Plate Heat Exchanger

[jimw86]

Im looking at getting a plate heat exchanger for my set up because im using to much water when cooling. Ive looked about and I have few questions so im hoping some of you might be able to help out.

Firstly I know more plates is better, but its also more money so whats worth getting plate wise and whats not. You can get a 10plate 22Kw exchanger on ebay for £26 but is that enough? I dont want to go down the £200 blichmann route.

Second, will I need a pump to get the wort through or would gravity work fine? Id be gutter if I did need a pump as ive just sold my totton pump because I never used it.

Cheers

Jim

 

[Aleman]

Gravity Feed will work fine with a PHE . . . I use a pump as I recirculate wort to ensure it is sanitised, but boiling water will do as good a job, also my brew length is 80-90L

I have the 60 plate version of This 30 Plate One If I was buying again I would only get the 30 plate one. What I have found is that beyond a certain number of plates it is the plate area that has more of an effect on cooling (Counter intuitive I know, as in theory it is surface area for heat exchange that matters and it should be irrelevant if that is supplied by lots of small plates or fewer larger plates.)

This 30 Plate one has bigger plates and would be much more efficient than my 60 Plate one despite my PHE having a Higher rating (by 5KW). I think this is because the coolant is in the PHE for longer, and there is a limit to how low you can turn the flow down before the wort temperature starts to rise at the outlet.

One important fact that must be mentioned is that these things are easy to block, and if yo are going to use one you need a hop filter that is capable of stopping particles bigger that 0.5mm from getting to the filter. I use a #30 Mesh hop stopper and have had no problems. . . . A copper manifold with hacksaw cuts is not going to do it!! Also you need to be particular about your cleaning and sanitising routine with them.

 

[jimw86]

How long is your transfer taking down to say 20'c mate?

 

[Aleman]

It takes about 15 minutes to transfer the 80L to the FV at full bore, and the wort comes out at about 25-30C on average . . . I could slow the wort transfer down, but it doesn't make that much difference, plus my FV has a chiller coil in it so I use that to drop it to pitching temperature . . . It allows the cold break time to settle so that I can draw it off from the dump valve.

Bear in mind that unless you have a prechiller on the coolant line they are much less efficient in summer. Other people seem to get much better performance than I do though :evil:

 

[jimw86]

yes, i did worry about the summer thing...at the moment im using 6 SS chiller coils and get to 25-30'c no problem in about 30-40min. I think I may look into making a pre-chiller first. I have a small chiller with python so may look at that before splashing the money on something that may not improve my system that much.

Cheers mate

 

[Vossy1]

You could always get a 'proper' heat exchanger like mine, the tap temp don't bother it too much :lol: :P
This one's a steal at the mo

(that is jokey post, though I do own one similar)

 

[Nunfa1]

Hi Jim,
have you configured your coils in series or parallel? I would have thought that 6 in parallel would be pretty efficient, but in series they probably wouldn't do much good after 3 or 4.

 

[mixale]

You could always get a 'proper' heat exchanger like mine, the tap temp don't bother it too much :lol: :P
This one's a steal at the mo

(that is jokey post, though I do own one similar)

Bargain price!
I to have one similar and cool 50lt to 20-25c in about 10mins.
The filter is critical in keeping these bad boys clean.
My heavyweight nylon sock filter even traps the hot break!

 

[pjbiker]

They are suspiciously similar to the domestic hot water heat exchangers found in combi boilers. I keep thinking about posting on freecycle asking for an old boiler but worried what I might get :rofl: . Would take some serious de-scaling and cleaning. Plumbing it in could be a challenge too.
My home made counterflow 10mm copper is of limited efficiency, takes 35-45mins/~55L brew so a plate chiller sounds like a sensible upgrade.

 

[Vossy1]

My heavyweight nylon sock filter even traps the hot break!

So it's not just mine then :lol:

 

[jimw86]

I wish I had a set up big enough for one...but they are a pain. I hate the bi-monthly task of taking ours apart at work to clean it.

 

[Loetz]

This 30 Plate one has bigger plates

Dumb Question: Is there some way that these things could double as a heat exchanger for HERMS? Could I just put it in the heat exchanger pot like this?

I'd rather not buy a second pump.

 

[Loetz]

Any thoughts on this guy?

http://cgi.ebay.de/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vie ... CA:GB:3160

I'm looking to cool about 13 gallons.

 

[Vossy1]

Dumb Question: Is there some way that these things could double as a heat exchanger for HERMS? Could I just put it in the heat exchanger pot like this?

You could but you'd have to pump the heated water through the PHE, meaning an extra pump, and you'd also need a ruddy good pre filter to stop grain getting into it.

Any thoughts on this guy?

I bought my PHE from Germany, they're pretty much the same the world over, just check how the plates are braized together, normally they're copper braized.

 

[Loetz]

You could but you'd have to pump the heated water through the PHE, meaning an extra pump, and you'd also need a ruddy good pre filter to stop grain getting into it.

I'll use the plate exchanger for cooling the wort and I'll just go back to the original plan to use copper pipe for the herms HX. It's just so expensive! What is a good length of copper pipe to use for the herms exchanger anyway? Could I get away with two meters?

 

[pjbiker]

You could but you'd have to pump the heated water through the PHE, meaning an extra pump, and you'd also need a ruddy good pre filter to stop grain getting into it.

I'll use the plate exchanger for cooling the wort and I'll just go back to the original plan to use copper pipe for the herms HX. It's just so expensive! What is a good length of copper pipe to use for the herms exchanger anyway? Could I get away with two meters?

2 metres should do it, think thats about what mine is, it's all I could fit in the kettle.

 

[Loetz]

You could but you'd have to pump the heated water through the PHE, meaning an extra pump, and you'd also need a ruddy good pre filter to stop grain getting into it.

I'll use the plate exchanger for cooling the wort and I'll just go back to the original plan to use copper pipe for the herms HX. It's just so expensive! What is a good length of copper pipe to use for the herms exchanger anyway? Could I get away with two meters?

2 metres should do it, think thats about what mine is, it's all I could fit in the kettle.

I ended up with 10 meters, but I haven't put it all together yet.