When shall I start recirculating ice water with my immersion chiller?

[Elysium]

I am planning to use normal tap water to chill the wort at the beginning, but the last couple of degrees are a nightmare.

What is the ideas temperature to stop using tap water and start with the icy water recirculation to chill 5 gallon wort effectively in 15-20 mins?

 

[jethro55]

I have the same problem using my immersion chiller. You could try to fill the sink with ice water and sit the kettle in it during the normal chilling.

One of these days I plan to buy a roll of soft copper tubing and make an immersion chiller with twice as many coils as the one that I purchased. I think that it needs an inner loop added to the outer loop. For now, I just stir the wort to help it cool faster.

 

[ChefRex]

I am planning to use normal tap water to chill the wort at the beginning, but the last couple of degrees are a nightmare.

What is the ideas temperature to stop using tap water and start with the icy water recirculation to chill 5 gallon wort effectively in 15-20 mins?

Depends on ground water temps,last week I started around 90F, whenever I notice that the drop off slows,
**** luck

 

[KepowOb]

Take the temperature of your ground water. I find that, once I'm within 10F of my ground water temperature, things grind to a halt.

Also, keep stirring your wort while you cool it! I just hold my IC and spin it around for 10-20 seconds. The lower the temperature, the famous I stir. The first few times I used my IC I didn't stir at all, and it took over 40 minutes to get to 75F. I can hit 75F in under 15 minutes, with the same ground water, by stirring almost continuously. It's a bit annoying, but really, really helps.


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[brewkinger]

My groundwater in northern VT is bone numbing cold (mid 60s) in the summer, so I have no need for pre chilling.
But I agree with stirring while cooling. I stir constantly and get my wort to pitch temps in under 10 min.
As an experiment I left the IC in the kettle once and did not stir, just occasionally lifted the IC in and out.
After 20 min, the wort was 103 degrees. Stirred for 5 min and the temp was down to 72.

If you HAVE to pre chill, I would say that you should get it down to 100 and then chill.


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[Demus]

Whether you have a simple immersion chiller or high end plate chiller/pump setup, the same problem arises. The rate of chilling is a factor of the difference between the wort and source water temperatures. If you have a way to pump ice water through your chiller, you can maintain a large temperature differential down to a lower wort temperature. If you do it too soon, you'll just melt a bunch of ice and not really chill much faster. Wait until your source water and wort are only about 20 degrees apart, then switch your source water to ice water. I do this with a pond pump, works great!


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[BlueHouseBrewhaus]

I do ice water for the entire chill. I put my BK in my sink, fill the sink with ice water and use a submersible pump to circulate the ice water. Takes 15-20 min to get to 60F. It's described more completely here:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f244/chilling-options-biab-471009/index4.html

 

[number40fan]

Today I tried something new, on my now third batch. Cooled to 120° with the garden hose, which took 15 minutes. Then took the pot and sat it in the left side of the sink. Filled with cold water and ice from the fridges ice machine. Then took 24 water bottles that I had filled and frozen and put them in the right sink. Filled with water and using a bilge pump, circulated the water from the right sink through IC. Down to 70° in another 10 minutes.

First batch, IC only with garden hose, down to 100° then in an ice bath in the sink took almost an hour.

 

[Zwerski]

Our CA municipal water gets pretty warm in summer. I chill with that (into my washing machine) until about 100 degrees. Then hook the chiller to an 85 gph fountain pump in a small cooler with ice water in it. Makes quick work of it - about 15 minutes total. I then re-freeze the cooler contents for next batch. Drought conditions our here.


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[grrickar]

Use a tub with ice water, and another tub to collect the hot exhaust water. I use those cheap tubs from Wal mart for that, and a pump from Harbor Freight. Works quite well - even better in the Ohio winter where I can sit the tub outside and get it to near freezing without using any electricity.

Unless you have a DEEP sink, the tub is more volume. Freeze bottles of water water and toss into the tub, then refreeze them for reuse after. Saves on store bought ice.

The tub of hot water can be used for cleanup. Just watch the first few gallons that come out - they will be extremely hot!

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f255/yet-another-immersion-chiller-first-attempt-507254/#post6549976

 

[OleGoatBrewing]

Here in Hawaii the ground water is normally 80 degrees or better. Back when I used an IC I would go though ice really quick so I started freeze four one gallon milk jugs and cool a tub of water with them. Once I got my wort down to about 90 I would start to recirculate with cooler water. It would get down to the 70's pretty quick.