Plate Vs Immersion Chillerq

[razz]

BB, obviously the most accurate way is to have a thermometer in line coming from the plate chiller. The reality is that once you clock up some experience using a plate chiller and you know your cooling capacity, that is tap water or tank water including the time of year, then you will know with in a few degrees how cool your wort will finish.

 

[browndog]

When I first started using my plate chiller, I would just let the wort run in a fast dribble thinking I needed to do that to get the temp down to the same as the cooling water going in, now I just about run it flat out for the same result.

cheers

Browndog

 

[sav]

For me I use my wort return from my herms, connect it to my chiller and pump through 100deg for 10min to sterilize then whack in my fermenter and it reads from the probe from my temp mate.


My Ic should fit its around 250mm it fits in my 18 gallon and the lid is smaller than my tun and its 300mm lid.

 

[sanmerah]

Since No Chill I opted for the Plate Chiller option, mainly space and storage constraints. I simply connect the garden tap to the chiller use the output to fill an esky, that hot water is great for use as part of the cleanup on the brewday...

 

[Screwtop]

As most of it has been said, I'll keep the reasoning short.

Built a huge (18M) IC in an attempt to improve efficiency. Not happy with the time it took so bought a 30 plate PC. Still using it and prefer it, does that tell you something?

Prep: Flush the PC with hot caustic or PBW solution then water to rinse.

Use: Recirc wort via the PC for the last 15 min of the boil to sanitise, after flame out, recirc via the PC to whirlpool in the kettle (wort return at the bottom of the kettle angled for whirlpool) at full bore, dropping wort temp in the kettle. Then throttle back wort flow to lower wort temp to the max possible depending on water temp, I have used the IC in an icewater bath to pre-chill the cooling water during warmer months. Tank water is used for the PC and returns to the tank. I use a hop sock so there is little hop trub, have used flowers directly in the wort but whirlpooling seems to take care of that. Don't even have a pickup in the kettle, it has a flat bottom and the outlet is in the side at the very bottom, trub stays in the centre. Peice a piss this brewing game eh!

Screwy

 

[jpr]

just put a plate chiller on ebay, works great with a fishtank pump and ice water u will get to pitching temps in one pass, just surplus to my needs cheers http://cgi.ebay.com.au/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi...em=220592835109

 

[Renzo]

Use a blichman inline thrumometer to test for temp into fermenter. Sanitize 5 mins before flamout by wrapping silicon hose in alufoil and pumping steam in through the wort in on plate chiller works well. When steam comes out of end of silicon its done. I use one of those steam dream steamers my girlfriend had but doesn't use. Plate chiller gets caustic wash straight after and then acid wash and then it's ready for next brew.

 

[yardy]

I bought the therminator but haven't used it yet. Should give it a run next weekend

what's your opinion on the therminator yyy ?

As far as efficiency goes, IMHO the plate chiller wins hands down. I can chill my 23L wort to the same temp as the water coming out of my tap in less than 10 mins

cheers

Browndog

what PC do you have bd ?

cheers

Dave

 

[browndog]

what's your opinion on the therminator yyy ?



what PC do you have bd ?

cheers

Dave

A mashmaster mk III mate, works a treat.

 

[kevin_smevin]

the therminator is great! i pump my wort through using my march pump at top speed and it chills to 20. If you slow down the wort flow rate it goes even lower. So it takes me about 4 minutes to bring my boiling wort to 20 degrees (about 27L). Pretty happy with that

 

[dent]

I wasn't happy with the tap water solution so I sealed up an 140L chest freezer fitted with a thermostat set to 2 degrees and a pond pump in the bottom. This was filled with water. Then I used two chillout counterflow chillers in series, one gets fed with the tapwater, the other gets the freezer water. This gets near boiling wort down to 7-8 degrees as fast as the march pump can push it, so it is acceptable. It also uses less water overall than tapwater alone.

 

[yardy]

the therminator is great! i pump my wort through using my march pump at top speed and it chills to 20. If you slow down the wort flow rate it goes even lower. So it takes me about 4 minutes to bring my boiling wort to 20 degrees (about 27L). Pretty happy with that

that's pretty impressive, did you get yours through ibrew ?

wonder how the MM Mk lll compares performance wise ?

I wasn't happy with the tap water solution so I sealed up an 140L chest freezer fitted with a thermostat set to 2 degrees and a pond pump in the bottom. This was filled with water. Then I used two chillout counterflow chillers in series, one gets fed with the tapwater, the other gets the freezer water. This gets near boiling wort down to 7-8 degrees as fast as the march pump can push it, so it is acceptable. It also uses less water overall than tapwater alone.

got any pics ?

cheers

Dave

 

[dent]

got any pics ?

cheers

Dave

Yeah - a bunch of tubes

The blue hoses are water, the silicon are wort. The ball valves are in an H configuration, as the pump also does duty in the HERMS. The kettle is connected to the yellow valve. Hot wort is run through the whole system for the last 20 minutes of boil for santitation. The insulated tube is the cold water input - the insulation is useless, it is just left over from a different application.

Not too much to see here, the blue hose is the cold water output from the pump, the black is pump supply, the white is thermo probe. Ice forms on the chest freezer evaporator coils which helpfully melts off when I refill the freezer after a brew.