too bad. Better still is that I fill it with 6-7 gallons of water and thats all!

Afterwards I keep the primary in the same cooler and rotate 2-3 bottles every 12 hours to keep ferm temps as low as possible. It has worked well over the years.

 

[CraigKing]

I haven't tried my plan yet, but I bought a submersible aquarium pump and plan to fill one of my 6gal brew buckets with water and ice. I'll use an immersion wort chiller, and pump the ice water through the chiller, then recirculate the water back into the brew bucket. I'll add ice as needed.

 

[Brew_G]

I use an IC and fill buckets with the "waste water," using that water for my garden when it cools.

Our ground water in Northern VA is really warm now, so this past Saturday it took about 25 gallons to get to 95F or so (it gets to about 125 pretty quickly though). I move the kettle to an ice bath (frozen water bottles) to get it the rest of the way to pitching temp. I ten use the water from the ice bath for both my garden and swamp cooler-ish setup.

Some water gets wasted in my system, but I make as much use of the water as I can.

 

[buzd]

I did my first test of using a pump to recirculate ice water through my chiller. It worked pretty well, but I did use about $10 worth of ice.

 

[Thorsbrew]

Ground water pretty warm here in NC as well. Regular ground water until wort drops to about 100F then put ice in a bucket with a pump to drop it the rest of the way. If there's still plenty of ice left (which i just make in my spare freezer) i'll recirculate the waste water back into the pump/ice bath when the wort is below 100F.

 

[pvpeacock]

I live in Southern California and had the same problem. Then I bought a Jaded King Cobra immersion chiller and it made all the difference in the world. I can get 5-6 gallons from boiling down below 80 degrees in under 10 minutes depending on the hose water temperature. I put the output hose in a standard 44 gallon trash can and stop before I even get to the top of the trash can. I then use the hot water in the trash can to rinse the chiller off when I'm done. Once the water in the trash can cools enough, I use it to water plants a gallon or so at a time. I also have two SS Brewtech conicals with FTS temperature systems. They do the work to get the wort the rest of the way down to pitching /fermentation temperatures.

 

[bendog15]

I live in Southern California and had the same problem. Then I bought a Jaded King Cobra immersion chiller and it made all the difference in the world. I can get 5-6 gallons from boiling down below 80 degrees in under 10 minutes depending on the hose water temperature. I put the output hose in a standard 44 gallon trash can and stop before I even get to the top of the trash can. I then use the hot water in the trash can to rinse the chiller off when I'm done. Once the water in the trash can cools enough, I use it to water plants a gallon or so at a time. I also have two SS Brewtech conicals with FTS temperature systems. They do the work to get the wort the rest of the way down to pitching /fermentation temperatures.

+1 on the jaded hydra chiller. It's 75 feet of outstanding copper coils and I love it. I can get wort down to 80 in 5-8 minutes depending on groundwater temps. Save the water in buckets and use it for washing brew day equipment or watering the plants. Or i will just transfer wort into carboys when it's around 85 degrees and let it sit in fermentation chamber for a few hours until it gets down to pitching temp.

Before the hydra I used a chugger pump, a homemade 25 ft immersion chiller, and a recirculating ice bath.

 

[GHBWNY]

I use another chiller in ice in a cooler as a prechiller to bring my water temp down. It works really well for me. A lot of other people use a pump and recirculate ice water through their chiller. I think most that use a pump cool down with their ground water and then switch to the ice water.

I like this idea.

Instead of a coiled pre-chiller dropped in a bucket of ice, I'm imagining a cooler already set up with an inlet and outlet and a series of tiers/loops of copper line, two to three to four? times the cooling surface area a standard chiller might have. Pack it with ice, connect the outlet to chiller #2 in the hot wort, turn on water.

 

[CGVT]

I like this idea.

Instead of a coiled pre-chiller dropped in a bucket of ice, I'm imagining a cooler already set up with an inlet and outlet and a series of tiers/loops of copper line, two to three to four? times the cooling surface area a standard chiller might have. Pack it with ice, connect the outlet to chiller #2 in the hot wort, turn on water.

The problem with this idea is you have to move the pre chiller in the ice to get the most efficient cooling. If you leave it stationary, it develops a thermal barrier and the water coming out is noticeable warmer.

You also have to make sure you have movement with wort over your IC (or move your IC in the wort) for the same reason.

There was a thread about this a while back where this was discussed in length and the Jaded Brewing guys chimed in with some really solid data and info on how to most efficiently cool you wort. I'll see if I can find the link.

 

[CGVT]

Check out this thread.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=584610

 

[pvpeacock]

I use a stainless steel cement mixer attachment on my cordless drill to keep the wort moving while using my Jaded IC. It really helps.

 

[GHBWNY]

The problem with this idea is you have to move the pre chiller in the ice to get the most efficient cooling. If you leave it stationary, it develops a thermal barrier and the water coming out is noticeable warmer.

You also have to make sure you have movement with wort over your IC (or move your IC in the wort) for the same reason.

There was a thread about this a while back where this was discussed in length and the Jaded Brewing guys chimed in with some really solid data and info on how to most efficiently cool you wort. I'll see if I can find the link.

Yeah, movement is the key. I am constantly stirring my wort with the IC and in every season but summer, I can chill 5 gal down to 68F in 10-12 min with IC alone. My last batch I did outside, so as a matter of convenience, hooked the IC up to the garden hose. Problem was, the hose was black, 75' long and it was a sunny 85-degree day. Big mistake. Took about 45 min to get to pitching temp. :smack: Gonna work on this one.

 

[schiersteinbrewing]

During the 100+ deg days here in West Texas my ground water is 88-90deg.

Bought a Jaded Hydra, with whirlpool arm. Made a prechiller that sits in a cooler with ice water and a small submersible pump to keep water moving. Recirculate wort through whirlpool arm and run ground water through prechiller, 10-15 min and its done depending on ale or lager. The discharge goes into the swimming pool.

I've wondered about just using the pool water and running through the prechiller to save even more water.

 

[vance]

During the 100+ deg days here in West Texas my ground water is 88-90deg.

Bought a Jaded Hydra, with whirlpool arm. Made a prechiller that sits in a cooler with ice water and a small submersible pump to keep water moving. Recirculate wort through whirlpool arm and run ground water through prechiller, 10-15 min and its done depending on ale or lager. The discharge goes into the swimming pool.

I've wondered about just using the pool water and running through the prechiller to save even more water.

Can you explain what you mean with the whirlpool arm and recirculating the wort? I keep seeing people reference it but I have no idea what they're talking about.

 

[schiersteinbrewing]

Can you explain what you mean with the whirlpool arm and recirculating the wort? I keep seeing people reference it but I have no idea what they're talking about.

Sorry for the delay, work and life got crazy.

I have a valve on the kettle which has a pump attached. The output of the pump goes into a piece of copper that has a bend in it that is submerged into the wort. During chilling you run the pump which recirculates the wort back into the kettle. The flow of wort and bend in the pipe creates a whirlpool in the kettle.

This is a two fold purpose, it is constantly moving the wort so you have better cooling as well as the whirlpool moves all the hop gunk and cold/hot break material to the center of the kettle so clearer wort makes it into the fermenter.

For example of a whirlpool arm: http://jadedbrewing.com/products/whirlpool-arm

You can also accomplish this by carefully stirring the wort frequently/constantly during and after cooling.

 

[vance]

Sorry for the delay, work and life got crazy.

I have a valve on the kettle which has a pump attached. The output of the pump goes into a piece of copper that has a bend in it that is submerged into the wort. During chilling you run the pump which recirculates the wort back into the kettle. The flow of wort and bend in the pipe creates a whirlpool in the kettle.

This is a two fold purpose, it is constantly moving the wort so you have better cooling as well as the whirlpool moves all the hop gunk and cold/hot break material to the center of the kettle so clearer wort makes it into the fermenter.

For example of a whirlpool arm: http://jadedbrewing.com/products/whirlpool-arm

You can also accomplish this by carefully stirring the wort frequently/constantly during and after cooling.

So the wort goes out of the kettle, through the arm, and back into the pot?

 

[CGVT]

So the wort goes out of the kettle, through the arm, and back into the pot?

Yes. Pump out of valve in bottom of kettle then back into kettle. The whirlpool arm generally returns the wort onto the side of the kettle so the wort circulates. This keeps the wort moving over/around the cooling coils facilitating quicker cooling, and as stated above allows the hops and break to settle out in a cone in the middle of the kettle.