Immersion chiller, think ill go back to no chill

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

Post by Wonkydonkey » Mon Feb 05, 2018 9:12 pm

I do slow flow at first, it gets me hot water into a cooler for later cleaning duties. Then faster into the fv, for warmer water to wash the fv with oxi/washing soda. Then just turn it up and allow wort to cool, with the added agitation of wort with the IC (stoping stratification) it works ok for me, not as fast as I would like, but it works. Another thing to look at is what the ground water is comming in at. At the mo for me it's 10c but in the summer it's 16 or more some times..that's when I switch to a plate chiller .
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Re: Immersion chiller, think ill go back to no chill

Post by sbond10 » Tue Feb 06, 2018 8:26 am

I think as others have suggested it nedds more copper which is a tad annoying but hey yoh live and learn buy cheap buy twice

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

Post by Meatymc » Tue Feb 06, 2018 1:08 pm

If there's only 13cm depth of wort for the coil to run down through couldn't that be part of the problem - lack of contact between the cold coil and the wort?

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

Post by Kev888 » Tue Feb 06, 2018 3:03 pm

I can't see any pictures on this thread but yes, only the parts of the coil in the wort have any useful affect on it; other parts in the air above are wasted. If using a wide shallow kettle then a big diameter but short coil may allow more contact area for heat exchange.

As has already been mentioned, agitation of the wort also helps greatly, as static wort isn't a very good conductor. This is especially so if the coil is small diameter in relation to the diameter of the pot - lots of the wort will be quite some way from the coils unless things are stirred/agitated to mix it up.

The most difficult time for the chiller is as the wort gets cooler, there isn't much difference between the wort temperature and the water temperature, so this doesn't encourage much heat to flow. So stirring becomes more important as the wort cools. If your cold water speed is low it won't help either; there is a trade-off between water used and cooling rate.

ICs aren't the fastest but they should be more than adequate for that much wort if implemented well. They also have some other benefits like little/no cleaning time, which can offset slightly longer cooling time.
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Re: Immersion chiller, think ill go back to no chill

Post by McMullan » Tue Feb 06, 2018 11:02 pm

https://www.beerhawk.co.uk/cold-crank-s ... on-chiller

You'd be lucky to cool a pint with that :lol:

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

Post by Pinto » Wed Feb 07, 2018 12:06 am

sbond10 wrote:
Sun Feb 04, 2018 2:44 pm
Id like to figure out whats wrong with this one rather than simply moving around the issue
You may have already considered this - but did you try to connect the inlet/outlet in the other direction ? My cooling coil is more effective if I run it the same was as my CFC (cold into the coil base) - I could understand why this is the case with a CFC, but a cooling coil ? there you go I suppose - I wont argue with practical observation.

As a matter of choice, I much prefer my CFC cooler - sanitation and prep is a little more faff, but more than compensated in cooling efficiency.
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Re: Immersion chiller, think ill go back to no chill

Post by sbond10 » Wed Feb 07, 2018 9:23 am

McMullan wrote:
Tue Feb 06, 2018 11:02 pm
https://www.beerhawk.co.uk/cold-crank-s ... on-chiller

You'd be lucky to cool a pint with that :lol:
Aye i know this now looks like im gonna have to go get more copper and get something wide and short.

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

Post by McMullan » Wed Feb 07, 2018 1:43 pm

What Pinto typed is relevant too. To be honest, I don't think I have ever seen a wort IC with horizontal coils. Make them vertical and, as Pinto recommends, fill from the bottom coils.

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

Post by orlando » Wed Feb 07, 2018 1:57 pm

McMullan wrote:
Wed Feb 07, 2018 1:43 pm
I don't think I have ever seen a wort IC with horizontal coils.
Is that a typo? I think the SS Brewtech fermentors have vertical coils for their cooling/heating system but all the IC's I've seen have the coils describing horizontal descending/ascending coils.
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Re: Immersion chiller, think ill go back to no chill

Post by McMullan » Wed Feb 07, 2018 11:51 pm

:? Less work to do in an FV :=P

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

Post by wolfenrook » Thu Feb 08, 2018 1:03 pm

Pretty sure that particular chiller is aimed at stove top, small batch, brewing of about 5 litres a time.

I managed to get a "small" IC off an eBay seller, that does a pretty good job on batches from an ACE mash tun boiler (so about 24 litres):-

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/16-coil-wort ... SwfglZyN52

It's still smaller than what a lot of people use, but it does a proper job of chilling and was a decent price. I did have to spend a little more on some cheap hose fittings to extend the hoses (inlet goes to an outside tap through kitchen window, outlet goes into the kitchen sink). I turn the water flow up until it runs warm from the outlet, rather than running hot, which speeds it up nicely as it increases the waters capacity to remove heat from the wort.

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

Post by sbond10 » Thu Feb 08, 2018 7:05 pm

If it was aimed at stovetop brewers i cant understand why youd have 50cm tails.
Further thinking on this i could drop the boiling liquid into a suitable thick fv then chill in situ that way all the coil is in the liquid

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

Post by jaroporter » Thu Feb 08, 2018 7:23 pm

yeah the geometry looks all out on that cooler. certainly not suprised you're struggling to chill with it though, even if you could get more of it submerged. i'd probably cut the tails and solder in a coupla elbows to let the coil sit horizontal in the kettle, but even then it only looks big enough for stovetop batches.
dropping into an intermediary FV would for sure help a bit as you wouldn't have to cool the stored heat in the boiler, but an extra transfer/sanitation sounds like far too much extra effort/cleaning for maybe marginal gains.
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Re: Immersion chiller, think ill go back to no chill

Post by wolfenrook » Thu Feb 08, 2018 7:52 pm

Somebody in marketing probably thought it looked better with the long hose tails perhaps? Like a big SS stirrer thing. It's definitely only big enough for a few litres though. Heck I'd like a bigger one than I have, to reduce cooling time even further, and mine has a way bigger surface area than that aborted attempt at coolness.. lol

If you go on the northern brewer website though (who make it and sell it in the US), they talk a lot about stirring your wort with it, hence the weird design allegedly. Check the reviews especially https://www.northernbrewer.com/cold-cra ... on-chiller.

For the price, you can get bigger, better, ICs off eBay though.

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

Post by sbond10 » Fri Feb 09, 2018 2:29 pm

Yep i think its back to the drawing board and buy sum more copper pipe. Im considerinng a 8cm high coil running 40cm around with 50cm tails does anyone think this will work

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