Cedar Rapids Brewing Society

How are most of you chilling your wort? I have tried several methods. First a 25 foot 3/8" copper tubing immersion chiller made by Larry. It didn't chill our 10 gallon batches very fast. Worked great for 5 gallons. I built a counter flow chiller with a garden hose and 25' of 3/8" copper tubing. It worked pretty well. I borrowed David Ard's Therminator plate chiller and pump. It chilled like the counterflow but faster. I recently purchased a large immersion chiller with a whirlpool return like developed by Jamil Zainasheff (Mr. Malty). He said he prefers this method to all the plate chillers. I will let you know how I like it. It is supposed to help retain hop flavor and aroma while reducing DMS due to the cooling of the entire volume of wort below 140 F in a matter of minutes. With my counterflow chiller or a plate chiller, the entire worts sits near 200 degrees until it passes through the chiller. No problem as long as it goes through fast. I will let you now how my new chiller works once I brew with it.

I use a 25' x 3/8" immersion chiller. I recycle water using a utility pump. It allows me to pump ice water through the chiller. I can usually chill 5 gal in 15-20 minutes. When I could keep adding snow to the chill water, it chilled very fast.

I use the ole ice in the kitchen sink method.

Brando, do you do partial boils or full boils?

Brownbeard, what kind of utility pump do you use? Is it like a sump pump? I wouldn't mind trying that some day.

I use an immersion chiller I built out of copper tubing. It works well as long as I stir the wort periodically. Jamil's approach is basically the same thing w/ a fancy wort-stirrer. After it's cool, I remove the chiller and give it a good stir to whirlpool, while I go sanitize my fermenter, siphon starter, tubing, etc. I'm doing 5 gallon batches.

-Tom

Matt F wrote:Brando, do you do partial boils or full boils?

Brownbeard, what kind of utility pump do you use? Is it like a sump pump? I wouldn't mind trying that some day.

It's not a sump pump, but it works on the same principal. It has a garden hose inlet and outlet. I believe it is 1/6 HP.

I do a counterflow chiller made from a garden hose and 5/16 tubing. I got the tubing free, that's why not 3/8. The 5/16 flows slow, 25 min. for each 5 gallon. I'm going to get a march pump this spring and force the beer through.

I usaully brew outside at home and run the hose through the counterflow to the sprinkler hoses for the landscaping. This winter brewing inside I used a sump pump and icewater. I filled my HWT and run out of that. It worked OK, but used a lot of ice.

I don't do overly hoppy beers so I'm not as concerned with the speed of the chill.

I have the standard 3/8" copper tubing immersion chiller. I normally go outside on the deck (even in winter) and use the garden hose to supply the water. I can normally get a 2 gal boil down under 90F in about 10 minutes, even in summer.

Best results to date (fastest chill to pitching temp) was this winter's Pilsen. I put the glass carboy on the deck with the 3 gals of water in it while I brewed. It got down to about 40F and was starting to frost up on the inside by the time I finished the boil. When I put the 85F wort in after chilling with the immersion, the whole 5 gals was under 60F, perfect for the lager yeast I was using. As much as I hate Winter, it's great for making beer!!

Yeah, I only do a partial boil. Maybe about 2 gallons, then add water up to 5.

I use the Chillzilla counterflow chiller that I got from Northernbrewer.

What I do like is that I don't have to put it directly in the wort.
Which makes the following possible.

One thing I did with this that helps is I modified a bucket that I can put the chiller in. Cut some holes in the side of the bucket for the connections to protrude from. Sanitize and place the chiller in the bucket 15 minutes before chilling wort and fill with ice. Stuff came out so chilled that I had to let it warm up a bit before pitching. However, that was when I was gravity feeding the system. Now I use a pump and it comes out just right.