hose pipe ban

[the red devil]

Hi All,
I live in an area where they have introduced a hose pipe ban.
I crash cool using a coil. I think i may be breaking the law if i continue using it by conecting my hose pipe.
Is it possible to deconstuct a fridge unit and use the coil with refrigerant ? will this be too cold?
This ban could go on for months!

[jaberry]

How about using a small pump and circulating through a tub of water with frozen bottles of ice in, seen this done quite successfully on YouTube

Look at this vid 3.00 mins in which shows it in action
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZGtFAcr6 ... ata_player

[borischarlton]

Have you got a pump? I am going to freeze a couple of buckets of water, then place the ice in my HLT where I will recirc the water from my coil. In my head it works well, yet to prove though!

Rob

[Beer O'Clock]

I have a pump that will recirculate the water from my 2 x water-butts. It won't last long before heating up, but it will take the edge off, I then transfer the FV into the brew-fridge to get it down to pitching.

[PureGuiness]

I got a cheap submersible pond pump recently because of the hose pipe ban bad use spare FVs full of pre-chilled water (using frozen bottles). The flow rate on the pump doesn't even need to be high. My setup managed to get down to pitching temperature in 30-40 minutes and didn't waste any water - that was without using much ice so next time when I use 3-4 frozen ltr bottles to pre-chill it should be quicker.

[cosmosmoss]

I have the same problem in my area. I was thinking of doing the brew as normal, transfer to FV after the boil, put the airlock on but not pitch the yeast till the next day. It wouldn't take long to just pitch the yeast. Sounds like a lot of effort to get a pump plumbed in.

[PureGuiness]

My pump isn't plumbed in. When I use it I just put it in the bucket, attach the hose from the IC to it and switch the power on, simples.

There are 2 reasons why we use the chillers to cool the wort as quick as possible. One is to get the yeast pitched and active as quick as possible but the main reason is to get a decent cold break and drop out the bulk of the haze forming proteins that clump together while cooling. Without it they will remain in solution and in the final beer.

[Scooby]

There are 2 reasons why we use the chillers to cool the wort as quick as possible. One is to get the yeast pitched and active as quick as possible but the main reason is to get a decent cold break and drop out the bulk of the haze forming proteins that clump together while cooling. Without it they will remain in solution and in the final beer.

Right on the first one wrong on the second. It doesn't matter how fast the wort is chilled with respect to protein coagulation/precipitation. What does matter is the low temp it reaches.

[PureGuiness]

I have always been told that the rate of cooling will affect the ability to secure a good cold break. In fact Palmers "how to brew" states:

Only by rapid chilling from near-boiling to room temperature will the Cold Break proteins permanently precipitate and not cause Chill Haze.

[Scooby]

I have always been told that the rate of cooling will affect the ability to secure a good cold break. In fact Palmers "how to brew" states:

Only by rapid chilling from near-boiling to room temperature will the Cold Break proteins permanently precipitate and not cause Chill Haze.

Does he give any convincing proof?

AFAIK there is no evidence either way as to whether the speed of cooling affects the cold break. There is that the temperature low is important
but only if you want to serve your beers chilled and avoid haze.

I reckon home brewers are just copying commercial breweries where some form of rapid cooling is necessary due to the volume.

IMO rapid cooling to get "a decent cold break" is just a load of homebrew BS and it doesn’t make any difference if you leave the wort to cool at
room temperature in a sealed vessel overnight.

[PureGuiness]

Ok. I'll accept your arguments about the rapid cooling not be necessary to secure the cold break for now, although I've not seen this before and the absense of proof that it does help does not necessarily make it untrue.

There remain other key reasons to rapidly cool the wort. The prime reasons being - the ability to pitch the yeast so that any lag time to fermentation can be reduced, reducing the risk of bacterial infection, and a secondary reason which effects pale beers more is that it quickly stops the production of DMS.

I know that plenty of people leave the wort to cool overnight without any bad effects on the beer and that DMS production is unlikely to be a problem once the wort gets down to around 80oC anyway, but I still think that cooling rapidly is beneficial and I will continue to use an IC to achieve this.

[Scooby]

No chill has been popular for years in OZ with many award winning beers brewed that way with no mention of problems with DMS,
you just need an appropriate boil.

The other reasons you give, lag time and infection don't stack up, there is no reason you can't store cooled wort in a sealed vessel for
an extended period before pitching yeast.

but I still think that cooling rapidly is beneficial and I will continue to use an IC to achieve this.

Fair enough but this post is headed 'hosepipe ban' and you were implying that not cooling rapidly caused problems in the finished beer.
It is still possible to produce quality beers without force cooling..

[techtone]

My wort chiller coil tail simply connects to the tap of a budget keg. Fill keg with water from a tap, place higher up than boiler and turn on. Might need filling once of twice depending on how much stirring or I can top up the keg with water whilst it is draining.

[liquidman]

Techtone,

Thats a blinking goog idea!

A

[Scooby]

Well if nothing else at least it negates the chance of prosecution