How to make big ice blocks for chilling?

[betarhoalphadelta]

So, as we approach summer here in SoCal, and our groundwater pushes up to 80+ degrees, wort chilling becomes difficult. Especially (obviously) if I want to chill to lager temps. Especially++ because I'm doing 10 gallon batches. And here in SoCal, water is pretty dear, so I want to use as little as I can.

My system is a three-vessel, single tier system with two pumps. I have a counterflow chiller.

My current process when the groundwater is hot:

• At flameout, I start recirculating the wort through the CFC right back into the boil kettle, while running hose water through the outside of the CFC.
• When I've knocked it down to 120 degrees or so, I remove the hose, fill my mash tun with a bunch of ice and just enough water to prime the pump, and run that through the CFC to chill more efficiently.
• When I get within 10 degrees in the boil kettle (ale or lager pitch temp), I redirect the pump output to the fermenter. I've found at full flow, that drops the final 10 degrees.

That said, I run into a problem... It takes a LOT of ice to cool 10 gallons of wort. If I can think long enough ahead, I can make 6 ice blocks out of gallon-sized zip locks--but that takes a lot of time, a lot of bags, and a lot of space in the freezer. If I forget, I'm stuck buying 40# of ice at the grocery store, which is basically $10 added to my brew day costs.

So I want to make big blocks of ice. I'm thinking of a few options:

1. Buying some large reusable plastic food containers (similar to this) and using them to make the ice. While it might require a bunch to produce enough ice, at least they're of a uniform enough shape and probably stackable so I could do them easily in the freezer.
2. Buying some large (2.5 gallon) ziplock or Glad sealable bags, and doing it the way I used to. The advantage is that 2 of those bags might be enough to cool a whole batch, so even though they're a weird shape they might be a lot easier than trying to fit 6 individual gallon ziplocks.

Has anyone ever tried option #2? I worry that none of the big bags are strong enough to handle 2.5 gallons of water. 1 gallon freezer bags have a difficult enough time.

What about #1? Are there any easier and cheaper containers than what I linked? Perhaps gallon-sized instead of 1/2 gallon?

Let me know.

 

[Transamguy77]

When I started brewing I did option 1 and I bought the style you linked but the cheap ones at wal mart and spent like $4 for 20 containers. You could get some similar at the dollar store.

They worked really well but as you say they take up a lot of space in the freezer, I also used to freeze soda bottles and they work until they start to melt and don’t radiate enough temp difference.

When I was in California I I had an extra fridge in the garage that was there when we moved in so I could make the ice in the freezer and I would put buckets of water in the fridge so the water started out in the 40’s and then add the ice.

 

[madscientist451]

Delete about a gallon of water from your recipe and dump one of the ice blocks in before the temp goes below 180f?
Use plastic milk/juice jugs and freeze the water in that?
If "saving water" is a concern, get large washtubs and catch the chilling water, dump it in the washing machine to wash clothes, or wash the dog, car or floors, use to flush the toilet, water plants.....
Another alternative, get the temp down as low as you can with ground water, then hook your chiller to a DIY aquarium chiller you can make for about $100, I think this design could be improved by adding some kind of water tank (brewing bucket?) in the fridge that the hose would sit in:

 

[wstumper]

I've been using 24 and 32 oz plastic cottage cheese/yogurt/sour cream/etc. containers along with 12 oz plastic juice containers (frozen aisle). Been saving these for awhile. My setup is a bit different since I brew 2.5 to 3 gallons and set the kettle in a basement sink filled with water and ice from the containers. I then run tap water through my SS wort chiller inside the kettle.

But after doing this several times, I've come to the conclusion that large chunks of ice don't keep the water as cold as smaller pieces! More surface area with ice-cube sized pieces -- the large chunks, while they look impressive, are only chilling the water on contact with the outside of the blocks. The ice lasts longer with big chunks, but isn't as effective at keeping the water colder. That's why Thermapen recommends using an ice bath slurry to check thermometer accuracy. (Although the ice containers work much better in coolers when on camping trips! Plus the containers keep the water from sloshing around with the food.)

Zip-loc bags of frozen water may work better than my containers, but you'd have to check the bags before each use to make sure they aren't torn from ice expanding.

I'm going to try using ice-cube tray sized ice next time and see if that makes a difference...

 

[shetc]

South Florida here. Get one of these babies. It will drop to the 90F ground water temperature in 10 minutes. I then use a pump to recirculate ice water through it. Can get down to 60F in another 10 minutes.

 

[cyberbackpacker]

large chunks of ice don't keep the water as cold as smaller pieces!

This! Really if using ice, lots of small ice chips is want you want to do for maximum benefit! The larger the block, the less effective at chilling.

 

[LittleRiver]

... large chunks of ice don't keep the water as cold as smaller pieces! More surface area with ice-cube sized pieces ....

You nailed it. Heat transfer is dependent on surface area.

I tried it both ways with my recirculating chilling rig, there is a big difference using many small pieces of ice.

 

[IslandLizard]

• When I've knocked it down to 120 degrees or so, I remove the hose, fill my mash tun with a bunch of ice and just enough water to prime the pump, and run that through the CFC to chill more efficiently.

What's the temp of that pre-iced chilling water coming out of your CFC? Do you recirc it back to your iced mash tun when the temp is at least 20-30F lower than your current wort temp? Or is all of it single pass?
The closer you get to your pitching temps, the longer it takes to bring it down.

I use a plate chiller, so similar to yours. Our tap water is 45-70F.
In Summer, it goes from boil to ~110-120F in single pass.
There's an immersion coil in my "ice tun," so I then pre-chill the tap water with ice first, and finish with circulating ice water to get to pitch temps.
So there are 3 stages. It takes quite bit of work and attention, more than brewing itself.

You can calculate how much energy needs to get lost to bring 10-11 gallons from 120F to 65F. Then compare that with the cooling capacity of your ice.
40# of ice sounds a lot for 10-11 gallons at 120F.

 

[Beermeister32]

Make a 7 gallon batch. Here in SoCal you can usually chill with groundwater to about 85 degrees.

Prior to brew day take 3 gallons of brew water, boil it and store it in gallon jugs in the refrigerator. I usually take chilled distilled and skip the boil. I have one of my refrigerators set to 34F so the water gets really cold.

Carefully add this back to your 85 degree wort and you will be very near pitching temperatures. You can even add it directly to the carboys. Fast and easy.

 

[Mutant]

I have used two square five gallon buckets of salt saturated water to then plunge a stainless steel coil into which I can get down to 19F in a kegerator; a freezer would get that much colder.. I pump the wort through the coil, so you have to be very good at cleaning and sanitizing the inside of the coil. The tough part of that is it takes days for the two five gallon buckets to chill back down. I use square buckets, as that is what fits best into a kegerator. Ten gallons of the salt saturated water at 19F will chill down five gallons of wort fairly quickly. Make sure to also rinse the salt water off the stainless steel coil, as it will pit.

 

[devilssoninlaw]

I work maintenance at the local hospital where they toss out "ice packs" on a daily basis. I've brought home about 10 of them and pop them in the freezer a couple days before brew day, they work great. The thickness works well with the brew kettle in my kitchen sink.

I brew 5 gallon batches and I'm a cheapskate. I keep looking at the different chillers but can't bring myself to drop the cash when these do the job very well.

Ask if you know anyone that works at a hospital, the lab seems to go through a lot of them.

 

[deuc224]

This is really making me think of using the glycol chiller extra outs to run into the CFC now. El Paso heat is running in the 100s constantly now, gonna have to think on this one.

 

[LittleRiver]

I use an inexpensive little water transfer pump to first recirculate from a 5gal bucket of tap water. The resulting hot water gets saved as wash water for cleanup.

Then I move the hoses over to a cooler with a 20lb bag of ice and 5gal of water. The resulting water is used for rinsing during cleanup. I get the bag of ice for $2 at a local discount grocery.

 

[ChiknNutz]

I have saved a few of the reusable ice packs that come in "HelloFresh" and similar food service boxes. I do what many on here have said, first chill to around 120-140 with ground water, then recirc cool water with a small pump. While I do need to improve the process by starting out with cooler recirc water, the ice packs are quite useful. I am using one of the more inexpensive ICs, has maybe 25' of copper tubing. The Hyrdas have great reviews, but as has been mentioned, I too have a hard time spending the money on one of those just yet.

 

[betarhoalphadelta]

Delete about a gallon of water from your recipe and dump one of the ice blocks in before the temp goes below 180f?

Make a 7 gallon batch. Here in SoCal you can usually chill with groundwater to about 85 degrees.

Prior to brew day take 3 gallons of brew water, boil it and store it in gallon jugs in the refrigerator. I usually take chilled distilled and skip the boil. I have one of my refrigerators set to 34F so the water gets really cold.

Carefully add this back to your 85 degree wort and you will be very near pitching temperatures. You can even add it directly to the carboys. Fast and easy.

Maybe I'm a purist, but the only thing that goes into my beer is beer... While I'm sure it wouldn't hurt my beer, I'd prefer to stick with my normal batch size and not worry about brewing stronger wort and then diluting, and making all the adjustments necessary for hop utilization/etc. My normal system is too well dialed in and the beer comes out exactly how I want it; don't mess with a good thing, right?

 

[betarhoalphadelta]

But after doing this several times, I've come to the conclusion that large chunks of ice don't keep the water as cold as smaller pieces! More surface area with ice-cube sized pieces -- the large chunks, while they look impressive, are only chilling the water on contact with the outside of the blocks. The ice lasts longer with big chunks, but isn't as effective at keeping the water colder. That's why Thermapen recommends using an ice bath slurry to check thermometer accuracy. (Although the ice containers work much better in coolers when on camping trips! Plus the containers keep the water from sloshing around with the food.)

Zip-loc bags of frozen water may work better than my containers, but you'd have to check the bags before each use to make sure they aren't torn from ice expanding.

This! Really if using ice, lots of small ice chips is want you want to do for maximum benefit! The larger the block, the less effective at chilling.

You nailed it. Heat transfer is dependent on surface area.

I tried it both ways with my recirculating chilling rig, there is a big difference using many small pieces of ice.

Totally agree and I realize that it's not as efficient as small pieces, but I don't want to buy the big bags of ice and don't want to spend the time filling 50 ice cube trays lol... Especially since I don't have a sink in the garage, so I'd have to either fill them from a hose or fill them in the kitchen and carry to the garage, avoiding a 66 lb puppy the whole time!

One thing I do is the recirculation of the ice water in the mash tun is done with me manually using the inlet tube to spray the return water directly on an ice block to maximize surface contact of the return water with the ice block.

Regarding the zip-lock comment, those would be 1-time use. I tear away the bag before putting into the mash tun to minimize any insulating effects of the plastic between the ice and the surrounding water.

 

[betarhoalphadelta]

When I started brewing I did option 1 and I bought the style you linked but the cheap ones at wal mart and spent like $4 for 20 containers. You could get some similar at the dollar store.

They worked really well but as you say they take up a lot of space in the freezer, I also used to freeze soda bottles and they work until they start to melt and don’t radiate enough temp difference.

When I was in California I I had an extra fridge in the garage that was there when we moved in so I could make the ice in the freezer and I would put buckets of water in the fridge so the water started out in the 40’s and then add the ice.

Good point. I suppose I should look around for the bargains. Given the intended use, they don't need to be name brand fancy things.

BTW I use an upright top-freezer fridge to ferment, and typically will cold-crash any fermenting beer for a few days before making a new batch. So that freezer remains empty during fermentation (won't be cold enough anyway) and will give me several days of usable freezer space for freezing this water when it comes time to brew.

 

[betarhoalphadelta]

I work maintenance at the local hospital where they toss out "ice packs" on a daily basis. I've brought home about 10 of them and pop them in the freezer a couple days before brew day, they work great. The thickness works well with the brew kettle in my kitchen sink.

I brew 5 gallon batches and I'm a cheapskate. I keep looking at the different chillers but can't bring myself to drop the cash when these do the job very well.

Ask if you know anyone that works at a hospital, the lab seems to go through a lot of them.

I have saved a few of the reusable ice packs that come in "HelloFresh" and similar food service boxes. I do what many on here have said, first chill to around 120-140 with ground water, then recirc cool water with a small pump. While I do need to improve the process by starting out with cooler recirc water, the ice packs are quite useful. I am using one of the more inexpensive ICs, has maybe 25' of copper tubing. The Hyrdas have great reviews, but as has been mentioned, I too have a hard time spending the money on one of those just yet.

That might be an option. My wife works in a medical office and they regularly get ice packs with their vaccine shipments. My biggest worry with that is that the plastic shell that the ice pack is in will cause it to be very inefficient at keeping the water cold as the ice packs start to melt. That's not an issue in an insulated box, but since I'm recirculating the warm return water as I go, I don't know if the insulating effect of the plastic will keep the temp too high.

 

[crooow]

I've used this thing to keep stuff cold in my cooler for days:

https://www.amazon.com/Cooler-Shock...ywords=shock+block&qid=1592488173&sr=8-2&th=1
It's huge and has a built in thermometer. It freezes down to just below zero. I wonder if a couple of these might solve your problem. I haven't yet used it in a brewing application.

 

[ChiknNutz]

I agree that my method is far less than optimal, but came at no monetary cost for the ice packs. I think pre-chilling the recirc water would certainly bump up the cooling efficiency, if you have fridge or freezer space to do so.

 

[Dr_Jeff]

Take a dish washing pan or one of the wash pans one gets when in the hospital, fill and freeze, you will end up with a 10x12x8 or larger block of ice. I do this for my jockey box on the cold plate.

I have a square five gallon jug that I had added garden hose connections to it. I'll fill it up most of the way, then lay it on it's side in the chest freezer, hook it up inline after I get the temps down to 100-120 with the ground water.

My super chiller does most of the hard work now.

 

[balrog]

more, less filled (thin), quart or gallon ziploc bags -- thus the surface area of the sides is the major cooler and they stack flat in freezer. I am thinking filling no more than 1/2-1" thick when closed, whatever that volume ends up, and you then have equivalent of frozen "plates" to circulate through/around.

 

[OldDogBrewing]

So, as we approach summer here in SoCal, and our groundwater pushes up to 80+ degrees, wort chilling becomes difficult. Especially (obviously) if I want to chill to lager temps. Especially++ because I'm doing 10 gallon batches. And here in SoCal, water is pretty dear, so I want to use as little as I can.

My system is a three-vessel, single tier system with two pumps. I have a counterflow chiller.

My current process when the groundwater is hot:

• At flameout, I start recirculating the wort through the CFC right back into the boil kettle, while running hose water through the outside of the CFC.
• When I've knocked it down to 120 degrees or so, I remove the hose, fill my mash tun with a bunch of ice and just enough water to prime the pump, and run that through the CFC to chill more efficiently.
• When I get within 10 degrees in the boil kettle (ale or lager pitch temp), I redirect the pump output to the fermenter. I've found at full flow, that drops the final 10 degrees.

That said, I run into a problem... It takes a LOT of ice to cool 10 gallons of wort. If I can think long enough ahead, I can make 6 ice blocks out of gallon-sized zip locks--but that takes a lot of time, a lot of bags, and a lot of space in the freezer. If I forget, I'm stuck buying 40# of ice at the grocery store, which is basically $10 added to my brew day costs.

So I want to make big blocks of ice. I'm thinking of a few options:

1. Buying some large reusable plastic food containers (similar to this) and using them to make the ice. While it might require a bunch to produce enough ice, at least they're of a uniform enough shape and probably stackable so I could do them easily in the freezer.
2. Buying some large (2.5 gallon) ziplock or Glad sealable bags, and doing it the way I used to. The advantage is that 2 of those bags might be enough to cool a whole batch, so even though they're a weird shape they might be a lot easier than trying to fit 6 individual gallon ziplocks.

Has anyone ever tried option #2? I worry that none of the big bags are strong enough to handle 2.5 gallons of water. 1 gallon freezer bags have a difficult enough time.

What about #1? Are there any easier and cheaper containers than what I linked? Perhaps gallon-sized instead of 1/2 gallon?

Let me know.

Some time ago I used similar plastic containers that I filled with boiled water 3 days before to let it freeze well, then I throwed them in accounting with the water that they contained, so I boiled a bit more to account for it, but the thing is that I made big blocks of ice from tap water which is cheap

Now I just buy a couple of bag full of ice wich for my volume is cheap and I use them for an ice bath for my kettle

There are some Ice machines out there that are intended for making clear ice for ice balls to use in whisky on the rocks japanese style, those aren't cheap but they lay a lot of Ice in a day of use

 

[Knightshade]

I'm in SoCal as well. I felt like I was right on the edge of disaster with my setup this past weekend. I've got a little aquarium pump underneath all that ice on the left pumping water into an immersion chiller. I let the first 3 gallons or so go out the window into a bucket to water the yard. I should have saved it to clean the chiller and pot, etc., next time...

Think it took about 30 minutes to get down to 70 for a 3 gallon batch which is way too damn long IMO. That was with me stirring every once in awhile and moving the IC around as well. I threw everything in the fermenter and pitched later that evening at 62. I've since ordered a riptide so I can whirlpool, and upgraded the aquarium pump from a 265 GPH to 660 GPH unit. Moving from 3/8" ID lines to 1/2" ID lines as well.

 

[NickTheGreat]

I just a poor boy from a poor family. But whenever we'd need lots of ice for something, we'd use milk jugs. But in our prime growing up, my mom would buy 6 or 7 gallons of milk a week. So she had plenty of them lying around.

Agree with the smaller chunks being better, but you're gonna want some big chunks in there too, or you'll be adding ice all the time.

 

[beernutz]

My chilling procedure for 10 gallon batches
1. pre brew day freeze three 1 gallon milk jugs filled with water. Luckily we have a spare fridge in our garage, otherwise I would go buy a couple large bags of ice at Publix for $4 each.

2. on brew day, 15 minutes before the end of the boil put the immersion chiller in kettle. My immersion chiller is a morebeer model which has a wort recirculating tube added.

3. when ready to start chilling connect ground water hose to immersion chiller and recirculating wort hose to that input on the chiller. Turn on ground water and start Chugger pump to recirculate wort which really accelerates the chilling process. I collect the hot output water from immersion chiller in a couple buckets to use for cleaning.

4. cut the 3 frozen gallon jugs with box cutter and smash ice with hammer into a round igloo cooler (a former mash tun) containing a pond pump and add enough ground water to cover the bottom of the pump. Don't use the output from immersion chiller to fill the igloo as that water is still too warm.

Recycle the jug pieces and if you have a recycling center plus that is a good place to stock up on more empty gallon jugs.

5. when wort temp goes below 100, disconnect ground water hose and attach output hose from pond pump directing ice water into the chiller and redirect chiller output water back into igloo cooler to create a chilling water loop.

Three gallons of iced water will get the wort temp into the mid/low 60s with about 15 minutes of total chilling time and getting the wort below 60 just requires another gallon of ice.

The process seems pretty efficient water-usage-wise and works every time even in the hottest part of the summer with mid 90s temps.

 

[Deadalus]

Yes a hammer or sledge hammer will bust up your ice blocks as needed. Any excuse to use a sledge hammer is generally fun.

 

[bkboiler]

Hmm...this has me thinking...
Been needing to invest in a pond pump for the same reason as you're saying.
I never thought to just use my spare "wort pump" instead to recirc the ice water from my mash tun. I'll need to buy some barb to 3/4" MHT fittings though.

For me I'll probably take a couple spare 1 gallon jugs that my distilled water comes in and fill to freeze. Once I pop it in the freezer it should ice over 36 hours in advance. Will of course need to cut the jug open to remove the ice, but that's ok for me, I buy usually 3-4 gallons to blend with my carbon filtered hard water.

I've been told the dimple in the side of the jug helps when the water expands when freezing.

I just need to buy an ice pick...

 

[JAReeves]

What's the temp of that pre-iced chilling water coming out of your CFC? Do you recirc it back to your iced mash tun when the temp is at least 20-30F lower than your current wort temp? Or is all of it single pass?
The closer you get to your pitching temps, the longer it takes to bring it down.

I use a plate chiller, so similar to yours. Our tap water is 45-70F.
In Summer, it goes from boil to ~110-120F in single pass.
There's an immersion coil in my "ice tun," so I then pre-chill the tap water with ice first, and finish with circulating ice water to get to pitch temps.
So there are 3 stages. It takes quite bit of work and attention, more than brewing itself.

You can calculate how much energy needs to get lost to bring 10-11 gallons from 120F to 65F. Then compare that with the cooling capacity of your ice.
40# of ice sounds a lot for 10-11 gallons at 120F.

So I am hoping to get a plate chiller later this week, I have been using a standard immersion chiller for the last two years.

I plan to precook my water using this method: SoCal Groundwater>>Immersion Chiller in Ice Bath>>Plate Chiller>>water reclamation barrels for later garden water.

I am hoping to get below 70F at least, as right now I can only cool to 80F before I dump my wort through a chinois (fine kitchen filter, also aerates) into the carboy. I have had good success with the immersion chiller-only method most of the year, but now that it is summer, I need to get my wort much cooler before the yeast have their way with it. My last batch just wouldn't get below 75F the first day of fermentation. Hydro samples taste ok, but I want better.

If this is sounds crazy, I am open to other suggestions!

 

[Everhard]

So I have the same issue with not wanting to use any more water then I need to plus in winter I don't want to run a garden hose into my brewery. (No running water in the brewery)
So my solution is what some others have done: butcher a window air conditioner, stick the condenser into a large cooler, fill it with water, then put a pump to run the water from said cooler thru my chiller and back into the cooler. If I wanted I could put coolant in said cooler and make it go even colder. Haven't tried that yet, my setup gets 6 gallons to 20c in 30 minutes summer or winter. Aside from being fast it doesn't use any more water then the original fill into the cooler. And that I just leave in there.

E.

 

[IslandLizard]

So I am hoping to get a plate chiller later this week, I have been using a standard immersion chiller for the last two years.

Welcome to the PCCC, the plate chiller cleaning club!
As long as you filter out or block your hops and other coarse stuff from going into the chiller, it's a wonderful and efficient chilling device.

But if it gets clogged, with hop debris or other pulp (e.g., disintegrated grapefruit peel/pith ), you'd be cursing yourself forever for buying one. Hot and cold break seem to pass through generally, but could plug it up too if there's a ton of it going through all at once. They're very hard to unplug, once it happens, and you can never be sure you got it all out.

Please inform yourself well, before using your plate chiller, about operation, cleaning, backwashing, etc.

I plan to precook my water using this method: SoCal Groundwater>>Immersion Chiller in Ice Bath>>Plate Chiller>>water reclamation barrels for later garden water.

You mean "prechill?"
Once you get within 20-40F from pitching temps, you may want to recirculate back to your ice bath. Let the chiller outlet temp be your guide. If the outlet temp is lower than your tap water going in, recirculation is more efficient.

 

[Brewsncrabs]

View attachment 685453View attachment 685453View attachment 685453

South Florida here. Get one of these babies. It will drop to the 90F ground water temperature in 10 minutes. I then use a pump to recirculate ice water through it. Can get down to 60F in another 10 minutes.

The Hydra. As Shetc says, they work. While my water temps are not that high as yours, in the summer I chill to about 90-100 and then add ice to my slop sink. Use a sump pump and get to 65 in a few minutes.

 

[z-bob]

I freeze 1L pop bottles full of water (don't quite fill them all the way), and after I chill my wort down to 90 or so I add a bottle or two of ice. Dip em in sanitizer first. The bottles have lids, so the melting ice does not dilute the beer.

 

[thefigure5]

So, as we approach summer here in SoCal, and our groundwater pushes up to 80+ degrees, wort chilling becomes difficult. Especially (obviously) if I want to chill to lager temps. Especially++ because I'm doing 10 gallon batches. And here in SoCal, water is pretty dear, so I want to use as little as I can.

My system is a three-vessel, single tier system with two pumps. I have a counterflow chiller.

My current process when the groundwater is hot:

• At flameout, I start recirculating the wort through the CFC right back into the boil kettle, while running hose water through the outside of the CFC.
• When I've knocked it down to 120 degrees or so, I remove the hose, fill my mash tun with a bunch of ice and just enough water to prime the pump, and run that through the CFC to chill more efficiently.
• When I get within 10 degrees in the boil kettle (ale or lager pitch temp), I redirect the pump output to the fermenter. I've found at full flow, that drops the final 10 degrees.

That said, I run into a problem... It takes a LOT of ice to cool 10 gallons of wort. If I can think long enough ahead, I can make 6 ice blocks out of gallon-sized zip locks--but that takes a lot of time, a lot of bags, and a lot of space in the freezer. If I forget, I'm stuck buying 40# of ice at the grocery store, which is basically $10 added to my brew day costs.

So I want to make big blocks of ice. I'm thinking of a few options:

1. Buying some large reusable plastic food containers (similar to this) and using them to make the ice. While it might require a bunch to produce enough ice, at least they're of a uniform enough shape and probably stackable so I could do them easily in the freezer.
2. Buying some large (2.5 gallon) ziplock or Glad sealable bags, and doing it the way I used to. The advantage is that 2 of those bags might be enough to cool a whole batch, so even though they're a weird shape they might be a lot easier than trying to fit 6 individual gallon ziplocks.

Has anyone ever tried option #2? I worry that none of the big bags are strong enough to handle 2.5 gallons of water. 1 gallon freezer bags have a difficult enough time.

What about #1? Are there any easier and cheaper containers than what I linked? Perhaps gallon-sized instead of 1/2 gallon?

Let me know.

I saved a 1-gallon round food grade bucket and lid that coconut oil came in and have made a few blocks of ice with that. After it's frozen, the ice releases easily by running a little water over the outside, or you could set it in a larger bucket with water to conserve.

I'm storing the blocks in big bags that ice cubes come in. It takes a while to freeze through and then to get to the freezer temperature. You definitely have to think ahead.

US Plastic Corp. sells rectangular buckets in varying sizes. They're not expensive; lids are usually sold separately; and then there's the shipping and handling cost: ~$19 S&H for a bucket and lid to 90210.

 

[JAReeves]

Welcome to the PCCC, the plate chiller cleaning club!
As long as you filter out or block your hops and other coarse stuff from going into the chiller, it's a wonderful and efficient chilling device.

But if it gets clogged, with hop debris or other pulp (e.g., disintegrated grapefruit peel/pith ), you'd be cursing yourself forever for buying one. Hot and cold break seem to pass through generally, but could plug it up too if there's a ton of it going through all at once. They're very hard to unplug, once it happens, and you can never be sure you got it all out.

Please inform yourself well, before using your plate chiller, about operation, cleaning, backwashing, etc.


You mean "prechill?"
Once you get within 20-40F from pitching temps, you may want to recirculate back to your ice bath. Let the chiller outlet temp be your guide. If the outlet temp is lower than your tap water going in, recirculation is more efficient.

Damn autocorrect.

 

[IslandLizard]

US Plastic Corp. sells rectangular buckets in varying sizes. They're not expensive; lids are usually sold separately; and then there's the shipping and handling cost: ~$19 S&H for a bucket and lid to 90210.

I had looked at their site several times, pricing is very average, but their shipping surely kills the deal.

Now you could order for pick up at one of their warehouses. At least it used to be. If you're near one or driving past when visiting family or friends during opening hours, that may be a good option.

 

[thefigure5]

Agreed. I have gotten items from US Plastic a couple of times when I needed to.

 

[ncbrewer]

If using frozen water bottles for cooling, they cool faster with salt water. I use 4 oz of salt in a liter bottle.

 

[JRG]

I tried making large blocks of ice but found it to be a hassle and the chilling times with recirculating water through hydra chiller were much longer than regular ice cubes. I use tap water to chill to ~100 then use ice cubes with 1 gallon of prechilled water. When making a lager I buy ice at Costco on the way home the night before brew day. A 20 pound bag is $2.19.