wort chiller in a bucket

[skatermxracer]

I was thinking about this today... I understand that I have to clean it well and sanitize before I use it. But... what if I build a wort chiller out of the cooper coil like everyone else. Take a 5 gallon bucket, drill a hole in the wall, put one end of the copper tubing through, seal it up. Then have the coil go up through the bucket and feed the worth through the copper tubing via siphoning, and fill the bucket with lots of ice and a little bit of water.


So I would siphon the wort from the boil kettle, through the copper coil, which is submerged in icey water, and out into my fermentor.

Opinions? All I'd need parts wise is the copper tubing and a old bucket.

 

[broadbill]

I was thinking about this today... I understand that I have to clean it well and sanitize before I use it. But... what if I build a wort chiller out of the cooper coil like everyone else. Take a 5 gallon bucket, drill a hole in the wall, put one end of the copper tubing through, seal it up. Then have the coil go up through the bucket and feed the worth through the copper tubing via siphoning, and fill the bucket with lots of ice and a little bit of water.


So I would siphon the wort from the boil kettle, through the copper coil, which is submerged in icey water, and out into my fermentor.

Opinions? All I'd need parts wise is the copper tubing and a old bucket.

I think you would burn through alot of ice. I'd have a good 3-6 bags on hand to cool down a 5 gallon batch. It will take 2 bags to fill it up, and I would not be surprised if you had to fill it up a couple times.

 

[H-ost]

Cool idea but before you get too far into it search for "DIY CFC". A CounterFlow Chiller is a common replacement to ice baths or immersion chillers and it sounds like it is kinda what you are looking for. I understand you can put one together for 30$ or so.

 

[Bobby_M]

30 pounds of ice and make sure you stir the icebath constantly.

 

[Chrisl77]

I did that for awhile until i got my pump and built a cfc of sorts. Make sure you put a shut off valve at the bottom so you can control the flow into the fermenter. You will need to slow down the flow to get the right temp.

 

[Tinga]

I made something like this over the summer and it worked pretty well. however some things to think about.

Flow rate. Do you have a pump? Unless you have a big height differential gravity might not be enough to make this technique time efficient.

diminishing returns. with a system like this the heat is transferring from the wort to the ice bath trying to cool you hot wort. so the more wort you cool the less cooling power the ice bath has. stirring the ice bath helps and can be done with a cheap marine pump if you're lazy but all the energy is being transferred.

you also need to have enough ice on hand for each brew session. Which isn't that hard to do but it is just one more of those things you need in order to have a successful brew day.

I used a system exactly like this over the past summer and I had about 40' of 1/4 copper tubing in a bucket with 40 lbs of ice and the wort was gravity fed. in a single pass the wort was chilled to about 59* but it did take an hour and a half.

 

[cowgo]

The hassle I see is having to then make sure you adequately clean out and sanitize that 25-50 feet of interior copper tubing. I think it's just easier, if you're concerned about all the water run off, would be to use the DIY plan for a sumersible pump in a bucket of ice water pumping through your IC. Just plan ahead of time to freeze a few gallon jugs in the freezer for ice. When you're done all you need to do is hose off your IC.

 

[broadbill]

The hassle I see is having to then make sure you adequately clean out and sanitize that 25-50 feet of interior copper tubing.

Not a hassle as all, as those of us with CFC can attest.

 

[postalbunny]

Def check out a CFC. I've seen people use a smaller immersion chiller in a bucket of ice that pre-chills the tap water before it hits the chiller in the wort. Within minutes the ice is melted.

Best bet is to get wort close to tap water temp, then dump the ice in the bucket to get the ground water even colder.

Therefore, I don't think running your wort through the inside of the chiller in a ice bucket will help much, unless you can replace the ice constantly.