How in the Hell do I chill the wort down to 45?

Times, hopping methods, etc

Moderator: Brandon

User avatar
jonathan.dunphy
Posts: 11
Joined: Fri Feb 10, 2017 12:36 pm

Re: How in the Hell do I chill the wort down to 45?

Postby jonathan.dunphy » Thu Mar 09, 2017 5:42 pm

You are right, however I was using this bath for my prechiller.
User avatar
Bilsch
Assistant Brewer
Posts: 283
Joined: Thu Mar 10, 2016 12:35 pm

Re: How in the Hell do I chill the wort down to 45?

Postby Bilsch » Sat Mar 11, 2017 7:14 am

I used to do the ice bath with my old copper immersion chiller circulated to the new ss chiller in the wort which worked really well. I picked up a used Neslab cft33 chiller for $100 and now have the luxury of not having to buy a bag of ice anymore. Used lab chillers can be had pretty reasonably on eBay if your patient. The CFT33 can reduce 6 gal of wort by 20deg F per hour on it's own but I use a round cooler as a cold storage medium. I fire up the chiller about the time I start the mash and let it chill the water in the cooler down to 33f or so. Then after the rough chilling with tap water I can switch circulation to the cool bank and continue on down to 45f fairly quickly.
User avatar
jonathan.dunphy
Posts: 11
Joined: Fri Feb 10, 2017 12:36 pm

Re: How in the Hell do I chill the wort down to 45?

Postby jonathan.dunphy » Wed Mar 15, 2017 11:15 pm

51131717630__241893ED-4FC5-4B6C-855F-F44CF7B50ECC.JPG
User avatar
jonathan.dunphy
Posts: 11
Joined: Fri Feb 10, 2017 12:36 pm

Re: How in the Hell do I chill the wort down to 45?

Postby jonathan.dunphy » Wed Mar 15, 2017 11:20 pm

I made one today out of a window ac unit by bending the front down into a ten gallon cooler full of water. I have pictures but I'm not sure how to post them. It brought 10 gallons of water in a cooler from 75 f to 32 f in thirty minutes.
HerrBrauer
Posts: 5
Joined: Fri May 05, 2017 3:34 pm

Re: How in the Hell do I chill the wort down to 45?

Postby HerrBrauer » Mon May 08, 2017 1:31 pm

Hey guys, this is my first post here. Chilling the wort down to lager pitching temp has always been a problem for me (sometimes my tap water is as warm as 30+degC / 90degF in the summer). Before my LODO days, I used to cool the wort down to the 20s degC / 70s degF with an immersion chiller and then let it seat in the fridge until the pitching temperature has been reached.

Since I started LODOing (and there was this huge pressure to rapidly cool the wort do pitching) I've been trying to find an effective and simple method that does not waste a lot of water. Eventualy I came up with the following:

1) After the whirlpool, I transfer the wort through a stainless counter-flow chiller to a purged 30 liter keg. If the tap water is too warm, I'll use a pre chiller, but as far the cooled wort comes out below 30 degC / 86 degF it's ok
2) After all the wort has been transferred, I hook a vaccum pump to the keg and let it run for a full hour
3) Then I'll just let the wort seat overnight (under vacuum) in the fridge
4) The next day I'll rack the wort out of the keg to the fermenter, pitch and aerate as normal. Sometimes I'll just ferment in the keg, but racking to another vessel allows me to get rid of some of the cold trub that has settled overnight.

I still cannot chill the wort rapidly down to 6 degC for pitching, but at least it will stay protected from oxygen damage during the overnight rest in the fridge. Here's a pic of my setup: http://imgur.com/a/RDOmy

Unfortunately this won't work with Cornies, as they cannot be vacuumed.
I didn't brewed many batches using this method yet, but so far so good.

Please let me know what do you think
Cheers!
User avatar
Bilsch
Assistant Brewer
Posts: 283
Joined: Thu Mar 10, 2016 12:35 pm

Re: How in the Hell do I chill the wort down to 45?

Postby Bilsch » Mon May 08, 2017 5:22 pm

That's an interesting method you've got there. I can't see how oxygen could damage your wort when it cannot go into solution.
I've got a couple questions.. How much vacuum can you pull on that keg and why do you hold the vac for an hour?
HerrBrauer
Posts: 5
Joined: Fri May 05, 2017 3:34 pm

Re: How in the Hell do I chill the wort down to 45?

Postby HerrBrauer » Mon May 08, 2017 6:35 pm

I run the pump for one hour because it takes some time to achieve deep vacuum. My pump is a cheap 3CFM single stage. Ideally I'd use a vacuum meter, but I don't have so I run the pump for this long just to ensure all the air has been removed. Actually you can hear the pump noise changing after vacuum is achieved - and that's well before the 1h mark.

Maybe we don't need deep vacuum and 15min is enough, but I'm playing with other variables at the moment and will keep tihs constant for now.
User avatar
Bilsch
Assistant Brewer
Posts: 283
Joined: Thu Mar 10, 2016 12:35 pm

Re: How in the Hell do I chill the wort down to 45?

Postby Bilsch » Mon May 08, 2017 10:21 pm

I was curious because there is a chance you could be boiling the wort again in the keg under vacuum. At the temperature you mention transferring, 86f, when you reached a vacuum of ~28 in/hg the liquid would again come to boil, although not for very long without heat input or ever decreasing pressure. Here is the really cool part.. If you could continue to decrease the pressure, theoretically, you could also chill the wort quite effectively due to the huge heat loss from latent heat of evaporation, steam chilling at it were. Another benefit being the evolution of the water vapor coming out would certainly completely flush the keg of every last molecule of oxygen. Very interesting all this.
HerrBrauer
Posts: 5
Joined: Fri May 05, 2017 3:34 pm

Re: How in the Hell do I chill the wort down to 45?

Postby HerrBrauer » Tue May 09, 2017 11:14 am

Wow! I didn't think about this. Very cool (no pun).
User avatar
Bilsch
Assistant Brewer
Posts: 283
Joined: Thu Mar 10, 2016 12:35 pm

Re: How in the Hell do I chill the wort down to 45?

Postby Bilsch » Tue May 09, 2017 12:09 pm

One little problem though (there always is a catch) is you would need a vacuum pump that can handle quite a bit of condensing water vapor such as a liquid ring vacuum pump. But with one of these pumps you could conceivably chill your keg in minutes since vacuum chilling is powerful, efficient and needs no heat exchange. Your heat magically comes out with the vapor. You would lose some water from the wort but you could just shorten the boil time and finish the boil in the keg while cooling. I'm also betting any dms formed while chilling will be effectively stripped out. I like it!

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 2 guests