Wort Cooling

[kevinj]

Trying to decide which way to go for my setup.
Which setup resembles what you use?
Which setup would give the best result?
Water usage(cost), ambient temperature of water/air are of some concern due to location.
How much dose the time required to chill the wort matter and what dose it affect?
Any other methods, (other than no chill} recommended? , no chill comments not required.

 

[kevinj]

Been reading some old threads on wort chilling.

Making home made freezer blocks.
Has any one ever tried salt in a sealed plastic bottle with room for expansion of course
Dose it freeze hard, dose it last longer than water?
Is there other liquids that would do a better job.?

 

[dblunn]

I'd say case B. You are better off knocking the temperature down with mains water first then do the last bit with the chilled water. Has to do with the cooling rate (heat transfer rate) being proportional to the temperature differential, Newton's law of cooling I think it is called.

 

[Moad]

yeah B

With ~16 degree tap water I get to 20-21 in a pass.

Throw some recirc iced water into a second and youll get it down t0 at least 15. I actually haven't tested with the iced water yet, will do next brew

 

[kevinj]

must be a lot of no-chillers out there
not that there,s any thing wrong with that

 

[sp0rk]

must be a lot of no-chillers out there
not that there,s any thing wrong with that

Don't be afraid of the no chill, it makes plenty fine beers
But like the others have said, if you're going to ice chill, do it in the second stage
Otherwise it actually has an insulating effect and won't bring hot wort down as quick as cool water would

 

[dblunn]

I don't think there is a divide between chillers & no-chillers. Chill a batch on brew day AND put away some FWKs to keep the fermenter full between brew days!
Dave

 

[Tilt]

Yep, agree with you on that @dblunn. I do just that and use both methods to maximise brewing enjoyment.

 

[crowmanz]

When I bother to chill it is using CFC with 1st using tap water down to below 40 degrees then 2nd with iced water recirculated through.

Mostly no chill though.

 

[MHB]

Just a note of caution. The single most likely place in a brewery to act as a seat for infection is a plate heat exchanger.
At some point in the HEX wort that is hot enough to be self sterilising becomes cool enough for yeast and many other bugs to live in.

The answer is to be extraordinary careful with your sterilisation, especially if you have two HEX in series (and yes that is the most thermally efficient way to use them). Apart from through cleaning and sanitisation, a really good long recirculation of boiling wort before you starting cooling is probably the best option.

Personally my first choice is a long tube in tube counter flow chiller. they are very easy to clean and lack the very narrow channels and crevices that make plate chillers so problematic, and you cant block one up with hops, anything that will go though a pump will go through the chiller.
There are plenty of them available commercially and they aren't too hard to make, you can find plenty of info if you do a bit of searching.
Mark

 

[MastersBrewery]

Even flash bling ones!http://cleverbrewing.com.au/brewing-equipment/counter-flow-chiller-stainless.html

 

[Tilt]

double post removed

 

[Moad]

I have found a plate chiller to be significantly better at chilling than a tube CFC.

Recirculating boiling wort for 15 minutes is what I do with both plate and tube CFC and haven't had any issues, I've only used the plate a few times though so not enough uses to say the process won't give you an infection etc

 

[technobabble66]

I've used only a plate chiller, but can definitely say they're great at dropping the wort temp down.

I'd suggest recirculating the wort through the chiller over the last 5-10 mins of the boil (as mentioned above, after running starsan thru it), then at flameout turn on the mains water and keep recirculating.
You can easily drop the temp of the wort in the kettle below 70*C within 5-7mins. So you can then stop the mains water & do whirlpool additions at this point (to minimize bittering and volatizing of hops oils).
When you're ready, run the chiller outlet to your FV & switch the mains water back on.
Fairly easy to hit 20-22*C doing this, I've found. (With melb tap water).
Maybe uses 50-75L water overall.

And flush the hell out of the plate chiller afterwards!!

(Tip: after basic flushing, recirculate hot sod perc thru it (counter flow) with a hop sock secured over the outlet. Leave it running for 20-30mins, leave overnight, then repeat. This way you can very thoroughly flush thru thousands of liters of "clean" water while only using 10L!)

 

[Moad]

And flush the hell out of the plate chiller afterwards!!

(Tip: after basic flushing, recirculate hot sod perc thru it (counter flow) with a hop sock secured over the outlet. Leave it running for 20-30mins, leave overnight, then repeat. This way you can very thoroughly flush thru thousands of liters of "clean" water while only using 10L!)

I recirc hot sod perc in reverse flow (in through "wort out" )then blow through the posts to clear any residual water once it all cools down

edit: clarified

 

[Frothy1]

I already had a dirty water pump Like this so I dump that in an esky of ice slurry and connect it to my immersion chiller.

Normally I can get +/- 50 liters of ice from work on a friday arvo, if not I freeze 3 x 5 litre ice cream container full of water.

It gets 29 liters of boiling water to 18c in 10 minutes which I'm pretty happy with.

After that I wait 15 - 30 minutes for it to settle out before transferring.

 

[kevinj]

Good info thanks

Asking a question sure bets spending hours and hours and hours trawling through old threads full of unrelated posts, that may have been relevant at the "time it was posted", but they should have long seance been deleted or maybe hidden so as to not clog a thread.

That's a great idea, converting some of the batch into FWK's
But don't you have to adjust the hops down?

 

[manticle]

You don't have to. You may find you want to, depending on beer style and/or palate but you find that out by brewing and tasting.

I am generally an NC brewer but my limited experience with chilling suggests plate chiller (and more plates = generally better) is the most efficient.

You really need to make sure it's properly clean - immersion carries much less risk.

 

[Darc]

I'm a no-chiller (not exclusively) and I love doing it, gives you a bit of versatility with your brew day and further fermentation. 17ltr cubes allow you to do a yeast starter with the remainder of the wort (19-23ltr batches).

 

[Frothy1]

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