I'm In Love

[skelrad]

with my new wort chiller! Brother in law gave me a gift certificate to our LHBS. After a year of saying "I'll just make a chiller" I finally broke down and bought one. Oh sweet heaven! It cut my brew time by a good 30 minutes. No more standing over the sink replenishing ice for an hour to just baaarely get the temperature low enough to pitch. No idea why I waited so long.

 

[BillyBob]

I agree.
I recently got one too. Great addition.

 

[NuclearBrewer]

Congratulations on the new piece of brewing equipment. I went through the same thing with mine - kept thinking I'd make one, but ended up buying one. Works amazingly, can chill beers in the summer in about 20-25 minutes. I was able to chill a recent brew in about 7 minutes (thanks to some cold ground water)!

 

[skelrad]

Yep, we've got some cold water this time of year in Wisconsin, so I went from boiling to 75 degrees in around 10-12 minutes. Awesome! The only problem I had is that the adapter I got with the chiller for the kitchen sink doesn't fit! Because my sink has a sprayer head on it, the adapter won't go in far enough to engage the threads. I was bound and determined to use the chiller though, so I just went outside and hooked it up to the spigot by the patio. Not ideal, but it was still way better than the old alternative!

 

[NuclearBrewer]

Yep, we've got some cold water this time of year in Wisconsin, so I went from boiling to 75 degrees in around 10-12 minutes. Awesome! The only problem I had is that the adapter I got with the chiller for the kitchen sink doesn't fit! Because my sink has a sprayer head on it, the adapter won't go in far enough to engage the threads. I was bound and determined to use the chiller though, so I just went outside and hooked it up to the spigot by the patio. Not ideal, but it was still way better than the old alternative!

It sucks that it didn't work on your kitchen sink, did it come with an adapter to go from kitchen sink to garden hose? I know most brewing gear is designed to work with utility sink/garden hose thread, which are different from most normal faucet threads. Since the sprayer head is in the way, unfortunately it doesn't really matter, but I'm glad you were able to find a good work-around!

I agree 100% that it is better than the alternative. I used to have to buy ice when brewing all of the time, which was an extra hassle when getting ready for brew day (not enough freezer space to make the amount of ice needed). I have to make some alterations to my chiller still, as the hose connectors on it aren't very good, and tend to be leaky. I just have connect and test it before using it each time to make sure I can get the leaking to stop, which I can in less than a couple minutes. Once I have some extra time in the summer I'm planning on sourcing some better connections to solder on.