Immersion Chiller Length
I am going to add a new chiller and was looking at whether I should get a 25ft vs 50ft copper wort chiller for 5 gal batches? There are also stainless ones. Is that better?
- 6 Replies
I have a 25′ one I got on Amazon and it works pretty well. My dad has a 50′ one that I’ve used a couple of times and it cools WAY faster. If I could do it over I’d get a 50 – they arent that expensive.
I found a 3/8 50 ft on Amazon for like 65 bucks and it was an upgrade from my 25 ft. Dropped my cooling time significantly and made chilling a less miserable process. I got the copper one because it’s naturally antibacterial and I have heard that the copper is good for the beer.
Here’s the one I got: https://amzn.to/390iUOD
I have 2 25′ ones. 1 coil goes in an icebath from the faucet and then connects to the other coil that goes in the wort. First I just run water from my hose through the one in the wort which gets it to like 85 degrees pretty quickly. Then I connect the one in the ice bath upstream from the one in the wort, and that helps it drop down to 70 faster, which used to take forever with just the tap water.
If you think you might upgrade your overall brewing process in the future, use stainless 50′ and then turn it into a HERMS coil for if you move up to 10 gallon batches and you buy a plate chiller!
Otherwise, copper is better. It has better heat conductivity than Stainless.
I use a stainless steel one which I like because it’s super easy to clean and works just fine.
I use a Scylla chiller from JaDeD Brewing which is an immersion chiller with 3 25′ coils and it is AMAZINGI You can get a whirlpool arm built in too, which I definitely recommend (it’s only like 15 more bucks). This got my chill times for a 5-gallon batch to under 5 minutes and it’s way less maintenance than a counterflow or plate chiller.
Log in to reply.