Immersion Chiller VS Counter Flow Chiller (CFC)

[@dstoffan89]

I use a cheap fountain pump to recirculate ice water through my immersion chiller, I can chill 6 gallons of wort to pitching temp in about 20 minutes this way.

[@HopKillerBrewery]

I would do the same once my wort got below 100F with the tap water. Works pretty good!

[@billzens3664]

Spot on!!! When I first started brewing five years ago I used an immersion chiller I made, then got a counterflow chiller with my Grainfather. Two years ago when i upgraded to my Spike system, I went to the exchillerator, and it works fine. Even summertime water temps in the 70's I cool a 15 gallon batch in about 20 minutes. Wintertime is much shorter.

[@HopKillerBrewery]

The Exchillerator is awesome! Always good to hear similar experiences as mine, cheers!

[@Homebrew58]

Another con of the counter flow and the reason I ditched mine for a Hydra immersion chiller is that the inner tube can develop cracks. If you are using a pump already you can add a whirlpool arm and just leave it on after you pull your IC and still get that nice hop cone in the middle of your kettle.

[@bledswitch]

Great stuff man, keep it up 👍

[@HopKillerBrewery]

Thanks brotha 🤙🏼

[@JakeSmith-yc3ex]

I love the "flex" of the utopia bottle in the background

[@HopKillerBrewery]

Worst +$200 bottle of beer on earth.

[@FreeYourBrains]

DIY immersion chiller, took 5.7 gallons from 205F to 73F in 4 minutes and 50 seconds flat . And the best part about it is that is stainless steel 1/2 inch thin wall pipe. I put my immersion chiller against any counter flow any day and I don’t have to worry about the inside of it.

[@TheBruSho]

Great comparison and breakdown!

[@HopKillerBrewery]

Thank you for the feedback!

[@eos6984]

Really helpful information. I liked how you clearly separated your preferences from the facts.

[@HopKillerBrewery]

Thank you for the feedback! Glad you got some value out of the video

[@joelauda7501]

Very helpful info for this newbie. Well done and thank you.

[@HopKillerBrewery]

Glad it helped!

[@alexb5766]

Pre chill with coil then run that hose water in a plate or counter flow.

[@rikvos4235]

Hello, i want you're opinion about something. I always coock the wort in the boil. Can i cool it down in the fermentation bin instead of cooling it down in the boil. Because there is no rest heat. Greats Rik vos from Holland

[@HopKillerBrewery]

Lots of home brewers do that, it’s called the “no-chill” method. As long as you have a stainless steel vessel or one that can withstand the hot temperature, you can chill it in your fermentation temp, then pitch yeast after it’s reached that. Hope that helps!

[@mikequebedeaux7224]

Great Video! Smashed Like! Question - Do you recirculate through your counterflow chiller until your arrive at pitching temp or just run the hot wort through it just once and then on to the fermenter? I’ve never used one before but I purchased a copper counterflow chiller but it hasn’t arrived yet. Keep making great videos bro! Mike

[@HopKillerBrewery]

I’ll chill and recirculate back to the kettle only if I’m targeting a certain WP temperature for WP hop additions, other wise I’ll WP without chilling for 5 minutes after the boil, settle for 10-15 minutes and then straight transfer to the FV in a single run. Using my glycol or fermentation chamber to bring it down to pitching temps from there. Hope you like your new chiller!

[@beernie1946]

@@HopKillerBrewery Awesome video! This helped me make the decision to invest in a counterflow chiller! I was wondering what you'd recommend for chilling when transferring to a plastic fermenter? i.e. in the case that the wort should be near pitching temperature to avoid heating/melting the fermenter. Would you recirculate and chill down to a typical WP temperature, let the WP settle at that temperature, and then transfer straight to the fermenter? (assuming the CFC can get to pitching temperatures from the WP temperature)

[@HopKillerBrewery]

@@beernie1946 when I’m transferring to a plaster fermenter during a hot summer day when my ground water is at its hottest all year, my “wort out” temperature is around 90-100F. Plenty cool enough for plastic. Now if it was +120/130F, I would do what you’re saying and then transfer.

[@Daemiex]

i have both, counterflow is useless with hoppy beers it just bungs up too easy, immersion works either way but itsnt as fast as counterflow, so i guess it all depends on what u brew really

[@dh9478]

Well done. I've been garage brewing about five years. Started with the immersion chiller and moved to a plate chiller early on. I hate hate the time I spend making sure that thing is clean after brewing. The last year I've been really optimzing my processes and simplying each step as much as possible. So, I've recently moved from plate chiller to CFC. I'd be super interested in a video on your post-brew cleaning process of the CFC. There's a lot out there. Thanks for considering.

[@dh9478]

Yikes. "There's a lot out there. " supposed to say NOT a lot out there!

[@HopKillerBrewery]

Another CFC user! Glad it’s made your brewing process more streamlined. You aren’t the first to ask this so I think I’ll go ahead and make a video about it! Thanks for feedback

[@BitterRealityBrewing]

Hope all is going well but I wanted to point out that the immersion chiller in this video is very old school (in a matter of just a few years) as you are probably aware but check out Jaded Brewing's chillers and even CUS.S. where they figured out that 25' was better than 75' feet of copper and three individual pieces of 25' copper was hands down the best. You get a bit complex and will full understand thermodynamics but essentially less than half way through a 75' tub of copper tub the hot wort has already heated the cooling liquid to the same as the wort making it useless. So the goal it to move as many flows of cool water as possible and a normal size hose can be easily split into 3 - 3/8 inch copper tubes essentially turning an immersion chiller into 3 immersion chillers working in parallel which has an amazing ability to chill wort at a crazy rate of speed. Plus Jaded will build systems for 10 gallon or larger batches to ensure maximum efficiencies on chilling. Warning a lot of people like to put quick disconnects on these which actually is nice but restrict the flow as the maximum flow from the spigot is required to help these perform. Keep up the great work.

[@HopKillerBrewery]

Thank you for this thorough response! Funny you bring up JaDeD, I’ll be getting one this coming week to review and compare to my normal single pass use of my Exchillerator. I’m really excited to see how it compares. If the chilling is as good as it’s reviewed, my only concern would be how well I’ll be able to get a cone of trub in my kettle after a Whirlpool. Since the chiller will be inside the kettle, I’m curious how much it will block the formation of a nice cone. Cheers man! Keep up your good content.

[@BitterRealityBrewing]

@@HopKillerBrewery I've seen people buy or make their own whirlpool arms as the one on Jaded, at least to me just looks like a bit of cooper tubing but without a good whirlpool arm you won't be able to get a cone going for your trub. I don't dump my hops directly into the boil but into a hop spider on the side which usually keeps my overall trub extremely low so I've never worried about that much. The key with the Jaded if you've seen my big review where I got carried away...is agitation of course but to use a regular hose (nothing skinny or fancy) and no connectors that could restrict the flow. I have very warm tap water usually here in Florida (82 F when I did my tests) and easily chilled mine in crazy short amounts of time. If you need to save water check out where I just used a large kettle filled with ice and water and a cheap (I think $40) pump...and that worked really well and saved a ton of water.

[@Schikitar]

You can also use an immersion chiller in an ice/water bucket as a 'poor mans' counterflow. ;) Also, what's your approach for getting that tighter cone? Cheers mate!

[@HopKillerBrewery]

Is that what you do? How well does it work? I usually get my long stainless spoon to swirl the wort in the kettle after flame out & get a real strong whirlpool going, works well for me!

[@cadillacescalade1]

1000000 thumb up

[@BapelZieN]

wHaT AbOuT A PlAtE ChIlLeR?! ;)

[@HopKillerBrewery]

Hahahah