Frost Damage To Cfc

[pint of lager]

Last Wednesday, the first brew of the season was mashed and boiled. When it came time to run it out the CFC, things slowed to a trickle.

When cleaning the cfc and pushing the cleaning solution out with the hose, it didn't appear to be running very well. The sanitiser went in, then it was hooked up to the boiler which is when I realised it was really slow, about 100ml a minute output.

At first I thought it was a mudwasp nest. These mongrels just love clogging up the works. So it was out with the pressure washer to try and get things flowing. Holding the pressure washer wand to the input of the CFC is not easy. By this stage it was about 5.00pm, getting dark and the air temperature was 5 degrees. After many generous soakings and many tries to get the pressure washer to push the blockage, it was discovered that there was actually copper blocking the flow path, about 12cm back from the wort output.

So the very first no chill batch stayed in the boiler overnight. Ran off into the fermenter at 11am the next morning, it was 20 degrees for the 45 litre batch. Overnight was about 2 degrees minimum.

Upon the CFC being disassembled, it was discovered that some water had been trapped in the cooling output pipe, which froze and crushed the wort tube. The CFC has lived outside for the last four years with no problem as it usually drains freely, but the whole lot had been moved for the Bathurst brewers influx, and the drain tube had been left with water trapped in it.

Amazing the pressure that even a small amount of ice can generate to crush 1/2 inch copper tubing.

 

[Jye]

The ice did a pretty good number on the tube. Was the hole also cause by the ice?

 

[pint of lager]

Brewassistant has fixed the CFC and it is ready to go for the next brew.

The hole was caused by a long screwdriver trying to remove the obstruction which I had thought was a mudwasp nest.

In cold climates, ice will split pipes, valves and pumps.

People not far from us who are on solar power had frozen pipes one morning. They left to go to work and arrived back to find that a pipe had split, the pump had pumped their tank dry and had also totally flattened their house batteries. So they had no power, no water and a stuffed pump.

 

[brew assistant]

not only had it failed at the joint where the cooling water enters but 14cms further up it also crushed the internal tube half way inwards.
the hole is from me trying to get a screwdriver in there and work out what was going on.
cheers