Winter, and copper coils don't mix

[Gonefishing]

Earlier last week I discovered that the copper coil in my herms unit didn't survive the winter. I assume now that as hard as I tried to make sure there was no water in it I failed and the tiny amount in the tube froze and cracked it.
Tonight I discovered that my counterflow chiller, which has been used twice suffered the same fate and is now junk. I'll probably make the attempt to take it apart and see if I can repair it though. However, that does me no good tonight. I discovered it leaks as soon as I turned on the water to cool the wort in my boil kettle... water was coming out both the water and beer outlets. I have the wort in a bucket sitting in ice water now. Wasn't looking forward to a long night....

 

[RPh_Guy]

Bummer. Thanks for the heads-up!

Here in northern Ohio it's winter about 7-8 months of the year. I've been keeping my equipment indoors because otherwise it just doesn't dry due to insanely high humidity.

I've also learned not to brew when it's below ~20°F, otherwise everything just freezes ... Need to be very careful to keep hoses flowing. Can't even sanitize stuff since the sanitizer just freezes right on the surface.

FYI MoreBeer has a good price on their CFC. (25' x 3/8" copper)

 

[Gonefishing]

I am in Maine... I think winter here lasts about 8-9 months.
I doubt you would ever see me trying to brew at 20 degrees... I freeze! Especially when trying to clean everything after I'm done.

 

[RPh_Guy]

Cleaning is definitely a b**ch.
I didn't get much brewed this December-January-February-March.

Gotta switch to cider, mead, wine, or maybe no-boil wild beers.

 

[JohnSand]

Sorry about your gear. I store most of mine in a shed, and lost a chiller the same way. Now I store the chiller in the basement.

 

[Hwk-I-St8]

Living in Iowa, I store all my gear in the basement. In the winter, sub freezing temps are an issue, in the summer bugs are an issue.

 

[Gonefishing]

I don't have a basement, just a crawl space. Can't store anything down there. I'll have to find space in a closet when cold weather, and my chiller, come again. Or, maybe just keep stuff in the fermenter where it will never freeze.

 

[balrog]

Sorry dude that stinks. I'm in MA and have the same issues, but brewing in 8° in garage can be done, just have to be particular about when to bring stuff to garage, and when to leave stuff in house until needed. Had to fill 7g and carry it out, and used pond pump recirc with copper chiller but kept everything in the house until the moment before using.

 

[ProblemChild]

went electric in my upstate NY basement. no worries about temps. Brew inside where the basement is kept at 58-60°F in the winter. perfect brew space. Boiling wort adds desperately needed humidity to the air. Cleanup is a breeze in the utility sink. Why brew outside?

 

[Hwk-I-St8]

went electric in my upstate NY basement. no worries about temps. Brew inside where the basement is kept at 58-60°F in the winter. perfect brew space. Boiling wort adds desperately needed humidity to the air. Cleanup is a breeze in the utility sink. Why brew outside?

For me, I don't have enough room in my basement, nor do I have a utility sink. I've spent many hours trying to figure out a way to shoehorn even a small footprint eBIAB setup into my basement and I've come to the conclusion it's not happening.

The good news is that we're looking for a house upgrade and a dedicated brewing space is in the criteria. It's pretty cool when you look at a house and your wife says: "It was nice, but I'm just not sure where you'd brew there. We'd have to budget money to create a spot for that."

 

[balrog]

It's pretty cool when you look at a house and your wife says: "It was nice, but I'm just not sure where you'd brew there. We'd have to budget money to create a spot for that."

wow. Color me hella-jealous

 

[Gonefishing]

For me, I don't have enough room in my basement, nor do I have a utility sink. I've spent many hours trying to figure out a way to shoehorn even a small footprint eBIAB setup into my basement and I've come to the conclusion it's not happening.

The good news is that we're looking for a house upgrade and a dedicated brewing space is in the criteria. It's pretty cool when you look at a house and your wife says: "It was nice, but I'm just not sure where you'd brew there. We'd have to budget money to create a spot for that."

I'm not jealous at all (HA!)...just curious, does your wife have a sister??

 

[gnef]

One simple purchase to mitigate this issue is an oil free air compressor to blow out the vast majority of the water.

This is actually part of my cleaning regimen. I built a dual stage CFC, so it has 50 ft of copper in it, and I don't like the idea of any water sitting in it, so after I purge the CFC with clean water, I then use my oil free air compressor to clear out the line multiple times.

The reason for oil free is so that you aren't introducing oil into the interior of your CFC lines that will touch beer.

 

[Gonefishing]

Yep, a compressor would work, but it costs a lot more than bringing that baby in the house when I'm done. That will be the new process.

 

[gnef]

For CFC's, I would say it is good practice to remove as much moisture from the inside of the copper, and really outside of the copper too. If you let water sit in contact with the copper, you can have issues of pitting in particular. Less likely would be verdigris growth, but since you can't see inside the CFC, I say it is best to be safe.