Best chiller for 30 degree ground water?

[xredwood]

I live in Cairns and it turns out it's actually quite warm here. Because of that, my tap water comes out at 30+ degrees which won't work too well for chilling. I'm in two minds about what to use for a wort chiller and was hoping for some opinions.

The two ideas I'm toying with at the moment are using a bucket of ice as recirculating water for an immersion chiller, or to get a plate chiller and use the bucket of ice as the cooling water for that. Thoughts? Cost wise they will actually be fairly similar as I would have to buy an 18m coil of copper plus pipe bender vs $130 for the plate chiller. For recirculating the cooling water I am just going to use a pond pump.

 

[mrsupraboy]

Depending on size and steady hands u should be able to wrap it around something circular with out it kinking so no need for benders

 

[mckenry]

The bucket of ice wont last long either. (If you're buying ice it will add up eventually). **If you're buying ice, see later on down.
If it was me I would use the plate chiller to get it as low as it will go, then let the fridge do the rest. Here in chilly Bowral, the tap water is about 13° at this time of year and one FAST pass will get my wort down to 24°
I then let it cool overnight before oxygenating and pitching yeast.
You should be able to get down to around 40 and let the fridge do the rest or better still, re-organise your brewday to brew overgravity by 5L and add **5L of ice and ice water (assuming you do 20L batches and are buying ice)
Youll have to redo hops if you can be bothered with the utilisation correction for high gravity brewing.
That will get your temps down quick smart.

 

[mckenry]

Also 30+ out of the tap?? You must always drink water from the fridge right? I only ever drink straight from the tap and find it so cold sometimes I get a brain-freeze. What a diverse country we live in....

 

[wide eyed and legless]

I made mine out of 2 x 2 metre lengths of annealed 19 mm copper spiralled around an LPG bottle joined with fittings and silver solder, one length of hardened 19 mm copper an the fittings necessary, save you having to buy a bender and should work out quite cheap.

 

[xredwood]

Also 30+ out of the tap?? You must always drink water from the fridge right? I only ever drink straight from the tap and find it so cold sometimes I get a brain-freeze. What a diverse country we live in....

Yeah we have a water cooler. When we first turn the tap on it's almost too hot to have your hand under, then if you let it run for around 2-3 min it gets down to 30.

 

[JDW81]

No Chill? h34r:

 

[micblair]

I've used both, immersion and plate. For a bit of extra effort (whilst being careful not to allow hops into your chiller) and spending the time back-flushing etc, plate chiller gets me close enough to ground water temperatures (whereas immersion never came close, whilst using a tonne of water). I've got a Therminator -- its probably one of the best bits of brewing gear I've purchased.

 

[xredwood]

I have considered no chill but I get confused with adjusting hop schedules and whatnot. Has anyone published a definitive guide on how to do it?

 

[Crusty]

I have considered no chill but I get confused with adjusting hop schedules and whatnot. Has anyone published a definitive guide on how to do it?

You'll get heaps of differing opinions on this one so I'll throw what I do at you.
I no chill always. My ambient tap temps are too high in summer & using an ice bath is not much better & I wouldn't take the extra risk of putting it in the fridge to get it down to temp. Others do it without issue but I would consider that a bit risky.
I just treat my additions as an extra 20mins of utilization. A 60min addition stays the same & I do this.

Chill No chill
30g @ 60 30g @ 60
30g @ 20 30g @ 0
20g @ 10 20g cube hop
20g @ 0 20g dry hop

So, 20min = 0, 15min = cube, 10mins = cube, 5mins = dry hop & 0 min = dry hop.
If you get a recipe that calls for a 15min & a 10min addition, I add both of those to the cube.
I'm in no way saying that this is the best way to do it but I'm very happy with the cube hop & dry hop additions for flavour & aroma.

 

[huez]

I'm in the plate chiller camp as well and also recirc ice water through it with a pond pump. One pass at half throttle on the wort pump usually gets me to around 20 degrees, on thursday i was bang on 19. I fill a spare fermenter with 15litres of tap water and a bag of ice and keep an extra bag spare in case i need it. Yes it adds to costs but i'd rather save the water, which i end up using for clean up anyway. I used an immersion chiller twice but the wasted water was to mental.

My plate chiller is about double the length of the blichmann one though, one instance where length matters more......

 

[xredwood]

Thanks guys. Huez, do you let the water recirc back into the same bucket or straight down the drain? Is the 15l pot with ice enough for a 20L batch? How well do you reckon gravity feeding the wort would go?

 

[huez]

I recirculate back into the bucket and then use that water to clean up with. Its enough for my system currently doing 30litre batches, i see no issues with mine going up to double batches and its why i bought the bigger one. It gravity feeds but struggles towards the end so i pump it. It took me a few batches to get to this point so you really need to fiddle with it yourself. Mine cost me a bit, but i love it and would display it in the bedroom if my mrs allowed it. For reference the therminator is 190mm long mine is 460mm but mine is only 30plates. The longer contact time means greater chilling capacity. Take that into account if you go down the plate chiller route