Pages: 1 2
Wort coolers
Hi Everyone,
I brewed my first batch of beer a couple of weeks ago (still conditioning in the keg, although it smelled good when transferring it), and the one annoying bit was that it took an absolute age to cool down the wort to pitch the yeast. This was with splitting it into two pots, one in the bath and one in the sink surrounded with cold water.
I have been looking with interest at the spiraled copper pipe wort chillers sold in a lot of homebrew places. If anyone has one, do they work? And also, how do you connect them to the tap? Or are there any other ways of chilling the wort?
Thank You!!
Hello avery,
I use one of these Immersion Wort chillers and find it cools my wort down from Boiling to yeast pitching temp in around 45 minutes.
Mine came with 2 lengths of tubing.
I use a bucket with a tap on it and also a 2nd bucket. I connect 1 tube from the bucket tap to the chiller and the other from the other end of the chiller draping into the 2nd bucket. Once the 1st bucket is empty I just turn off the tap and pour the water back into that bucket from the other.
I an pleased I have got a wort chiller and would say it was money well spent.
avery,
Yep, a really good investment.
I made my own (plenty of websites will give you instructions if you google it), cheaper than buying one. You just need some microbore copper pipe (8mm or 10mm) from B&Q or somewhere similar, and some fixings to attach the hose onto the pipe. You can carefully bend the microbore by hand. To attach to the tap, I used one of those showerhead attachments you put on bath taps, chopping the actual showerhead off and using the pipe to attach to the hose feeding the chiller. So not at all hard to make. I just feed the chiller straight from the tap, and put the runoff hose back down the sink.
I get even better results than Alton_Bee (maybe due to using cold water straight from the tap rather than recirculating, I don't really know), it chills 6 gallons from boiling down to yeast-pitching temperature in around 25 minutes, compared to several hours before I made my chiller! Definitely worthwhile.
All the Best!!!!
The best beers I've brew have come after I made a wort chiller. It's just a coil of copper tubing with plastic hose as input and output and a garden hose connector. It cuts the waiting in half or more and reduces the chance of contamination.
does the copper oxidize and turn green (like the statue of liberty)? does this effect the beers taste?
Yes, they work great. I used to place my brew pot into a tub of ice water to cool the wort, but this method took lots of time & ice.
I invested in an immersion wort chiller. It's a spiral pice of copper tubing that attaches to the kitchen sink.
I place it into the boiling wort 15 minutes before the boil is done. Then, I take the pot off the stove, attach the end of the wort chiller tubing to the kitchen sink, and cycle the water through. It stills takes some time to cool, but it's a little faster and less hassle than the ice or cold water method.
Been interested as well... please let us know how mush better it works for you... TheJet
if you haven't seen the price of copper tubing lately, be prepared for some sticker shock. it may not be as cheap as it once was to make your own CFC's or immersion chillers.
probably the best value out there now is the Shirron plate chiller that Northern Brewer sells, you can pump wort through those things basically as fast as your pump can go and it chills to within a few degrees of your water. amazing things, really, and it also can be gravity fed. if you can afford it, buy one...
Off the net.
Wort Chiller
The following is a recipe to construct a wort chiller. A wort chiller will chill your wort down to yeast pitching temps. within minutes depending on the temperature of the water coming out of your spigot. You can also build another one and place it in an ice bath before the one going into the brew pot. They are easy to build and very cheap. Try pricing one out of the brew shop.
To build a wort chiller, all you will need is:
15 - 20 foot of 3/8" OD (outside diameter) copper tubing
10" of 3/8" ID (inside diameter) plastic tubing
2 small hose clamps
1 female fitting for faucet (faucet = Water Tap in the UK)
Bend tubing around a coffee can. Leave about a foot at the end and bend it up through the center.
BE CAREFUL NOT TO CREASE THE TUBING.
Attach half of the plastic tubing to one end and half to the other. Secure one end with a hose clamp and attach the faucet fitting to that end and secure it with other hose clamp.
Now your ready to chill your wort. Put the wort chiller in the brew pot during the last 15 minutes of the boil to sanitize it. Put the brew pot in the sink and attach to the faucet and put discharge end down the drain. Cover pot and turn on cold water to circulate through the coils. In about 20-30 minutes you will achieve pitching temps.
By:- Brian Summers
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I used one of those showerhead attachments you put on bath taps, chopping the actual showerhead off and using the pipe to attach to the hose feeding the chiller. So not at all hard to make. I just feed the chiller straight from the tap, and put the runoff hose back down the sink.
Are you talking about flexy pipe used in plumbing, like hooking up a hot water heater or the gas line from the wall to your stove?
Marv.
If you're doing 5gal batches and up a wort chiller is almost a requirement, cooling quickly allows a good cold break to form and reduces the amount of time your wort is prone to contamination from bugs other than your yeast.
Pages: 1 2