Plate Chiller

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sim

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Im using a plate chiller tomorrow, and dumping straight onto a yeast cake so i dont want to totally roast my yeast with hot wort! So, approx how much 30c ish water are people using to to cool 40 litres of boiling wort to 20c ish, using a plate chiller?

If someone can point me toward an equation machine where i can enter data and get spat out a figure that would be awesome.

At the moment my plan is 50 litres of 4c chilling water, but my linear brain imagines that will get me to about 40c... So, from experience how much 4c super cold water would i need to take me from boiling wort to 20c? I realise there's a fair bit of room for movement. opinions? Suggestions? Should i expect to do two passes to hit sub 20c?
 
Im using a plate chiller tomorrow, and dumping straight onto a yeast cake so i dont want to totally roast my yeast with hot wort! So, approx how much 30c ish water are people using to to cool 40 litres of boiling wort to 20c ish, using a plate chiller?

If someone can point me toward an equation machine where i can enter data and get spat out a figure that would be awesome.

At the moment my plan is 50 litres of 4c chilling water, but my linear brain imagines that will get me to about 40c... So, from experience how much 4c super cold water would i need to take me from boiling wort to 20c? I realise there's a fair bit of room for movement. opinions? Suggestions? Should i expect to do two passes to hit sub 20c?

G'day mate,

Hard to calculate total water needed to chill but when I use my plate chiller I usually start the flow of cooling water reasonably solid and then slowly crack the ball valve on the kettle. Starting with a slow rate of wort through the chiller means that it will start to come out nice and cool. You can feel the wort out tube and adjust the speed of the wort out to dial in what temp you want. I find if you have water under 20 degrees C you can nearly match the flow rates and the wort will come out at the temp of the water going in.....but I do have a 30 plate.

You could also sanitise a pint glass, collect a big chunk of yeast cake (cover with glad wrap), rinse, clean and sanitise the fermenter, get your wort in it and then pitch the yeast from the pint glass. 3/4 of a pint of yeast is HEAPS.
 
My 30 plate gets the wort to 30c on a single pass with summer-temp tap water. Tap water would have been mid-high 20's I would think. I would think you would use more than 50L of water through the chiller though, but I've never measured it myself.

As mentioned, just harvest some of the yeast, clean and sanitise the fermenter, then pitch that. Oxygenate the wort for best results.
 
I cube my warm water to use on the garden so uou could say i do measure it. Anywhere between 50 - 70 litres is usual. Lately im able to cool down to 22C just using tap water. If i were you i would harvest a cup of slurry and add it to your wort rather than dump wort of unknown temperatures onto a cake and potentially shock the yeast. Much easier to gently warm up a cup if need be.
 
400mL of yeast is a better pitching rate than a full yeast cake anyway. It's still second gen so it will go mental compared to the first ferment it did. Last time I put a batch onto a full yeast cake I nearly thrushed the whole house!
 
Well, 50 litres of 5c took 40 litres wort down to 23c. Happy with that, i think im now a converted plate chiller!

I also used the plate as a heat exchange during the mash, which i talk about in the last post of my brewery rig build, link in my signature. I havent seen anyone doing it, but i cant think why not, and it seemed to work well.
 
I like that you used much less water than when I do it with ambient. Probably use about half the water I do for the same volume of wort.

Some more details about how you did it would be great.
Did you pump the chilled water through? If so at what rate?
Or just gravity feed?
Straight from a couple of cubes or a dedicated chilled water vessel?
 
i have two old plastic fermentors that i chill down in the fermentation fridge the day before brewing. I pump that through (didnt measure the flow rate bugger) it was coming out just too hot to keep my hand under, and the wort just a bit less. Probably took 10mins (beats an hour woohoo!). Its a 30 plate mashmaster chiller.

I like this system for a few reason. Means i can hold onto the chilling water, or water the garden with it at my leasure - so little waste, and also chilling it down makes use of the ferment fridge, so no buying ice.

I'd be very interested to hear from anyone else who's used a plate like a herms.
 
I'd be very interested to hear from anyone else who's used a plate like a herms.
I would be worried about the gunk build up personally. Any grain particles are going to get stuck and the proteins could well build up too.

I am just speculating as I have had hop and break clog mine before (just using it as normal). I tried whirlpooling with the chiller in line as to sanitise it but changed so I whirlpool for a little while first then switch as to get rid of most of the particles.
 
I would be worried about the gunk build up personally. Any grain particles are going to get stuck and the proteins could well build up too.

I am just speculating as I have had hop and break clog mine before (just using it as normal). I tried whirlpooling with the chiller in line as to sanitise it but changed so I whirlpool for a little while first then switch as to get rid of most of the particles.

Yeah true. I actually routed it through the water side of the plate whilst herms-ing for that reason. Similar seperation system i have with my two pumps, so i dont ever put scabby cooling water through the pump dedicated to wort.

The plate getting blocked with hop flakes and crud is the reason if held off getting one for so long, but i reasoned to myself that i cant see inside my pumps either so suck it up. Also i figure once a year i could do a flush with caustic and that will eat everything out. We'll see.

I sanitised the wort line of the chiller by recircing some boiling sparge water after im done sparging, which sanitises the HLT as well if needs be.
 
That sounds fine. Just keep it in mind if your flow slows that's probably the problem.

At the end of my brew day I put 10L of water and a butload of napisan in my HLT. Set to 90 deg, turn on the pump and let it recirc for anywhere from 10min to an hour (oops, is that still running?)...

I have my hop-sock hanging in my HLT to catch any particles so they don't go back in. Works pretty well at keeping it clean.
 
Yea true.

I have my hop-sock hanging in my HLT to catch any particles so they don't go back in. Works pretty well at keeping it clean.

Good idea. Well, ill report back if i get any dramas happening!
 
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