Using an ice immersed wort chiller.

[D_Skee]

Hi All, Merry Christmas.

I have just moved into all grain and am about to purchase an immersion chiller so i don't have to use a water bath. My problem is that my tap water comes out at around 20-22*C and i want to be around 17*C for pitching yeast. What are peoples thoughts if i were to get a second immersion chiller and place it in an ice water in my sink and run the tap water through the iced chilled coil then through to my chiller in the hot wort? is it worth my time to achieve only a few degrees?

Cheers,

DS

 

[Bribie G]

Guy who regularly won medals in the Nats with his lagers does the following:

Freeze ice cream containers of water before brew day.
Fill a couple of big buckets with iced water with the smashed up blocks bobbing in them. Using a pond pump, circulate this water through the immersion chiller and back into bucket #1 until the "cool" has been used up. Then switch to bucket #2.

He pitched about 15 mins after draining the kettle into the fermenter.

I no chill but if I were ever to impetuously and insanely go for chilling, that's the method I'd use for quick results and minimal water usage.

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

Would work.

I would do the bulk of the chilling from the mains; then the last few *c thru an ice bath. I would also slow the water flow rate down when using the ice bath.

Note: A nicely formed coil is not as good as a randon ball of copper tube. Have a look at Wortgames avatar to see what I mean.

 

[HBHB]

Summer tap water temps here can be as high as 30-32 deg C. Using a full 50 ft chiller i can get down to that tempin about 15 minutes. Then a small 15 odd ft copper coil in an esky or 20L bucket with icy water does the job to finish off on a slower flow rate. No issues.

Martin

 

[schrodinger]

I use a method similar to what Bribie mentioned: two 7.5-m immersion chillers in parallel, chill water recirculating through an Esky filled with ice water. I start with the Esky half full, and top off the ice repeatedly. This is overkill for 5-gal batches, but I like overkill.

 

[Bribie G]

Stu, where we are, cold water is cold water. However in vast areas of the country you can actually take "cold" showers. The OP doesn't have his location in the side bar, that could be helpful.
The other issue is that SEQ brought in water restrictions that would make your eyes literally water and as a result, average household consumption went down voluntarily to about half of Melbourne, as one example.
It's now deeply ingrained, when the Malignant Dwarf took over he pleaded with the population to use more water as he wasn't getting enough tunnel digging revenue from the water bills any more. The basically told him to feck off.

To let a tap just run and run for cooling purposes still fills me with genuine indignation. Guy I mentioned in the post uses his "spent" water on his roses.

 

[Mardoo]

I would do the bulk of the chilling from the mains; then the last few *c thru an ice bath. I would also slow the water flow rate down when using the ice bath.

Yep, I agree. On my set up the boil to 26-ish degrees takes about the same amount of time as the 26 to 18 degrees. I'm building a 5 meter coil to immerse in an ice bath to use on the second half of the chill.

And yes, try to reserve the water you use for your garden. You don't need a massive flow rate through the chiller to achieve the same results.

 

[lael]

Summer tap water temps here can be as high as 30-32 deg C. Using a full 50 ft chiller i can get down to that tempin about 15 minutes. Then a small 15 odd ft copper coil in an esky or 20L bucket with icy water does the job to finish off on a slower flow rate. No issues.

Martin

What volume of wort are you chilling Martin?

 

[lael]

I use a method similar to what Bribie mentioned: two 7.5-m immersion chillers in parallel, chill water recirculating through an Esky filled with ice water. I start with the Esky half full, and top off the ice repeatedly. This is overkill for 5-gal batches, but I like overkill.

hey Schrodinger - what temps are you getting to at what speeds?

I'm really interested in this question as am struggling to chill the volume from my new system at a speed I like (80L) and am trying to work out how to approach it. Currently whirlpooling with an immersion chiller. But it took a while. I ended up putting into fermenters and in the freezer (fermenting chamber) at around... 30C to chill down overnight. Pitched in the morning. But I would like to be able to chill closer to pitching temps. I need to measure how long my current wort chiller is. Anyone have info on 'ideal' design that allows whirlpooling at the same time?

 

[real_beer]

Don't waste your time building an ice chiller for a plate or coil & then filling it up with iced water, just surround it with ice & let the water drain out of the esky or container as it melts. That's how they're designed to work. If you ever look underneath an old plate chiller you'll see the feet they stand on are all different heights so it sits at an angle for the water to drain off the plate and out the drain of the container. All you do when you let water sit there is waste the ice chilling water thats supposed to have done its job when it melted. Same applies to portable keg systems.

Cheers

A couple of crappy pics:

 

[Kiwifirst]

Would work.

I would do the bulk of the chilling from the mains; then the last few *c thru an ice bath. I would also slow the water flow rate down when using the ice bath.

Note: A nicely formed coil is not as good as a randon ball of copper tube. Have a look at Wortgames avatar to see what I mean.

I hadn't thought of that. I have my nicely coiled copper tube, perfectly symmetrical and whilst the garden loves brew day, I do worry about the amount of water used in a 30 minute boil to pitch temp. I justify it with that the garden needs the water, but if I can cut that chill speed down then not only will the garden be happy, but the kids too

I like the idea of two buckets of iced water and a pump system.

 

[Middo]

I bought a 12w aquarium pump on eBay for around 20 delivered. Works a treat, with an 50 litre esky I use tap water to bring the boil temp down in the wort and with a 20 litre batch I switch it to recirculating the water with some large slabs of ice from 4 * 2ltr ice cream containers. Wort ready to pitch yeast in under 15 minutes.

 

[Kiwifirst]

Just trying to picture this.

So lets say I have my copper coil in the brew pot. Then instead of water mains in and out to the garden, I could just run tap water with some slabs of ice in the esky that I have just cleaned the grain out of with a fish pump?

That....sounds simple, add that to the thread I just read with 30 min mash and 30 boil and I literally half my brew time Well at least for the APA's.

 

[Middo]

You won't want to recirculate the hot water and ice first... Unless you have about 4 bags worth for 20 litres. It will melt away faster than you think.... I tried this myself, now I'll use tap water out, refilling the esky, take the sting out then put the hose back in and recirculate with iced water.

 

[Kiwifirst]

You won't want to recirculate the hot water and ice first... Unless you have about 4 bags worth for 20 litres. It will melt away faster than you think.... I tried this myself, now I'll use tap water out, refilling the esky, take the sting out then put the hose back in and recirculate with iced water.

So just running normal tap water until what temp? Otherwise this would just be the same as running it straight through onto the garden. At what temp does it pay off to switch to iced water? I am guessing when you get round that 30c mark, because it seems to me that I can get to 30 ok and then it take a long time to take that last 10c heat out.

 

[Middo]

I've gone by feel but the first few minutes it's pretty damn hot and after about 8 or so minutes I switch to ice once the heat has subsided. Getting the 12w or there abouts on the aquarium pump regulates the pressure and flow rate so you won't waste too much water.

 

[Kiwifirst]

I've gone by feel but the first few minutes it's pretty damn hot and after about 8 or so minutes I switch to ice once the heat has subsided. Getting the 12w or there abouts on the aquarium pump regulates the pressure and flow rate so you won't waste too much water.

Great. I will look into this. Looks like a great option for reducing the chill time. Especially that 30c to 16c or 17c for my next hefe

 

[country_brewer]

please excuse my ignorance, but why not sterilise the chiller, put it in an ice bath, then run the actual wort through the chiller and straight into the fermenter?

 

[warra48]

You have just reinvented the system used in plate chillers.
Should work though, but cleaning and sanitising might be a bit of a pain.
Don't know how much ice you will need, but it may be a lot.

 

[Kiwifirst]

please excuse my ignorance, but why not sterilise the chiller, put it in an ice bath, then run the actual wort through the chiller and straight into the fermenter?

Not sure I'd want boiling wort running inside copper pipe. I know you can sterilise the tubing, but I'd still be nervous about how clean it really was.
Secondly, if you are going straight into your fermenter, you'd need to be confident that the journey through the coil drops the temp enough to pitch, what if by the time it's been through it is only at 24c?