Hi everyone,
I'm putting an AG setup together over the next few weeks.
I'm having a bit of trouble working out what to do for the wort chilling phase. I have a plate chiller and a March pump that I plan to use. I'm planning on doing 10 gallon batches.
1) Is recirculation necessary for a plate chiller, or will I be okay going straight through and into the fermenter? If I need to recirculate, would it be best to fit an angled inlet so that whirlpooling can happen while it's chilling, or can I achieve this by just using a hose going over the edge?
2) I hear that the chiller can get clogged with hop material so I was looking at getting a bazooka screen or something similar. The issue I see with this is that it's going to go straight through into the centre of the kettle which is where the trub cone would build up if I whirlpool. I'd prefer to use a pickup tube with the inlet towards the wall of the kettle, but then I'd still need some sort of filter - would stuffing a bit of steel wool in the end do the job?
I'd like to keep things relatively simple if possible, but there seems to be so many different options out there for this and I can't make up my mind.
What do you guys do?
I'm putting an AG setup together over the next few weeks.
I'm having a bit of trouble working out what to do for the wort chilling phase. I have a plate chiller and a March pump that I plan to use. I'm planning on doing 10 gallon batches.
1) Is recirculation necessary for a plate chiller, or will I be okay going straight through and into the fermenter? If I need to recirculate, would it be best to fit an angled inlet so that whirlpooling can happen while it's chilling, or can I achieve this by just using a hose going over the edge?
2) I hear that the chiller can get clogged with hop material so I was looking at getting a bazooka screen or something similar. The issue I see with this is that it's going to go straight through into the centre of the kettle which is where the trub cone would build up if I whirlpool. I'd prefer to use a pickup tube with the inlet towards the wall of the kettle, but then I'd still need some sort of filter - would stuffing a bit of steel wool in the end do the job?
I'd like to keep things relatively simple if possible, but there seems to be so many different options out there for this and I can't make up my mind.
What do you guys do?