Counterflow wort chiller question

[BrewStew]

Do you guys with CFC's recirculate your boiling wort through it to sanitise it or use sanitiser? or a mixture of both?

 

[Aleman]

Yes

 

[Aleman]

:rofl:


I clean with a hot caustic solution every now and again . . . then flush with a hot acid rise (White vinegar ) then fill with boiling water seal the ends and store . . . when ready to use, I drain it (Blowing it out with CO2), and recirculate boiling wort for 5-10 minutes to ensure its all sanitised.

 

[BrewStew]

cheers! :thumb:

 

[Vossy1]

Yes here also :lol:
Almost identical to Aleman, but I deliberately use a Saniclean solution to strip the oxidised layer of the copper every now and then. I also recirc hot wort for the last 10 mins of the boil, mainly to make sure the ball valves, pump and tubing are sanitised.

 

[BrewStew]

cheers V :thumb:

i'm thinking of building one and using that as well as my IC to try and get my cooling times down as i'm close to an hour for a full 80L boiler

I was thinking of recirculating the wort from boiling at flame out through the CFC and back into the boiler at the same time as cooling it with my IC as I've noticed that using just the IC alone gives me hot spots. when my Brewmomemeter mounted halfway up the boiler says it's cooled enough, i run off... then the temperature goes up! (obviously because the wort is hotter at the top) so i figured, if i'm going to recirculate, i may as well pass it through a CFC too for that added cooling effect.

I was considering just sending the hot wort straight through the CFC and into the fermenter, but i want to try and leave the break material in the boiler :thumb:

 

[Vossy1]

I was considering just sending the hot wort straight through the CFC and into the fermenter

That is without doubt the fastest way to do it, it really shortens the brew day. I'm trying to find a way of making it faster by side stepping the hop bed for faster drain off, depends what the cfc can cope with, but I would imagine 10ltr per min to be easily achievable. Using a conical you could easily drop the break after a few hours, would make for a much shorter brew day. Having said that I'm not sure break needs to be removed, but that's an old chesnut of a convo :lol:

 

[Aleman]

I think an easier solution would be to make a dedicated IC for your 80L boiler . . . . I'm not convinced that fast flow through a CFC actually works . . . . Been there done that . . . . Looking at building a 10m one from 6mm pipe . . . using slow flow rates should get reasonable cooling . . . . Vossy is right though using a conical it doesn't matter if the break gets carried over as its very easy to drop it.

 

[Vossy1]

I think an easier solution would be to make a dedicated IC for your 80L boiler

Yep just done that :lol:

I'm not convinced that fast flow through a CFC actually works . . . . Been there done that .

Ah, but mine is a dual coolant feed cfc with two cfc coils (well one long one tecnically :lol: ) ..so maybe it might just work, no reason not to try it :hmm:

 

[Aleman]

I'm not convinced that fast flow through a CFC actually works . . . . Been there done that .

Ah, but mine is a dual coolant feed cfc with two cfc coils (well one long one tecnically :lol: ) ..so maybe it might just work, no reason not to try it :hmm:

So is mine . . . two 11m coils fed independently . . . couldn't get the wort temp below 35C

 

[Vossy1]

So is mine . . . two 11m coils fed independently . . . couldn't get the wort temp below 35C

That's really strange :hmm: My cfc takes the wort to tap temp, whatever it is, so I always have to restrict the coolant flow. In December the cfc was chilling to 4 deg c and I had to restrict the coolant to a trickle to get the wort temp up to 20 deg c.
What flow rate were you getting for 35 deg c A ?