Wort chillers

[Wink34]

Immersion or counter flow?

 

[JoshuaWhite5522]

I have an immersion, but looking to move to a Counter flow in the near future

 

[Wink34]

I currently don't use one, I talked to a brewing company and they told me counter flow was the way to go. I'm really just looking for opinions before I buy

 

[JoshuaWhite5522]

CFCs are nice and more effecient, but more costly and a little more difficult to build. My IC works well in my keggle as long as I stir the wort, but that can be a pain if i need to do other things while it's cooling. If you are doing 5 gallon batches on the stove top the IC is a great way to cool, especially if you live in the north where you have really cool ground water. You'll also need a pump to push your wort through theCFC, I've seen some people use them gravity fed, but experience with my buddys CFC showed that a pump made it work much better.

 

[Chuck_Swillery]

Made my own chiller and pre-chiller set up - love it. Each has its pro/cons. I am not familiar with the others but can not complain about the job performance of my homemade chilling set-up.

 

[michael.berta]

For me personally a Blichmann therminator (counter flow chiller) works fantastic. I can go from boiling wort to full fermenters in about 12 minutes...

 

[Homercidal]

Both have their advantages and disadvantages.

IC: Easy to clean. Cold Break can be left in BK. Cools all wort at once. Not as efficient. Won't clog.

CFC: Efficient. Cold break goes into fermenter. Only cools the wort that has passed through. Hard to be sure it's clean. Can clog.

PC: Little more expensive. Highly efficient. Can be baked (sterilized). Only cools wort that has passed through. Can clog.

**Note that the above assumes gravity fed. With a pump, all chillers can recirculate and chill the entire volume of wort at once and cold break can be left behind.

Personally I think IC's have a lot going for them. Since I already have a CFC and it works well, I'm not looking to trade for an IC, but I've thought about it. I will likely upgrade to a PC for it's smaller size and higher efficiency and for the ability to sterilize it in an oven.

I usually run water through my CFC to rinse it and then some star san to sanitize before I put it away, but even so I have run a dip tube brush twice now and had some nasty dark stuff rinse out of it, so I KNOW it's not getting as clean as I'd like. Knowing my chiller was sterilized would be a nice thing.

You can get a decent Plate Chiller for like $80 from Duda Diesel online. They even have a chart showing their performance so you can pick the right one for you.

 

[JoshuaWhite5522]

sorry to thread jack....

Homer,
When you say reciculate do you mean the wort pumped back into the boil kettle? Or are you just refering to recirculating with a submerged IC in the kettle?

 

[bighorn_brew]

I recently purchased a stainless steel wort chiller against the opinion of a few that said they don't chill as quickly as copper. I go from boil to 65 in less than 15 min.s. That said, I live in an area with cold ground water most of the year, even during summer time months, huge resevoir nearby is our water source. I wouldn't hesitate to recommend it to anyone. Brookyn homebrew was my source of IC.

 

[E-Mursed]

IC took forever to get my beer cooled down to pitching temps. It is easier to clean, but uses a ton of water(IMO).

CFC got my beer down from 200 to 59 degrees on first pass using 25ft CFWC with my former IC as a pre-chiller in a bucket of ice. Water in and beer out are both at a very low flow rate.

I run boiling water through the beer line from my HLT and then shoot Starsan through it from a charged keg filled with Starsan. I discard the excess Starsan as it runs through the chiller, and collect wort in my carboy when the wort comes through.

Here is a picture of my CFWC setup before sanitizing and use.