Hybrid Chiller

[sintax69]

Is there any draw back to this style of chiller I dont see many people with these and was wondering if they are worth the effort.
I have no problem getting the gear or making it I have 18m of tube(freebie) and was thinking this would be a nice looking chiller.
I would like to know if they work any better or worse or am I better of making a large CFWC.

 

[dicko]

Is there any draw back to this style of chiller I dont see many people with these and was wondering if they are worth the effort.
I have no problem getting the gear or making it I have 18m of tube(freebie) and was thinking this would be a nice looking chiller.
I would like to know if they work any better or worse or am I better of making a large CFWC.





View attachment 6488

[post="116784"][/post]​

Hi s 69,
I made one of those and it worked just fine.
One day I got a bright idea and hooked the outlet to a garden hose to run the water into a different area.
What I didn't realise that the hose I used had a non return quick connect on the end that I was going use as the outlet.
Well, I turned the tap on to run cold water thru the chiller and "KABOOM" :angry: the PVC casing blew to pieces.
This happened in the middle of a brew so I had to resort to what is now refered to as the "no chiller method".
Seeing that it was a major reconstruction needed to restore the "hybrid" I decided to just keep it simple and make a standard CFWC from fittings and a garden hose.
To answer your question;
Both designs produce equally cool wort given the same conditions.
Drawback is that you cant close off the water outlet of the chiller at any time while water is flowing through it.

Here is a pic of mine

 

[ausdb]

Is there any draw back to this style of chiller I dont see many people with these and was wondering if they are worth the effort.
I would like to know if they work any better or worse or am I better of making a large CFWC.

[post="116784"][/post]​

A CFWC will be much more efficient water wise, this not a very efficient design as there is too much bypass of your cooling water, unless you managed to internally baffle it so the water tooka zig zag path as it moved from one end to the other. If you have 18m of tube then cut it in thirds and make 3 CFWC's out of it. My CFWC is 8m of 3/8" copper inside 5/8" copper and the outer is cool to the touch (tap temp) by the time it has gone 1/2 way through so 6m would be fine.

 

[BoilerBoy]

Then there's the poor mans chiller.

9m of copper tube crudely bent to fit a 90L stacking crate with an outlet at the bottom.

3-4 9L buckets of water and a heap of ice, regulate flow through the tap and stir water around and in 20-25 min 27 L at 18C

I'm going to mount the drill and use a paint stirrer to see if it makes it easier.

and all the left over water goes on the garden,

Cheers
BB

 

[crozdog]

Syntax,

i'm currently making one. I'll post pics when done. Top score re the tubing! Can you get any more??

The thing that convinced me to use a hybrid is that I had pipe; a 1000l kids swimming pool to use as a reservoir & a 4000l/hr pond pump. The other reason is I intend to brew 80 - 100L at a time & am conscious of the water usage - hence the use of the pool.

I've made the coil by wrapping some newspaper around 4" pvc then wrapping the coil around that. I used this method as I intend to "fill' the centre of the coil with a length of 4' PVC pipe sealed with end caps. The 4" will act as a baffle & force the input cooling water to flow between the exterior of the 4" pipe & the internal surface of the 6" PVC I will use for the outer shell, ie the cooling water is forced over the coil which sits between the 4" & the 6" pipe.

The enclosed 4" pipe ensures that the entering cooling water is directed over the coil & not just through the centre as would occur in the diagram you show. This I believe will counteract AUSDB's concern re bypass of the cooling water & make it quite efficient.

Dicko, what if you turned the cooling water off on the input? Wouldn't that do the same trick as closing off the water outlet of the chiller without the risk?

cheers
crozdog

 

[Dunkel_Boy]

Ahhh, the wonders of heat exchanger design. *pulls out copy of Perry's*

I'll assume your scale is good and you're going to be able to do it properly, but ausdb is correct with the 'untouched' wort flowing through the middle there. However, I can see the advantage of having superior infection resistance when compared to a CFWC.

You could do considerably better (but would require approximately 50% more copper) if you put another coil through the inside - but not sure on your dimension (can't read them) so this might not be completely feasible). Baffles (bits of plastic/whatever sticking out from the shell to separate zones) are useful, and increase turbulence (a very good thing) but increase pressure drop too (a moderately bad thing). Overall, you notice a massive difference if you pre-chill the water down to ice-like temps, as BoilerBoy suggested. 60L from 100 down to 20 in 30 minutes or less (or cooler), is about 10-15kW from only about 20-30m worth of copper (IC + pre-chiller).

 

[coolum brewer]

Is there any draw back to this style of chiller I dont see many people with these and was wondering if they are worth the effort.
I have no problem getting the gear or making it I have 18m of tube(freebie) and was thinking this would be a nice looking chiller.
I would like to know if they work any better or worse or am I better of making a large CFWC.





View attachment 6488

[post="116784"][/post]​

This is usually called a tube-in-shell exchanger in industry. Just a small (but important point) flow should be from right to left (not left to right as indicated) in the diagram (but in practice would be mounted vertically with water flow in from the bottom) for most efficient operation.