Dualing Wort Chillers - Building and Testing Heat Exchangers With and Without Flow Disturber

This is a video of how to make a counter-flow wort chiller (heat exchanger). Two nearly identical units are made and compared at the end. The difference between the two is that one has a wire wrapped around the inner copper tube, and the other one does not. The one with the wire is about 5% shorter, but has the benefit of having a "flow disturber". In theory, disturbing the flow would put colder water near the copper, increasing the efficiency. 3/8 inch (really measures 1/4) soft copper tube of 25 feet was split between the two devices. The outer jacket is just an inexpensive 5/8 garden hose. The design (stolen from a forum post) includes a place to mount an outflow thermometer. I spent a total of $70 on both units.

Category:

Howto & Style

Tags:

• brewing
• chiller
• heat exchanger
• chillzilla
• counter flow wort chiller

[sengsationa1]

Each chiller is about 12.5 feet; I bought a 20 foot soft copper and another 5 footer. My target length was actually 15 feet, but they didn't have a 10 footer, so I compromised.

I brewed on 12/20 in Charlotte, NC (didn't check the temperature of the hose water) but I had to close the valve on the hose water because my wort was way too cold for pitching. So I went from a full boil to about 65 degrees, and that was with the hose going slowly. So in the winter, the unit is very effective.

[wawebster]

How long is each chiller? 10 ft from the the 20 ft tube?