Plate Heat Exchanger

[Dutto]

Another Thread sparked off my thinking about cooling the wort.

The most efficient heat exchangers I ran into in the Oil & Gas business were "Plate Heat Exchangers". They were efficient but incredibly expensive.

Undeterred I Googled "Small Plate Chiller" and got this ...

https://www.manomano.co.uk/catalogu...-10-plates-plate-heat-exchanger-22-kw-1811304

I'm not sure from the description that this particular model can be dismantled for cleaning but filtering the wort would make it "lump free" and therefore there should be no need to dismantle it and a quick flush through with clean water after use should return the exchanger to a pristine condition.

The £35.73 (including delivery) doesn't seem extortionate.

They seem to be very popular in the USA so ...

Any thoughts? Anybody use one?

 

[Clint]

I think if you keep posting your Christmas shopping list on here you will just get socks,knickers and a hi karate gift set!

Cheers

Clint

 

[Bigcol49]

Hi!
There are YouTube videos of 30 plate chillers. Will this one be "powerful" enough?

 

[Dutto]

Hi!
There are YouTube videos of 30 plate chillers. Will this one be "powerful" enough?

The one in the link is rated at 22Kw so I think it would be more than adequate. (Imagine the effect of sticking 23 litres of wort into a boiler fitted with a 22Kw heater!)

Also, you can slow the flow from the boiler down to hit the required temperature ...

... always assuming that the cooling water is at a lower temperature than that required.

In which circumstances, it would be necessary to pass the cooling water through a bucket of ice similar to using a coil-cooler.

Just ran the idea past Santa and I could collect a bucket of ice right now! :whistle: :whistle:

 

[terrym]

The one in the link is rated at 22Kw so I think it would be more than adequate. (Imagine the effect of sticking 23 litres of wort into a boiler fitted with a 22Kw heater!)

Also, you can slow the flow from the boiler down to hit the required temperature ...

... always assuming that the cooling water is at a lower temperature than that required.

In which circumstances, it would be necessary to pass the cooling water through a bucket of ice similar to using a coil-cooler.

Just ran the idea past Santa and I could collect a bucket of ice right now! :whistle: :whistle:

The heat transfer coefficient (the ability of a unit to transfer heat between one fluid and another) of plate heat exchangers is very good, compared to other types of heat exchanger, and they do have their place in many applications.
In an industrial setting they can be dismantled and cleaned to maintain their efficiency. If they can't be cleaned and the internal channels get plugged with solids or a film of crud they will lose their efficiency. So ideally in this case, the wort should be filtered before it passes through the unit.
Plate heat exchangers come with a pressure drop for passing fluids on both sides. Water from the mains is pressurised so no problem, but wort would need to be pumped to get it through the plates.
Finally the fundamental equation which drives heat exchanger design is
Q=UA(DT)
Where
Q= heat transferred
U = heat transfer coeff
A= effective area of exchanger
(DT) = an expression of the temperature difference between the cooling fluid and the fluid being cooled.

I suspect that the rating of 22kw is an optimum for the unit on offer, probably on water to water service, and relies on a maximum (DT) since in this case A is fixed, and U would also be nominally the same. What this means is that to get wort from 100*C to say 20*C would require a high flowrate of mains water to get the high (DT) required by minimising the water temperature increase and that in turn is limited by the pressure drop through the unit.

All that said if it does work in a home brew setting, brilliant:thumb:

 

[Bigcol49]

Dutto: check out YouTube - loads of vids about plate chillers.

 

[Dutto]

...........

Finally the fundamental equation which drives heat exchanger design is
Q=UA(DT)
Where
Q= heat transferred
U = heat transfer coeff
A= effective area of exchanger
(DT) = an expression of the temperature difference between the cooling fluid and the fluid being cooled.

.........

I have a mate who did his PhD Thesis on "Two-Phase Flow".

On his first day at work on a Gas Plant I was showing him round and explaining the process when I pointed out the Inlet Gas/Gas Exchanger.

"Where?" he asked after a few seconds.

"There." I responded and pointed.

"Where exactly?" he said after a few more seconds.

We had been walking along as this conversation took place and I could reach out and actually touch the 80 metre long by 1.5 metre diameter exchanger that stretched out ahead of us.

"Here! This is it." I said as I slapped the side of the exchanger.

As he pointed out later "It was about then that I thought 'You have a lot to learn.' I knew what a heat exchanger was, but the ones I had worked with at University were about half a metre long."

Here's his Thesis ...

https://shareok.org/bitstream/handle/11244/31385/Thesis-1973D-N459t.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y

I understand about 1% of it ... :thumb: :thumb:

... which is why I will probably stick with my coiled tube cooler no matter how disreputable it looks ... :lol: :lol: :lol:

... but maybe I can find a cheap plate exchanger that can be dismantled, so ... ??? :whistle: :whistle: :whistle:

 

[terrym]

On his first day at work on a Gas Plant I was showing him round and explaining the process when I pointed out the Inlet Gas/Gas Exchanger.

.. which is why I will probably stick with my coiled tube cooler no matter how disreputable it looks ... :lol: :lol: :lol:

...

As you no doubt quickly found out working in the industry, gas-gas exchangers require a largest surface area, whatever the configuration, compared to those involving liquids for the same thermal duty (for design reasons I've largely forgotten)!

As far as your copper coil is concerned it looks fine to me and if it does the job, brilliant, so long as its got an ASME stamp. :whistle:

 

[simon12]

I would not recommend a plate chiller to anyone doing less than 100l batches and is already using pumps for everything. They clog up easily and to clean them its best to be able to recirculate a cleaning agent though in both directions. Also in the case of that one I suspect due to its size it will not cool any quicker than an immersion coil.

 

[peebee]

I don't use a plate chiller but a slightly less efficient counter-flow chiller (homemade "pipe-in-pipe" setup with inner core 15mm bore). But I do dual purpose mine to be a HERMS "coil" too, and a plate cooler would instantly block up.

But both my CF chiller and any plate chiller share a problem: In Summer the tap water (being use as the coolant) is 18C (its down to 11C just now). Try cooling to a 19C pitching temperature with that!

I'm now using a shelf cooler in series so the CF chiller gets it down to 35-40C and the shelf cooler drops it further. That is quite fast enough. But needs a bit of tweaking yet to get the wort to a predictable temperature.

 

[Dutto]

I've got a Shell & Tube Cooler as per this photograph but (as shown in the second photograph) I found it unwieldy to handle and really not all that efficient; especially in summer.

I may go out and buy another coil of 8mm copper pipe and have another attempt at making a better looking coil cooler.

Alternatively, I may just build a "square coil' from 15mm tubing 'cos I know I can solder! :thumb: :thumb:

 

[peebee]

I've got a Shell & Tube Cooler as per this photograph but (as shown in the second photograph) I found it unwieldy to handle and really not all that efficient; especially in summer.

I may go out and buy another coil of 8mm copper pipe and have another attempt at making a better looking coil cooler.

Alternatively, I may just build a "square coil' from 15mm tubing 'cos I know I can solder! :thumb: :thumb:

Hum, mine's a little larger (5M) but "unwieldy" would have to describe it. Fortunately I've got it permanently fixed to a wall. Might trigger some ideas? I like your "twirl-ly" pattern to the inner core; mine just relies on the switchbacks to create turbulence.

I've measured mine in Summer requiring a tonne of tap water to cool 65L of wort to 19C.

 

[Bigcol49]

Hi!
That's a reyt beast!
I WANT MORE KIT!!!!! :lol:

 

[terrym]

Hum, mine's a little larger (5M) but "unwieldy" would have to describe it. Fortunately I've got it permanently fixed to a wall. Might trigger some ideas? I like your "twirl-ly" pattern to the inner core; mine just relies on the switchbacks to create turbulence.

I've measured mine in Summer requiring a tonne of tap water to cool 65L of wort to 19C.

That's quite a complex double pipe exchanger you have created in such a small space.
I'm impressed :thumb:

 

[simon12]

I made a chiller like that with 15m of 15mm pipe inside 15m of 22mm pipe, I couldn't solder anything so used drilled out john guest fittings. It works as well as a plate chiller about the size of a house brick but unlike it it doesn't clog up halfway through and lose its efficiency. It chills 180L in under an hour.