Fellows I have come up with something I hadn't seen in print.I plan on taking a 30 gallon plastic barrel with a 12 Volt Battery & 12 Volt pump and placing the Barrel inside a Refrigerator to keep my water COLD to pump thru my Copper Wort Chiller,that way I will still be able to cool my beer down to the temp I need to pitch my yeast! I will just drill me two holes the size of the Tubing thru wall of the Refrigerator and run my lines in and back out to the tank & circulate the cold water!
Larry, is this going to be a single pass or do you intend to recirc the warm water back to the frig? Believe it or not, depending on the size of your chiller/batch, 30 gal may not be enough. Good luck
Fun idea. You could use some cheap pond pumps and an external thermostat to turn the pumps on and off when the temp spikes. Are you currently using the fridge for other things?
Ken Schwartz (who I believe was/is from Texas) designed a fermentation chamber so that he could ferment beers during the hot weather of Texas. He called it the Son of a Fermentation Chiller. You can read more here: https://www.homebrewersassociation.org/pimp-my-system/son-of-a-fermentation-chiller/ Cheers!
You can use tap water to get the wort down to a little over 100°F and then switch over to pumping cold water.
Sorry Fellows,got busy,couldn't get back in here last couple days.I like all the ideas here.Not sure how tho I can do the tap water tho without a holding tank for the water to go back into,see I have all this set up in my shop,it doesn't have a water line going to it,so that's why I was using a tank,I have a 65 gallon water tank I can use,trying to figure how I could use the water hose,but if I have a lot of water standing around the shop the water board may see the water and question it,they are very strict here where I live.Might just have to do bag ice in my big tank,I like the fermentation chiller to!!
This is what homebrewing used to be all about and it is what makes it fun for some of us. There is always a better way to do it. Find a problem and invent a solution. Now you just buy your wort chiller or your mash tun. No fun. I agree with @GreenKrusty101 here. You will need quite a bit of cold water. You may want to dump the first 5 gallons and not recirculate into the cold water bath. Also, if water use is a concern, run the hot discharge water or all of the water into your washing machine. It will be ready for the next load of laundry. I have a 50' 1/2" hose set up so I can discharge the water from the upstairs brew house to the basement laundry. Cheers.
I've got to run about 20 feet to my laundry room. I'd entertain the idea. I'm curious to know how you keep water from getting all over your house.
Yeah, there is some running up and down the stairs. And it isn't a bad idea to pre-load the clothes. If you get a bit over ambitious you may have your own Eureka moment. Cheers.
Yea,i like the idea GreenKrusty had also,dumping the first 5 gallons of water that goes thru thru the wort chiller,sure would allow the cold water to do a better job,and as your say dumping that first 5 gallons into a bucket or something,have a buddy take water hose for refilling 5 more gallons of cold water back into your holding tank!! Great,I will do that!!
