Wort Chiller Pond Pump Idea

[blotto]

And also...just use water straight from the tap for the initial temp drop, it will drop pretty quick, then use the ice bucket to drop the last 15-20*. That way you dont need so much ice

This is what I do, I only need 2-3 frozen milk bottles of water and every ice pack and baby teether I can find in the freezer I have hot tap water as well so only goes down to mid 20's with tap water.

 

[Mikeyr]

I tried using a bilge pump, flow was excellent but in the end have a rig that now puts the warmed water into the pool!

Ice is basically energy and our coal power uses a huge amount of water and is poor efficiency. Some bright spark can probably work out the best nett result.

If you're not in a water poor area, garden/pool/pond is a good idea, or wash the car, did that once, nice warm water sure cuts the dirt fast.

 

[chrisluki]

What if i used a combo of my current immersion chiller and tap water, with a stainless ice bucket sitting in the middle?

If i could get an ice bucket like this, i could fill it with large iceblocks...i just need to measure the inside diameter of my immersion chiller to make sure it fits in there.

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Wine-Bucket-Chiller-Holder-Satin-Finished-Stainless-Steel-215mm-/300927346728?hash=item4610aae828:g:-lYAAMXQgJhTeYrg

 

[oglennyboy]

Coil formed chillers are actually the WORST form to use. They chill the wort close to the coil but the rest remains hot. They may look pretty but are terribly inefficient

Next time you use your coil grab your thermometer and measure the temp near the coil and then in the middle. Even though the output of the coil will be cold the centre of the kettle will still be very hot

The best chiller looks like a random ball of tube, bit like a bowl of spaghetti.

If you are a die hard coil chiller then its best to stir or agitate your wort to mix it up get it to cool quicker, but this creates a problem of stirring up all the trub

I worked out very early on just how bad a straight coil was and built the ugliest mother of a randomly betd tube thing you ever did see, but it chilled the wort in about 1/3 the time as a straight coil

Sorry for the hi-jack Chris!
DBStu, I remember seeing a pic of your immersion bird's nest and the question I forgot to ask at the time was.... there's not really going to be a trub cone form due to the massive turbulence on whirlpooling, and if you pull the coil out it's going to stir everything up, so do you do anything different? Or once you hit pitching temps you just drop it straight into the fermenter? I'm not fussed about cold break, have taken to pulling most of it across anyway (some nice experimental posts on these boards gave me some comfort), but I still try to keep the hot break back.

Chris, I like the idea of the ice bucket in the middle of the coil, seems like it should work. I imagine the same heat transfer inefficiencies as with the coil and wort would apply, in that you still have to keep the cold water moving so as to have maximum temp gradient at the bucket:wort interface.

 

[chrisluki]

Sorry for the hi-jack Chris!
DBStu, I remember seeing a pic of your immersion bird's nest and the question I forgot to ask at the time was.... there's not really going to be a trub cone form due to the massive turbulence on whirlpooling, and if you pull the coil out it's going to stir everything up, so do you do anything different? Or once you hit pitching temps you just drop it straight into the fermenter? I'm not fussed about cold break, have taken to pulling most of it across anyway (some nice experimental posts on these boards gave me some comfort), but I still try to keep the hot break back.

Chris, I like the idea of the ice bucket in the middle of the coil, seems like it should work. I imagine the same heat transfer inefficiencies as with the coil and wort would apply, in that you still have to keep the cold water moving so as to have maximum temp gradient at the bucket:wort interface.

No dramas mate.

Things would be so much simpler if i could afford a proper recirculating chiller!!!

 

[Bribie G]

I've often wondered about the possibility of making a scale version of something like this, like they used to do back in the days when men wore trilby hats and women were hairy in all the right places .. B) B) it would be an excellent method of aeration as well.

 

[chrisluki]

I've often wondered about the possibility of making a scale version of something like this, like they used to do back in the days when men wore trilby hats and women were hairy in all the right places .. B) B) it would be an excellent method of aeration as well.

I am sure I have read about something similar this week?

 

[TidalPete]

Invigorated by a gratifying Melbourne Cup day & Bribie's post I will give my 2-cents.

Over many years I've done, in the following order, chilling with ice, copper immersion chilling, 30-plate chilling & am now back to immersion chilling again but using a ss immersion chiller for the following reasons:-

Ice chilling is obvious (in the bath, whatever), copper chiller worked well with my young (ATT) HERMS but was a ******* to keep clean externally & so progressed to a 30-plate ss chiller which worked magnificently until the day that I realised, being so close to the beach, my bore water was slowly but surely corroding the copper welding in the ss plate chiller with the unenviable results & so progressed to the final solution of the ss immersion chiller .

Cut a long story short, I run the salty bore water through the ss immersion chiller. Stop/progress according to my '0' chill additions then chill down as far as the bore water will take me (around 29/30 deg c in summer) then switch to a 1 x 2-litre ice cream container of frozen water sitting in just enough water to submerge the pond pump in a tilted esky until I reach equilibrium (usually around 19 deg c +/-).
This is fine for Ales. Lagers usually take another 2-litre frozen water addition if I want to bring the temp down lower.
Please note that tilted is good as you are barely covering the pond pump intake & thus need minimal water volume to keep the ice icing on as it were.

My 2-cents.

PS --- Please take it as read that ss immersion chillers work excellently in normal circumstances away from a salty environment.

 

[Ducatiboy stu]

Sorry for the hi-jack Chris!
DBStu, I remember seeing a pic of your immersion bird's nest and the question I forgot to ask at the time was.... there's not really going to be a trub cone form due to the massive turbulence on whirlpooling, and if you pull the coil out it's going to stir everything up, so do you do anything different?

Obviously you cant whirlpool with a birds nest

Getting it chilled nicely will leave a nice layer of trub on the bottom of the kettle.

I always tilt the kettle by putting a chock under the tap side.

Once you have a nice chilled break you can drain off a fair bit of the remaining wort.

The trick is to be gentle.

Once you pull the chiller out let it sit and settle before you drain the kettle

If you chill it right and let it settle you will end up with SFA wort left in the trub... B)

 

[dannymars]

A simple thing I've found is that if you are whirlpooling and using an immersion chiller, make sure the whirlpool is going in the opposite direction to the water going through the chiller. Once I realised this, my chilling went much faster than before.

 

[TidalPete]

I would positively agree with former posts that a 'birdsnest' immersion chiller configuration is a very much faster chilling alternative than the standard coil-formed immersion product we get online. :super:

Just saying.

Have No-chilled a couple of times OTY's & am still alive ATM. B)

 

[roastinrich]

This old school one at De Halve Maan would have cooled a few thousand gallons.

 

[Dips Me Lid]

Another trick to do is get a pedestal fan to blow air over your kettle while spraying the outside kettle surface with a water mist, helps to speed up the process, I also spray my burner stand as I find it retains a lot of heat energy.