Help with counter flow chiller

I've just used my homemade counterflow chiller for the first time. It's a hosepipe and 10m of 8mm copper pipe job. Everything went well apart from. The time it took to cool.

I didn't check the exact time but it must have taken the best part of an hour to drain 30L though it. I thought it would be quicker than an immersion chiller but this was significantly longer.

In the plus side it delivered wort at 18-20°C straight into the fermentor. I had to slow the water to a trickle, so there is definitely capacity to push more wort through it.

Is the only practical solution a pump? I have a small brown dc solar pump but haven't tried it out yet. With the flow I was getting today I would be worried about it running dry.

My new Cf chiller is a similar length of 8mm inner pipe and it takes around 30 mins to drain about 30l. I don't use a pump and rely on gravity, picture of set up below although this is with my old unit.



The jug allow me to get the chiller lower to improve the gravity drain, and it saves me having to move a full FV (also gets a good lot of aeration)

Thanks for the advice. I was draining off a counter top, with the chiller sitting on a bucket similarly to yours. I then went directly into my FV which was in the brew fridge. The hose outlet into the FV was slightly higher than the outlet of the cooling coil but still quite a lot lower than the tap on the kettle. It did just seem to drain very slowly. It wasn't blocking as the flow rate didn't change when I prodded at the hop filter.

Do you do anything to cool the wort in the kettle at all? I was concerned that my flame out additions sat in hot wort for a long time and might lose a lot of aroma from the extended soak.

Simonh82 said:

Thanks for the advice. I was draining off a counter top, with the chiller sitting on a bucket similarly to yours. I then went directly into my FV which was in the brew fridge. The hose outlet into the FV was slightly higher than the outlet of the cooling coil but still quite a lot lower than the tap on the kettle. It did just seem to drain very slowly. It wasn't blocking as the flow rate didn't change when I prodded at the hop filter.

Do you do anything to cool the wort in the kettle at all? I was concerned that my flame out additions sat in hot wort for a long time and might lose a lot of aroma from the extended soak.

Click to expand...

At the moment after flameout I leave for 10 mins the whirlpool and leave for about 20 mins to allow things to settle before starting to drain. This is for pellet hops, with whole hop I just leave out the whirlpool

One other quick question. How do you clean and sanitise your chiller? I ran some cold water through it but despite giving it a good blow on the end to push the water out, I can't help but think there will be some stagnant water pooling in the coils just waiting to infect my next brew.

search the web for dairy suppliers who sell the silicone hose we also use .. they can sell long tube wire brushes circa 3m in length, alternitively if you have compressed air or co2 you can blow a plug towing dental floss or fishing line to drag a cleaning rag through aka gun barrel and saxophone cleaning.

Dont lid your kettle when draining through the cfc it may limit the air in to replace the beer as it drops out.. Also your hop filter (if any ) may be limiting the flow out too..

Fil said:

search the web for dairy suppliers who sell the silicone hose we also use .. they can sell long tube wire brushes circa 3m in length, alternitively if you have compressed air or co2 you can blow a plug towing dental floss or fishing line to drag a cleaning rag through aka gun barrel and saxophone cleaning.

Dont lid your kettle when draining through the cfc it may limit the air in to replace the beer as it drops out.. Also your hop filter (if any ) may be limiting the flow out too..

Click to expand...

Thanks for the suggestions. I don't have compressed air, or CO2, although I'm looking at starting kegging at Christmas so may do in the future. My chiller uses 10m of copper pipe, so I think that might be a push to get a plug down without sticking.

I guess for the moment, I will shoot some cold water through to clear anything out and then drain some boiling water through it to sanitise before using it on the beer. When I get my pump up and running I can circulate the wort though it during the middle of the boil to sterilise.

Once I've finished using mine I run hot water through it and then rinse with Starsan.


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Simonh82 said:

One other quick question. How do you clean and sanitise your chiller? I ran some cold water through it but despite giving it a good blow on the end to push the water out, I can't help but think there will be some stagnant water pooling in the coils just waiting to infect my next brew.

Click to expand...

What I normally do is run a couple of litres of boiling water through (from my HLT) straight after use (cooling water disconnected). I try and drain as much water as possible before blowing through with CO2 (I didn't always do the CO2 bit but just stored it somewhere warmish).

On brew day I run another couple of litres of boiling water through it and then squirt some starsan in the top. This has been known to take out some of the oxidisation in the copper pipe and the water comes out a shade of blue.

Every few brews I will run some PBW through as well.

I have had my original chiller since 1995 and have only stopped using it earlier this year in favour of a new posh model.

Dads_Ale said:

What I normally do is run a couple of litres of boiling water through (from my HLT) straight after use (cooling water disconnected). I try and drain as much water as possible before blowing through with CO2 (I didn't always do the CO2 bit but just stored it somewhere warmish).

On brew day I run another couple of litres of boiling water through it and then squirt some starsan in the top. This has been known to take out some of the oxidisation in the copper pipe and the water comes out a shade of blue.

Every few brews I will run some PBW through as well.

I have had my original chiller since 1995 and have only stopped using it earlier this year in favour of a new posh model.

Click to expand...

Well if that's worked for you for 20 odd years and you've not had an infection then I imagine that it will work fine for me.

Simonh82 said:

One other quick question. How do you clean and sanitise your chiller? I ran some cold water through it but despite giving it a good blow on the end to push the water out, I can't help but think there will be some stagnant water pooling in the coils just waiting to infect my next brew.

Click to expand...

Just to chuck a "cat among the pigeons" I'll suggest something quite different and quite the opposite to other suggestions.

It's not stagnating water you need to worry about, as a copper tube is involved it's the potential formation of Verdigris (mainly green copper carbonate). It can form in damp places with access to air. So if you don't want "stagnant" water you had better make sure the cooler is stored bone dry. As making it dry is awkward, do as I do and store full of water.

The water won't turn "stagnant" as there is no organic matter to rot. And the close proximity of all that copper isn't a great environment (toxic) for bugs anyway. Just flush it well with clean water before using (along with any sanitising you might do) .


Another thing I noted: Pumping will speed things up, but using one of those little 12V jobs will probably result in the pump bunging up with hop debris and things won't be speedy anymore. I know people use them, but do you want to take the risk? If a pump is positioned where it should be, at the lowest level of the piping (assuming the usual "impeller" type pump), it can't run dry. These (impeller) pumps can't suck, they only push, so if the flow stops they'll just beat what remains to a fine froth.

Dads_Ale said:

What I normally do is run a couple of litres of boiling water through (from my HLT) straight after use (cooling water disconnected). I try and drain as much water as possible before blowing through with CO2 (I didn't always do the CO2 bit but just stored it somewhere warmish).

On brew day I run another couple of litres of boiling water through it and then squirt some starsan in the top. This has been known to take out some of the oxidisation in the copper pipe and the water comes out a shade of blue.

Every few brews I will run some PBW through as well.

I have had my original chiller since 1995 and have only stopped using it earlier this year in favour of a new posh model.

Click to expand...

Well I knew I shouldn't be complacent and carry on as before with a new bit of kit.

I upgraded to a new CFC which had a lot of benefits over my old one, including a temperature probe (see picture).

What I didn't fully appreciate was that the up turn at the end served as a trap for and water left in the system, even though I had dried as best I could and blown through with CO2.

On Fridays brew day (not brewed for at least 2 months) on clean up I noticed some black deposits in the run off water. So today I undertook a full strip down and probe of the lower coils with a few pipe cleaners revealed a lot of gunge :-(.

So have spent the day soaking in PBW then VWP which seems to have done the trick.

Note to self. Next time remove the dial gauge assembly and ensure the coils are fully dry, they down't sit flat....