Make Your Own Wort Chiller (for about $65.00)

The Chiller!
For the past 16 months I've been cooling my wort with what I've had available, that was a metal washtub and a garden hose.  I'd curl up the garden hose in the wash tub (outdoors), put my brew kettle in the  tub and turn on the hose.  The water would circulate around the brew kettle cooling it from 212 to 70 in about 30 minutes.  This worked fine but in the middle of a Minnesota winter it made working with a garden hose  and a washtub a pain, plus I had no way of capturing the excess water as it spilled over the sides of the washtub onto the ground.  Wasteful!

Taken from BYO Mag.  Dec 2011

 The December 2011 edition of BYO magazine (click link to purchase)had a great article on chiller performance by Chris Bible.  The chart on the left was my inspiration to build my own chiller. 

I went to my local big box home improvement store and bought a coil of refrigeration grade copper tubing.  It's important to know that two grades are available, one with thicker walls and one with thinner walls.  You want the grade with the thinner walls, you will not be putting anything under pressure, so no need for tubing with a thick wall.  Plus, the thin walled tubing is easier to manipulate.  Per the chart above, I decided to go with a 50 foot coil of 3/8" inner diameter copper tubing.  I spent about $45.  Then...

50 feet of 3/8" ID copper tubing + 5 feet of tubing

The first thing to do is wrap the tubing into a tighter circumference than it is packaged.  I did this by wrapping it around a Corny keg, it was easy to do and took very little time.  I recommend wrapping it around something smaller than a 5 gallon bucket. Why? Because it's nice to store/clean it in a 5 gallon bucket (photo below).

The down-tube on the left is your cold water inlet.  You want the cold water to start circulating from the bottom

BE CAREFUL when bending the tube as it WILL kink if you over do it.  Make small bends, working a bend over several inches of the tube.  As you can see in the photo, the bends at the end run about 12 inches of tube.  I used some wire to keep the tubes together, I plan to weld the two together between my two wire ties.

I had to cut a few inches of copper tube off to make my ends line up.  A simple pipe cutter did the trick. I brought the extra bit I cut off into the hardware store to ensure that the plastic tube I bought would fit.  Small  clamps were added to ensure everything would stay together.  I bought 10 feet of plastic tubing, using 5 feet for my inlet and 5 for my outlet. I spent $3.00 on 10 feet of tube and 4 small clamps.

Heating up the plastic tube by dipping it in hot water helps make it pliable enough to slide on easily

I used 5 feet of tube to keep the garden hose(s)
connections away from the brew pot when cooling



There are 3 pieces that make up the connections

  



 The Hose connections were a bit tricky as you need a few pieces to step up the size to a standard female garden hose connection.  I found a knowledgeable plumber working in the plumbing isle who quickly put together the pieces I needed.   Small clamps keep everything in place. I spent $18.00 on the hose connections.

Be sure to scrub the copper down before you use it as it is very dirty when it comes out of its packaging.  You'll find that out when you coil it around the Corny keg, your hands will be filthy.  Also, be sure you put the chiller in your wort 15 minutes before flame out to sanitize it, and your wort.

 

It fits nicely in a 5 gallon bucket for storage & transport

So, how did it work?
I chilled my wort from 212 to 78 degrees in 10 minutes flat!  It was amazing to watch the thermometer drop!  The copper tubing on the inlet was really cold, about 56 degrees.  As the water exited the outlet tube is was scalding hot (duh).   It is important to have the cold water inlet to the chiller be the tube that goes straight to the bottom of the coil.  Why?  I'm not sure of the scientific reason, but an engineer I work with explained it to me once.  All I can say is that it works wonderfully!

A few other notable items.  For my first use I placed my outlet hose in a 5 gallon bucket to collect the 'waste' water.  I filled it up about 3 times (15 gallons).  I used the water to water some trees in the yard.  I read once that someone hooked the outlet to a sprinkler and watered his lawn with it.  I will try that too.  Whatever you do, you can collect it and reuse the water vs. using it to water your concrete driveway.

Hope this helped!  Cheers, and happy brewing.
-Chris