Methods/equipment used to chill wort

[AJB3]

I just converted my set up to a 44 qt brew pot...yeah baby! I also put together a copper tube wort chiller that fits nicely inside the brew pot and connects to the hose easily, only one problem...a ton I mean a ton of wasted water!!! I have seen some pump setups on utube for chillers and the water is recirculated from a trash can. Just wondering if anyone has come up with something cool to save on water, when using the copper tube method, that is relatively inexpensive? Also, I am always open to alternative cooling methods as this step in the brewing process always seems to add to my odds of contamination. Thoughts anyone?

 

[tektonjp]

You can try to recirculate. Once one bucket gets warmed up, then switch to a cold bucket to get down to pitching temps. I personally use a CFC, and it uses a bit less water, but I save the warmed water in a few buckets to use for clean up

 

[Jbear]

Harbor Freight has cheap pond pumps for recirculating - I got one for $14.99.
I collect the first few gallons of really hot water in my HLT for cleaning - usually about 6 gallons. After the water coming out of the chiller is cooling down, recirculate with the pond pump sitting in a cooler of ice water.

Personally I think that an immersion chiller is probably the most sanitary method of chilling. Put the chiller in with 10 minutes left in the boil and it gets sterilized. With counter flow or plate chillers you are sending the wort through a tube that you have to clean / sanitize by pumping through it.

 

[rhamilton]

I have an igloo cooler I fill with water and freeze. That becomes my water chiller and I recirculate the hot water over the ice and put the Harbor Freight pump in the bottom of the cooler. Works very very very well without water waste. Cools my wort below 80 degrees in about 7-8 minutes with a really really crappy pump. Just have to remember to freeze the igloo cooler the day before you brew. I'll try to do a write-up tomorrow but no promises.

 

[tom_gamer]

I have an igloo cooler I fill with water and freeze. That becomes my water chiller and I recirculate the hot water over the ice and put the Harbor Freight pump in the bottom of the cooler. Works very very very well without water waste. Cools my wort below 80 degrees in about 7-8 minutes with a really really crappy pump. Just have to remember to freeze the igloo cooler the day before you brew. I'll try to do a write-up tomorrow but no promises.

How do you freeze your cooler? Does it fit in your freezer?

 

[rhamilton]

How do you freeze your cooler? Does it fit in your freezer?

Yea it is a vertical, rectangular cooler. Probably holds 12-18 cans.

 

[tom_gamer]

Yea it is a vertical, rectangular cooler. Probably holds 12-18 cans.

Nice.

BTW I use a plate chiller, and run the water into the pool. I live in Texas so adding the hot water to the pool usually cools it off in the summer time. Lol

 

[tre9er]

If you use a pre-chiller (smaller coil of copper immersed in ice-water) you could recirculate probably without the water being too hot to effectively cool. Of course, I'd still recommend saving the first 4-6 gallons for cleaning (fill your "utility" buckets, add PBW) that way you're recirculating the coolest water you can.

If you don't want to mess with a pre-chiller just save the first bit of water then add ice to your recirc bucket, provided the pump has a screen on it.

 

[tre9er]

I have an igloo cooler I fill with water and freeze. That becomes my water chiller and I recirculate the hot water over the ice and put the Harbor Freight pump in the bottom of the cooler. Works very very very well without water waste. Cools my wort below 80 degrees in about 7-8 minutes with a really really crappy pump. Just have to remember to freeze the igloo cooler the day before you brew. I'll try to do a write-up tomorrow but no promises.

can you explain this a bit more? Put the pump in the bottom of the cooler...that's frozen solid? Sorry, a bit lost.

 

[rhamilton]

can you explain this a bit more? Put the pump in the bottom of the cooler...that's frozen solid? Sorry, a bit lost.

Yea that's an important detail. So to make room for the pump in the frozen cooler, I have a 1 liter bottle filled with metal weights. I put that in the cooler, fill it it water, and put it in the freezer. So the pump will go into the cavity where the bottle is. To remove the bottle from the ice block, I pour warm water into it and it'll loosen up from the block and come out. Put the pump where the bottle was and add enough water to prime the pump. Water exits the cooler, goes into a rib-cage copper coil in the wort, & returns through a hole I drilled in the top of the cooler. The hot water then melts more ice in the cooler, adding more cool water to be recirculated through the chiller.

I ended up doing the above process since my ice maker capacity is crap.

If your ice maker has the capacity (or if you just buy ice) you can skip the above process and just fill an igloo cooler with ice, add enough water to prime the pump, and do the above process without freezing and having to add the empty bottle. I'm just a cheap ass

 

[tre9er]

Excellent, I figured there had to be a way you were creating a cavity for the pump!

 

[AJB3]

Thanks for all the input guys! Since I already fabbed my own copper wort chiller, I decided to stick with that investment and figure out a way to recirculate like you all had mentioned. I went to home depot and big trash can, a 2x4 to span the trash can, a 10ft garden hose, hose clamps, and the most powerful recirculating pump I could find- think i got lazy on my research here and overpaid but I just wanted to get this going! By the way, I got this main idea off of YouTube - I'm not that smart!

Setup- I anchored the pump to the center of the 2x4 and then anchored the 2x4 off center (to leave a large opening on one side) to the the top of the trashcan. I filled the trashcan with ice from my freezer and filled with water (about 3/4 up) from the hose outside.I cut about a 2 1/2 ft piece of hose and connect to 'water in' side of pump and the free end sits in cold water. I use another small hose to connect to the 'water out' of the pump and 'water in' of the copper chiller. Finally there is your last piece of small hose coming off the other end of your wort chiller. Like you guys said, the first 6 or so gal are hot so I use that for cleanup. Once it cools off and I start recalculating, it takes about 7 minutes or so to get down to 70 degrees. The best part is I bet I save 20 plus gallons of water and it is more efficient! I'll attach a picture next brew day!

 

[ChuckCollins]

I use a immersion chiller with a pump hooked up in a ice water bath .

 

[kerant]

I just converted my set up to a 44 qt brew pot...yeah baby! I also put together a copper tube wort chiller that fits nicely inside the brew pot and connects to the hose easily, only one problem...a ton I mean a ton of wasted water!!! I have seen some pump setups on utube for chillers and the water is recirculated from a trash can. Just wondering if anyone has come up with something cool to save on water, when using the copper tube method, that is relatively inexpensive? Also, I am always open to alternative cooling methods as this step in the brewing process always seems to add to my odds of contamination. Thoughts anyone?

After the first time of seeing 20 gal's wasted I started draing the hose into empty carboys and pails to use for future brews.

 

[kerant]

I have an igloo cooler I fill with water and freeze. That becomes my water chiller and I recirculate the hot water over the ice and put the Harbor Freight pump in the bottom of the cooler. Works very very very well without water waste. Cools my wort below 80 degrees in about 7-8 minutes with a really really crappy pump. Just have to remember to freeze the igloo cooler the day before you brew. I'll try to do a write-up tomorrow but no promises.

Pics of this set up would be cool. Or anything similar.

 

[andys_got_it]

I submerge my brew bucket into an ice bath...I know it is not cutting edge in technology but it works.

 

[johnbrain]

I put my 20 quarts bk on the step of my swimming pool. When I eventually go all grain I plan to use an immersion chiller and recirculate pool water from the colder deep end.

 

[Bobby_M]

While some areas have tap water too warm NOT to use ice, I still find it interesting that folks will find potentially false economy in making ice to save 20 gallons of water. I'd love to know the actual cost and environmental cost comparisons between the two. I pay 10 cents for 20 gallons of tap water and I know for sure it would cost more in electricity to freeze say 10 pounds of ice. The harder figure is the environmental costs between the electricity to make the ice locally vs. the impact of producing 20 gallons of tap water. Careful re-use of this waste water increases its efficiency, even if just used for cleaning.

 

[tom_gamer]

While some areas have tap water too warm NOT to use ice, I still find it interesting that folks will find potentially false economy in making ice to save 20 gallons of water. I'd love to know the actual cost and environmental cost comparisons between the two. I pay 10 cents for 20 gallons of tap water and I know for sure it would cost more in electricity to freeze say 10 pounds of ice. The harder figure is the environmental costs between the electricity to make the ice locally vs. the impact of producing 20 gallons of tap water. Careful re-use of this waste water increases its efficiency, even if just used for cleaning.

I don't have anything exact for you but I do want to say this. The freezer that would use to freeze set ice is already running, it would run a bit more, but I would say it wouldn't be a significant change in your electricity bill. Also people like ne reuse the tap water. I drain the chiller water into my pool, which would have to do either way. So I don't think it would be a high cost difference either way.