Wort Chiller/Drought question

[boogaloo]

I am brewing in drought conditions at moment, and I can’t really justify running my wort chiller to pitching temps. I get down to the mid 80’s pretty quickly, but it takes forever to get down another 20 degrees.

I was thinking about running the chiller to the mid-80’s, reserving the water for cleaning, and then racking to my carboy chilling to pitching temps in my swamp cooler.

Thoughts on this?

 

[flars]

Good thinking.

 

[brew_ny]

I am brewing in drought conditions at moment, and I can’t really justify running my wort chiller to pitching temps. I get down to the mid 80’s pretty quickly, but it takes forever to get down another 20 degrees.

I was thinking about running the chiller to the mid-80’s, reserving the water for cleaning, and then racking to my carboy chilling to pitching temps in my swamp cooler.

Thoughts on this?

it appears to be a good plan but I do no chill most of the time

all the best

S_M

 

[Natdavis777]

Ive chilled many times to mid 70s, and placed in the ferm chamber until I was at desired pitching temps (low 60s). Id either wait until the next morning (usually 12 hours) or kick the temp down to freezing to expedite the cooling process if I had a few hours to spare.

 

[Subdivisions]

I do this every time. I get it to 80 degrees then dump it in the fermenter and put it in my swamp cooler. Sometimes overnight, sometimes for 6 or 7 hours depending on when I brewed it. Just make sure the fermenter is sanitzed well and there is no problem leaving it sit for a while.

I think it's much better to pitch at an appropriate temperature than it is to worry about leaving a beer in a sanitized container overnight or for a few hours.

 

[TheBrewingBear]

My ground water temp hits 80s in the summer. I'm thinking about getting a submersible pond pump to recirculate ice water to get those last 20 or so degrees. I figure with a hose splitter and some fittings I could have both tap water and ice eater rigged up and switch from tap to ice when needed. This is gonna be my alternative to waiting.

 

[nyks]

My ground water temp hits 80s in the summer. I'm thinking about getting a submersible pond pump to recirculate ice water to get those last 20 or so degrees. I figure with a hose splitter and some fittings I could have both tap water and ice eater rigged up and switch from tap to ice when needed. This is gonna be my alternative to waiting.

I do something similar to this. I hook up my immersion chiller to my tap to get the wort down to 100-110F (75F tap water right now). Then I switch over to my pump that's in a cooler containing some water and frozen milk jugs/ice packs. This will get it under 70F.

My chiller has garden hose adapters, so I just swap the in/outs between my faucet w/ adapter and pump.

I capture all the water in buckets so I can use it to water my plants/trees, once the water temp cools down.

 

[ElJefeBrews]

I'm also in drought conditions and I run the water coming out of the chiller into the washing machine... and then the machine is hooked up so the water coming out waters the vegetables garden in the backyard. Triple use out of that water

 

[mattdee1]

2-month lurker, first time poster.

I just thought I’d chime in because I’ve just started in this hobby (2 x 5.5ish gal batches only). I’ve not yet even tasted the results (one batch fermenting, other just bottled) but I can say I’m very pleased with my wort chilling process—both in how quickly it works and how little water I feel like I’m wasting. It’s quite similar to what others have said.

My chiller is made from 50ft of copper tubing with dual (i.e. inner and outer) coils. I think this part is important, to get as much surface area in contact with the wort as possible. Admittedly, I kind of duffed the fabrication/bending process of the copper tube--the thing looks like total crap—but it drops neatly into my kettle and it sure does seem to work.

- Drop cooler into wort
- Fill chest-type cooler with hose water
- Drop submersible “pond pump” into the cooler, connect it to inlet of immersion chiller
- Let outlet of coil drain onto the driveway (if you can capture this water and use it for something, all the better), with a hose backfilling the water into the cooler (don’t let the pump run dry!)
- Regularly “swirl” the chiller around in the wort (without splashing) to keep the wort moving over the coils a bit. I didn’t time it, but for me, this got my temperature down to sub-100F in what felt like no time at all. The “swirling” motion really helps speed it along; every time I do it, I feel a burst of heat flowing out the outlet of the chiller
- As I approach 90F, I shut off the hose and go “closed loop”, routing the outlet of the chiller back into the cooler such that it just keeps recirculating the same water
- To chill the water in the cooler, I fill up used beer/soda cans with water and freeze them. Not sure if this is better than plastic bottles or not; I thought the metal cans might help transfer heat better, but I have not tried plastic so I can’t compare.
- It seems to work because using a 24-pack of frozen cans, I’m easily able to get the wort down to pitching temperature in, again, what feels like no time at all (I’m guessing 10 minutes, but definitely no more than 15 minutes). Again, regular swirling of the wort chiller is important to get the quickest chill times.
- During clean up, I fill up the “spent” cans with water out of the cooler, and re-freeze them. Note, some will have split due to the freeze/thaw cycle, and those get returned to the store for deposit.

Your hose water is probably hotter than mine so you’d probably need more ice than I do, but this method has worked very well for me and I don’t plan to change it any time soon. For my first batch, I was prepared with (3) cases of 24 frozen cans, and I only ended up needing one case.

Cheers
Matt

 

[MattyIce]

I do not do this as much as I should, but I will sometimes run the output of my wort chiller into my washing machine for the next load of laundry just like ElJefe said. My washing machine holds about 20 gallons or so, which is just about enough to get to ale pitching temp in the winter here. Keeping some around for cleaning is another great idea. If you actively agitate the wort while chilling, you'll chill faster, AND the water coming out will be warmer/better for cleaning.

 

[pvpeacock]

I put the hose running out of my IC into a trash can and usually get the wort down to pitching temp. before the trash can completely fills up. I then let the water in the trash can cool overnight and use it for watering my yard. If I can't get it down to pitching temp. before the trash can fills up. I connect my IC to a submersible pump and recirculate cold water out of a cooler (my HLT) with frozen water bottles in it.