Ozbrewers Toys

[barls]

i wonder how that stuff would go on my water bath that im using for my lagers at the moment

 

[ozbrewer]

to keep it cool it would be a good insulator

 

[ozbrewer]

this is the compleat system, its all up and running, the HLT is working with its 1800wt element and has a heap of copper inside to heat the mash liquor, its insulated with some black camp matresses that i got from dimmys for $5




the CFC is a peice of 100mm drain pipe, it has about 10 mtrs of copper coiled up inside, it takes boiling wort to the same temp as the tap water in about 15 minutes.....i am more than happy with the final outcome of this, it went through about 6 rebuilds before i got it the way i wanted




the base of the mash tun is another job that came out better than i expected, i riped the guts out of the stem, and kept the main body, inside is attatched some SS braid, and the whole lot come apart easy so it can be flushed out.......

 

[Lufah]

Looks great. :beer: I would love to see some detailed plans for the cfc.

Travis

 

[ozbrewer]

ill draw up some pics, dammed if i ever want to pull it apart again

 

[Lufah]

Thanks. Your website link isn't working either.

Travis

 

[Justin]

Looks great Ozbrewer, excellent job. That insulation looks great too, a very neat job.

Glad to hear the chiller is working well too. I've been tossing up the idea of building one like it actually. I've been debating the merits of a permantly mounted immersion chiller in the kettle, or buying a morebeer convoluted chiller or making a counterflow chiller-possibly one in your design. I think Dicko uses the same type on his brewery.

I like the practicalities of an immersion but the compactness of a counter flow is nice, especially your design. Do you plan to build a hop back to preserve those aroma hops so they aren't sitting around in the hot wort in the kettle for 15mins? I would but can't seem to find hop flowers anywhere locally, only pellets. Has anyone heard of a hopback being used with pellets in a hop bag or something similar?

Cheers and once again, good work on the brewery.
JD

 

[warrenlw63]

I think Dicko uses the same type on his brewery.

[post="77012"][/post]​

Justin.

Can't vouch for Dicko but IIRC the PVC casing on his split whilst in action. :blink:

C'mon Dicko. Give us the greasy details.

Warren -

 

[ozbrewer]

yeah i had problems with the pressure in the PVC....but only from doing silly things like shutting off the outlet hose.........the new outlet hase is open with no valve

 

[warrenlw63]

BTW Ozbrewer, forgot to tell you. :huh:

Bloody nicely thought out rig mate.

Warren -

 

[ozbrewer]

ok this is a bit of a drawing of the inside of the CFC

the brass allthread seems to be the best way to connect fittings, the copper coils is 5/16 so i welded some 1/2 inch tails on so that i can seal it all up with 1/2" compression fittings


Its glued together with the plumbers blu glu as this seems to be the strongest seal, silicone just didnt cope, and even areldited let go under pressure

 

[Justin]

Sounds like it's working well enough Ozbrewer so good job. For others look for more info I think John Palmers site, How to Brew also shows a schematic of this design as well.

Just out of interest, did you consider putting anything in the centre of the chiller to disrupt the water flow at all? I was thinking the soldering of a few copper tabs to the coil (in a sprt of spiral configuration) orientated towards the inside of the coil would help make the flow a little more turbulent (I'm not saying it wouldn't be very turbulent in there already) and also act as a bit of a bigger heat sink for the copper pipe. I wonder if you'd see any increase in efficiency.

Did you think about doing anything like this?

Cheers, Justin

 

[ozbrewer]

i thought of having a peice of pipe comming from the water inlet go all the way to the top with some holes in it, but as it worked out the watter hits the first coil, and gets washed around from there.....

after my first few attempts i decided that i will KISS......first thing was to stop it blowing up on me

 

[ozbrewer]

Palmers design


I actually thought mine was an origonal design, untill i saw it in a book a little while back

 

[ozbrewer]

Thanks. Your website link isn't working either.

Travis

[post="77007"][/post]​

Thanks mate, i was having some problems with the server , its all up and running again, but none of the links are up yet...its still to come

 

[Justin]

For those looking for a bit more info and detail on making a counter flow like this one have a look at this site.

http://www.concentric.net/~vsabbe/portabrew.htm

Click on Wort Chiller from the side menu for a description and brief details and then open the PDF at the bottom of the page for an indepth list of parts and construction details with photos.

Cheers, Justin

 

[ozbrewer]

PDF link is down, getting the 404 message


my plans are simple, jam a heap of copper in a tube....seal the bugger up.....hope it dont explode

 

[Justin]

Works fine for me. Don't know what's up?

I just thought the internal photos would be nice for the less confident. I agree there is nothing to it, no secrets, but some people like to have a step by step from the absolute basics.

Cheers, Justin

 

[ozbrewer]

yeah mate i agree.....when i glued mine together and then realises i didnt take any pics i kiked myself

 

[kungy]

Hi Ozbrewer,

I was thinking along these lines (with the only change being to put a sealed pipe up the middle to force the water out to the copper pipe) particularly due to it being a relatively compact and aesthecially pleasing chiller. I have just a few questions for you and others if they can answer it-

- How efficent is the chiller is relation to a normal CFC. Are they pretty comparable or not?
- I have seen conflicting stuff as to the length of the the copper needed. The relative concensus is 9m of 1cm copper piping, is that the absolute minimum i should use when gravity feeding

Pretty much i am sick of how slow my Immersion is, should i hybrid or go normal CF?

Thanks in advance

Will