Whirlpool Chiller Screen

[Junket]

Had a lot of free time this week, so cleaned and tweaked the brewery. I've been having problems getting good circulation from my whirlpool chiller due to hops clogging things up. Found a suggestion on another forum and ordered a sheet of stainless steel screen from mcmaster-carr. Folded it in half, sealed the edges by folding, clamped it around a length of copper pipe, and fit it over the inlet on my chiller (I have a dedicated intake tube soldered to the chiller because my old brew kettle did not have an outlet valve). About 10 bucks and 10 minutes and now I'm getting much better circulation. It also does a nice job of catching hops, leaving less muck on the bottom of the kettle.

[andy77]

That's interesting. Junket, you're drawing your wort up through copper, through your pump and back down a parallel pipe to whirlpool? What benefit does this give?

[Junket]

Gets a nice whirlpool going without stirring and with lid on. Gets down to 80 in under 10 minutes with tap water.

[ireinj]

Love the setup. I'm currently looking on McMaster for SS hardware wire cloth. Do you know the specs on the type you used? Is it fine or medium mesh? I was thinking 60x40 medium mesh size. What size piece did you buy? Thinking 12" x 12" would be enough. Any suggestions? THanks

[jalopy1]

Back on the topic of this wire mesh cloth material, I will only buy from 1 of 2 places:

Mcmaster Like you said - just watch the prices on them because they obviously do not manufacture this stuff, therefore the prices can go up and down a lot.

http://www.bwire.com/ - They manufactuer this stuff and have 2 large warehouses full of inventory. They can sell you small pieces or rolls at the best price for material here in the USA.

The 60 x 40 medium mesh size should be fine for something like this. Stainless steel is obviously the material that you are going to be looking for to avoid any rust and corrosion. May want to buy a piece a little bit larger than the 12" x 12" square that you are thinking about. More to play around with in case of mistakes.