Which Plate Chiller

[citizensnips]

Hey all, looking for some advice on plate chillers.

As a foreword I'm well aware of sanitation concerns, clogging and so forth with plate chillers, I'm not looking for advice on why I should be using other types of chillers. Apologies for being blunt but after looking at other threads, this seems to be the way they head pretty quickly.

I've been having a look around lately at the different types of plate chillers for home brewers and have a few questions for anyone that has experience or advice on those available. Again to help keep convo on track, I'm not in the market for a Therminator as it's a bit pricey or the Keg King version as I'm after threaded outlets, not the barbed version......bit of a shame as that would have been perfect!

I live in Melbourne so water temp is quite cold year round and I will mostly be doing 21L batches with the occasional double running through it.

First question was if anyone has a 7-9" long 30 plate chiller and how these go with chilling capability? I want to do one pass to fermenter and avoid recircing back to kettle.

Secondly has any one purchased one of Ali Express? There are a lot of different models, unfortunately not to many longer versions, most around 9" long. However you can pick up 30-40 plate chillers for a reasonable price so I'm leaning that way for the moment.

Other question was regarding Duda Diesel chillers and how they stack up with their price + shipping. I gather the quality is there and the variations are plenty, although they seem a little costly getting them over to Aus.

Any thoughts or experience would be appreciated.

Cheers all!

 

[rude]

The ChillOut 30 plate chiller from Craft Brew $139
No experience but was refered to it years ago but still cubing
I think it was better than most with surface area of the plates being greater

 

[kcurnow]

I have one of the larger Duda diesel ones. On plate chillers you want longer length rather than more plates to give you cooling. Longer length = greater contact time, larger number of plates = higher flow rate through chiller. On my chiller I can chill an 80lt batch down to pitching temp in a single pass and under 5 minutes.
I have however managed to get hop debris stuck in the plate chiller and it is proving almost impossible to get rid of it now. If I had my time again I would try and find a small professional unit that is able to be pulled apart to clean fully. The only one that I know of close to this is the one by sabco. It is pricey though.

 

[citizensnips]

The ChillOut 30 plate chiller from Craft Brew $139
No experience but was refered to it years ago but still cubing
I think it was better than most with surface area of the plates being greater

The chillout is that same model from Keg King, unfortunately it has the barbed outlets which I'm trying to avoid.

I have one of the larger Duda diesel ones. On plate chillers you want longer length rather than more plates to give you cooling. Longer length = greater contact time, larger number of plates = higher flow rate through chiller. On my chiller I can chill an 80lt batch down to pitching temp in a single pass and under 5 minutes.
I have however managed to get hop debris stuck in the plate chiller and it is proving almost impossible to get rid of it now. If I had my time again I would try and find a small professional unit that is able to be pulled apart to clean fully. The only one that I know of close to this is the one by sabco. It is pricey though.

Interesting mate, haven't heard of to many that get permanently stuck. I've wondered whether it's worth trying to avoid chillers with the brazed metals in them in order to be able to run caustic through it. That will pretty much clear out most crap, especially when heated. If you haven't already you could always put it in the oven, bake the hell out of the hops and gunk and turn them to charcoal/dust and then flush them out. Otherwise there's always the option of hooking up a co2 adaptor and pass some through it to blow it out, under its max rated pressure of course.