Live in Fla and have been using emersion chiller but it’s not working well due to heat here. Thinking of getting the plate wort chiller above. Any advice from those who have used this, posit :mrgreen: ive or negative will be appreciated.
I got this one for christmas.
The 40 plate chiller. And I LOVE it. I live in Charleston, SC and have issues with ground water temps as well. Was taking me roughly an hour to get to 80, then I would have to put in my chest freezer to get it down the rest of the way to pitching temp. It would take me roughly three to six hours total to get there.
Now, I am at 63/64F within 15 minutes of flameout. In 15 minutes of turning off the flame I am pitching my yeast.
Did I say I LOVE it.
And when I hit summer temps and my ground water temp goes up, I just plan to use my old immersion chiller as a pre chiller.
Hopefully this will maintain my current chilling times.
Not trying to talk you out of a plate chiller, but I’m curious why your IC isn’t working for you. Groundwater in Austin is usually well above 80F and I use a 50’ 1/2" IC with a whirlpool and groundwater to get to 100-110F, then switch to a recirculating icebath with a pond pump to get the wort down to 60F. With a 12-gal batch, this takes maybe 30 minutes, but I’m doing other things.
The key to using an IC is to have the wort move over the coils, either through stirring or using a pump to whirlpool, and to keep the incoming water colder than the wort - groundwater in the south is only going to get you down around 80-90F at the best regardless of what chiller you use.
