Sunday 16 February 2014

New circuits fitted to Maxi chiller

Due to a issue with the cooling side of my fermenting control I've decided to make a change. This involves modifying my Maxi chiller so it has an additional 2 separate circuits being used just like the python pump line, ie water being pumped from the water bath through the conicals chiller, then back to the water bath. I had to cut 4 new holes in the lid of the water bath for the new pipework which is all 3/8th beer line and John Guest fittings for ease of use. Picture 3 shows the returns in the water bath, the elbows are pointed toward the ice bank for maximum cooling effect on the returns. The outlet elbows face the opposite direction and are on the opposite side of the water bath, nearest the original outlet ports of the maxi chiller. Previously I had tried to use the beer cooling coils in the water bath to circulate coolant in a similar way, using an external coolant reservoir with submersible pumps, but I found that the temperature of those cooling lines was increased (by a small amount) due to non agitation of the water bath when in use. A way round this would have been to mount a separate agitator pump in the water bath which would turn on when either of the coolant circuits fired up, however for ease of use I opted for the method above as electronics is not a strong point of mine...ha ha. For the moment the python line will remain unused but should I ever decide to use 3 fv's again in the future I could always bring it back into use. Just need to find some time this week to get the pumps into position and test the cooing circuit :-)