Spike Wort Chiller Review

[@jaskats1]

The Spike counter flow chiller has been my favorite purchase of 2023. It is legit and one of their best recent re-inventions. Thanks for another excellent video!

[@curtpick628]

Comparing it to Jaded, what were your chill times?

[@BEERNBBQBYLARRY]

I don’t recall. About the same I think. I’ll be hopefully doing a speed comparison of chiller types this winter.

[@BEERNBBQBYLARRY]

Would need to go back and rewatch the live stream brew day to find out.

[@qh4007]

Hydra consistently 3 min to 3.5 minutes. 5gallons. Which in a brewday is a blink of the eye.

[@vruychev]

I use 44 qrt cooler with ice and recirculate. One pass of 15 gallons in 15 minutes from 200 F to 75 F no problem. This chiller is a BEAST!

[@BlichmannEngineering]

Thank you for always supporting the brewing community. Keep up the brew-inspiration!

[@FermentationAdventures]

I have it and like it. I went from an all copper morebeer CFC to this guy. Huge improvement in chilling. Solid construction. I wish the wort water direction printing was a little more prominate, as the way I mount it, it's hard to read, but otherwise pretty happy with it.

[@chriscardona8032]

You could mount it on its side which would eliminate the laying flat issue.

[@BEERNBBQBYLARRY]

Correct, but I don’t have a means or place to mount it.

[@thomasbpetersen]

Have one, other brand... 9m and it's chilling from 100C to 26C in 25min. and use 55L of water. It's so god...

[@qh4007]

Im just Jaded!!

[@JaDeDBrewing]

We are too!😃

[@BEERNBBQBYLARRY]

@JaDeDBrewing Haha!

[@WreckedBrewery]

That's a bit of a bummer that part of this chiller is made out of copper. I love Spike equipment as I have plenty of it! However, when I was in the market for a counterflow chiller a few years back, Spike didn't offer one. I ended up purchasing the Northern Brewer stainless steel one which is all stainless. It's been very good to me these past 4 years that I've used. I would suggest to Spike to make theirs fully out of stainless too as it puts the mind at ease for cleaning, especially parts you can't see. The exterior visually looks like same as the one I got from NB. It is a good construction and does great at chilling so no complaints there. Cheers!

[@FermentationAdventures]

I'd prefer stainless too, but I'm ok with copper.. been using copper CFCs for quite awhile. I assume Spike went with copper to get the internal pipe twisted to increase the turbulence of the wort. I assume that's not possible with stainless.

[@SpikeBrewing]

@WreckedBrewery Thanks for the feedback. The inner copper convoluted design was chosen specifically for the 30x thermal conductivity that copper offers over stainless steel. If you look at an all stainless design like Stout for example, ours has almost 2.5x quick cooling times in a smaller package and much lighter. We sold our v1 chiller which was 100% copper for 6+ years and never had customer issues due to it being copper. Simply flush with hot Brewery Wash, rinse with Star San and do a finally rinse with water like any other chiller and you'll be good to go!

[@garymock9969]

Totally disagree with your POV here. The thermal properties of stainless vs copper hands down make stainless the worst choice for cooling your work quickly. I would love to hear how you believe one substrate cleans more easily than the other? Also, this review was pretty lackluster if you ask me Larry. No data on cooling times and overall performance. Just Larry showing a loose water line connection. Normally you put a lot more effort into product reviews Larry.

[@grahamhawes7089]

I refuse to use copper I can’t see. Very difficult to know if it’s clean, very difficult to clean without being able to scrub. If I was going to get a counterflow chiller I’d get all-stainless, efficiency be damned.

[@SpikeBrewing]

@grahamhawes7089 copper is used pretty commonly in brewing, distilling and in food. Just like any plate or CFC chiller a simple flush with hot Brewery Wash, rinse with Star San and a finally rinse with water will clean it up great. You've been selling copper counterflow chillers for 6 years and have never had an issue reported by customers. Mind over matter for that particular issue. Cheers!

[@grahamhawes7089]

@@SpikeBrewing respectfully, I’ve had immersion chillers with slight green corrosion/verdegris that survives PBW soaks, Starsan soaks, and hot vinegar soaks. So far only physical scrubbing (during chemical treatment) has reliably gotten it shiny again so it can regain the good, dull oxide layer through use. Speaking as a customer with his own personal experiences and biases, a stainless CFC would get a very strong look, a copper one is a non-starter for me. I’m sure copper ones work great but I just don’t want verdegris in my beer.