Pumping ice water through counter flow chiller

[Wolfman86]

Not sure if i should put this in the grainfather thread but anyways...im yet to use my grainfather but plan to on good friday, being a no chiller im also yet to use any type of chiller methods. Ive done some research and im under the impression that my tap water (Brissy) is not goin to get down to pitching temps without some sort of pre chiller, most people are running tap water through an immersion chiller in an ice bath but i dont want to buy another bulky immersion chiller and was think of just pumping iced water from an esky through the counterflow chiller. Has anyone got any info/other methods they could give me regarding pump types etc. Cheers

 

[mtb]

What research led you to believe your tap water wouldn't get to low enough temps? That seems strange.

If you use a fermentation fridge, you don't even need to hit pitching temp with your chiller anyway - just chill it down as far as can go, then complete the cooling process in the fridge

 

[TheWiggman]

It would be a waste to pump iced water through the chiller to start with. Use regular tap water until the wort is in the ball park temp of your tap water temp. THEN use iced water to do the last bit of work.
How do you plan to pump the ice through the chiller?

 

[Bribie G]

Pond pump from Bunnings. Make ice in ice cream buckets in freezer.
Break up with hammer and put in pails.
Recirc through chiller.

I attended a couple of brew days with the guy who used to win the lagers in the Nats and the system works brilliantly but your brew house ends up looking like a scene from a WW2 submarine movie during the depth charge scene.

I went out and bought cubes.
And came second in lagers one year.

 

[klangers]

As Wiggman says, you're better of "trim chilling" with the ice water, otherwise you'll get halfway to where you want to get before your ice warms up. This is ESPECIALLY true for a immersion chiller which are very inefficient by industry standards.

So run tap water through it until it cools to room temperature, and then pump your refrigerated water through.

Industrially we use two stage plate heat exchangers. Water first (which is recovered to HLT) then glycol to trim to pitch temperature. For us, this is basically equivalent to two plate heat exchangers in series with different coolants.

 

[Wolfman86]

The tap water was bout 27 the other day and from what ive read chilling usually stays a few degrees above your tap temp. I was hoping to get it down to pitching temp straight away because i plan to do two seperate brews on the same day and if i put the first brew in the fermentation fridge and it cools to pitch temp then cooling the second brew in there will bring the first further down below temp... if you get me. I have no idea about pumps thats why i asked, was hoping someone had aome ideas or had done something similar

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

27...bloody hell..thats pretty warm

 

[mtb]

Was that the first runnings from the tap though? Or did you run it for 10sec and then measure temp?

 

[Wolfman86]

Filled the grainfather for the initial clean and thats what it was at

 

[Wolfman86]

The reading from the grainfather probe

 

[damoninja]

Yep I'd believe this. Mine was 23 the other day and it's not even a hot day. I can chill to ~25 then drop it in my pre chilled fridge.

I bought an el cheapo pump and plan to recirculate ice water through my immersion chiller. I did this once with my KK pump as proof of concept, worked but I discovered I need a LOT more ice, I'm going to have to start freezing bottles and stuff a week before a brew unless I buy bags which isn't very cost effective.

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/311728706320?_trksid=p2057872.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

Have not yet tested this for flow through an immersion chiller, but it would totally do the trick for a counter flow chiller.

 

[Bribie G]

Wolfman if you are serious about playing around with ice water, just send me an Aus post bag and you are welcome to my submersible pond pump that I bought from Masters about 3 years ago and never used. Might as well be used as sitting in shed.
You'll just need to match some hoses and you're off and running.

 

[cliffo]

I use tap water with my immersion chiller to get my wort down to about 35 and then use about 25 litres of pre-chilled water (recirculated) with a pond pump that gets me down to about 20 pretty quickly.

Works well.

 

[Matplat]

Yeah, likewise I get to about 35-40 with tap water, then use a spare FV filled with iced water and gravity feed it through the IC, last brew I got down to 22deg. I kinked the hose on the outlet to slow the flow of the chilled water....

 

[mstrelan]

What research led you to believe your tap water wouldn't get to low enough temps? That seems strange.

Brisbane tap water today is around 25C. Has been over 30 the last few months.

 

[Parks]

Very lucky to get under 30deg with Brissy tap water alone.

 

[mtb]

Crazy stuff, I learned something new today.

 

[fletcher]

just in case it hadn't been asked, are you making sure the wort leaving the GF is slowed? dial back the valve on the side.

 

[Bribie G]

Back in the 1970s there was a long running UK series "Secret Army" - not Allo Allo - about the Belgian Resistance. In one scene the dastardly Gestapo were torturing a prisoner by running a hosepipe over his body.
Of course back then everyone watched the same shows, no Netflix or Foxtel etc and next day the amusement in Brisbane was intense "I'd have been thanking the SS if that was me" .

 

[Wolfman86]

Thanks for the info fellas. Brissy tap water does get pretty warm, i only just started using the hot water tap for my showers about 2 weeks ago. Might take you up on that offer Bribie G