Immersion chiller, think ill go back to no chill

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sbond10
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Immersion chiller, think ill go back to no chill

Post by sbond10 » Sat Feb 03, 2018 12:19 pm

So for christmas i bought my self a cold crank immersion chiller from beer hawk. The main reason i went for this design was the tails are 55cm long and i brew 23ltrs in a 100ltrs so i get around 13cm of final liquid in the pan. So a standard chiller wouldnt fit and i didnt want to make my own as im crap at diy.
So it was a massive failure i was expecting a chill time of 20-30 minutes nope instead it was a long slow 70 minutes to get some to 28 degrees, i litrally had to run the water barelly on other wise the water came out stone cold and even on a trickle it was barelly warm. I was stiring and even shaking the chiller about.
What the hell am i doing wrong before i throw the chiller in the bin and buy a second jerry can.
Cheers sean

Jim if your reading this can i message you the pic and video on twitter as i only access on a mobile phone

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Jim
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Re: Immersion chiller, think ill go back to no chill

Post by Jim » Sat Feb 03, 2018 12:35 pm

sbond10 wrote:
Sat Feb 03, 2018 12:19 pm
..............Jim if your reading this can i message you the pic and video on twitter as i only access on a mobile phone
That's fine, though you should be able to post pics OK from a mobile and link to a youtube vid as long as you aren't using Tapatalk. The new forum works well with mobiles on its own, so really you don't need Tapatalk any more.
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Re: Immersion chiller, think ill go back to no chill

Post by sbond10 » Sat Feb 03, 2018 12:45 pm

Done via the jbk page thanks jim.

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Re: Immersion chiller, think ill go back to no chill

Post by Fil » Sat Feb 03, 2018 12:46 pm

i think the length of that chiller could be the reason, i had to google, it 13 feet of copper tube?? most IC's are twice that length or longer, so 70 minutes is probably about right. 30-35 mins (often felt like longer) for 5gallons was par for the course with my ol 10m IC. a 10m coil of 10mm soft copper tube is not very expensive, and its very easy to bend especially if you use a form (something to bend it round) you only need take special care with tight bends so as long as you avoid those its a very pleasant calming job sat out on the lawn slowly but surely wrapping a coil round the perfecly sized form.. build a coil to fit your kettle :) give yourself room to get a paddle in to stir to aid the chill, (i didnt and ended up stiring with the chiller, it got heavy quickly..)

with a large diameter shallow kettle i would be tempted to wrap a number of small coils round something like a wine bottle in a loop to sit round the perimeter of the kettle a simple stir in the middle would then circulate hot beer over all the coils in one ;) the well built many diddy coil IC chillers can boast peformance similar to CFC chillers, tho they tend to be all fed independently with cold water..

for a quick chill tho cfc is the way to go imho..
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Re: Immersion chiller, think ill go back to no chill

Post by Jocky » Sat Feb 03, 2018 1:49 pm

13 feet should be fine.

The big difference is made when you agitate the wort around the chiller - either by stirring the wort or jiggling the chiller.
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Re: Immersion chiller, think ill go back to no chill

Post by jaroporter » Sat Feb 03, 2018 2:02 pm

i think mine was 10m of 10mm copper (double coil) and it was slow as anything with 23L. probably 40 min to ~33C with the effort of stirring (always seemed major infection risk). always cooled the last 10C in the FV in the fridge as it would just takes forever and loads of water to get there.

course it all comes down to the design of the chiller. probably easiest way to increase IC cooling efficiency up to a point would be increasing the tube length. you could probably add coils like fil says with not too much effort. maybe even some elbows instead of smooth bends for turbulation.

i then made a standard coil CFC and it was better, but i never liked not being able to see inside and having to either dry out the coils (impossible really) or store full of water. used that once before reassigning the copper elsewhere and starting to nochill. i've made a few other designs of CFC since that have been much better but it never actually started me chilling again 'cause i couldn't see a benefit.

so yeah, i don't think you're doing anything wrong! it'd just be better with an improved (tailored) design.
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Re: Immersion chiller, think ill go back to no chill

Post by chrisbjones202 » Sat Feb 03, 2018 2:32 pm

I made a new one recently around a cornie as my old one wasn't sitting in the wort.

Did 23l this morning and chilled to 20 in about 15min stiring some of the time.

Easy to make, I fit a washing machine tap to easily adjust flow

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Re: Immersion chiller, think ill go back to no chill

Post by Jim » Sat Feb 03, 2018 2:45 pm

sbond10 wrote:
Sat Feb 03, 2018 12:45 pm
Done via the jbk page thanks jim.
I've retweeted, so anyone following JBK can see them. 8)
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Re: Immersion chiller, think ill go back to no chill

Post by sbond10 » Sat Feb 03, 2018 3:06 pm

Yea maybe inwas expecting to much from it as others have said its rather short

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Re: Immersion chiller, think ill go back to no chill

Post by IPA » Sun Feb 04, 2018 9:21 am

You should have bought a plate chiller. No waiting no stirring. Open the tap wort goes in at boiling comes out into the FV at 22° c
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Re: Immersion chiller, think ill go back to no chill

Post by sbond10 » Sun Feb 04, 2018 10:49 am

IPA wrote:
Sun Feb 04, 2018 9:21 am
You should have bought a plate chiller. No waiting no stirring. Open the tap wort goes in at boiling comes out into the FV at 22° c
Can i put it on your credit card ? Until they come down in price and able to be opened up im dubious about using one. Plus knowing my current luck id buy one be proper excited and find out i need either a pump to get it to work or some really exspensive filter

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Re: Immersion chiller, think ill go back to no chill

Post by sbond10 » Sun Feb 04, 2018 10:50 am

Jim wrote:
Sat Feb 03, 2018 2:45 pm
sbond10 wrote:
Sat Feb 03, 2018 12:45 pm
Done via the jbk page thanks jim.
I've retweeted, so anyone following JBK can see them. 8)
Thanks jim

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Re: Immersion chiller, think ill go back to no chill

Post by McMullan » Sun Feb 04, 2018 1:03 pm

ICs work very well, especially this time of year. I get about 25L from boiling to below 20*C in less than 10 minutes using an IC. 15-20 minutes in the summer. If you're on a budget, no problem:

https://www.plumbnation.co.uk/site/10mm ... 0608002358

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=vipL11vq_g8

sbond10
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Re: Immersion chiller, think ill go back to no chill

Post by sbond10 » Sun Feb 04, 2018 2:44 pm

Id like to figure out whats wrong with this one rather than simply moving around the issue

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Re: Immersion chiller, think ill go back to no chill

Post by greenwood » Mon Feb 05, 2018 10:13 am

sbond10 wrote:So for christmas i bought my self a cold crank immersion chiller from beer hawk. The main reason i went for this design was the tails are 55cm long and i brew 23ltrs in a 100ltrs so i get around 13cm of final liquid in the pan. So a standard chiller wouldnt fit and i didnt want to make my own as im crap at diy.
So it was a massive failure i was expecting a chill time of 20-30 minutes nope instead it was a long slow 70 minutes to get some to 28 degrees, i litrally had to run the water barelly on other wise the water came out stone cold and even on a trickle it was barelly warm. I was stiring and even shaking the chiller about.
What the hell am i doing wrong before i throw the chiller in the bin and buy a second jerry can.
Cheers sean

Jim if your reading this can i message you the pic and video on twitter as i only access on a mobile phone
I think a clue might be 'I literally had to run the water barely on' . I've used many of these chillers and find they work best with water on full blast regardless of what you feel the temperature coming out is .


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