Cooling during fermentation

[billvelek]

I'm always striving to improve my brewing, and would like to lower the fermentation temperature of my ales to about 64F/18C, which I understand is the best temp for most. (I know ... there are plenty of brewers making good beer at 72F, etc., but I still want to try the lower temp.)

I have a 5-gallon plastic conical fermenter mounted in an insulated cabinet cooled with ice, but I'm not satisfied with its performance. I am therefore considering a peltier device; two of them are shown here -- http://www.coolworksinc.com/iceprobe_pr ... allery.htm -- to chill a 12 gallon conical, achieving up to a 25F drop from ambient temperature. However, I do not want to cut holes in the side of my conical, plus there is no room inside the cooling cabinet for side-mounting the peltiers. But the probe on the peltiers is too short to reach the wort when going through the lid. I am therefore researching whether a heat pipe, driven by the peltier, will work; the heat pipe would essentially be a long probe, with about twice the surface area of the IceProbe which is already advertised as being sufficient for this purpose. If anyone has any info or knowledge about peltiers, heatpipes (or thermodynamics), and/or experience with fermenters made from copper, I'd like to discuss this with you, please.

Before anyone starts suggesting alternatives, let me say up front:
1. Evaporative cooling is not an option;
2. A dedicated refrigerator or converted freezer is not an option;
3. I'm not interested in cooling by recirculating any liquids (glycol, cold water, etc.) because such a system is actually more complex than what I'm trying to do, and would require a pump as well as a means of refrigerating; and
4. I know ... I have too much time on my hands. Hey, I'd rather be thinking and talking about brewing equipment and new ideas than watching television.

Cheers, Bill Velek
Join "HomeBrewers" international grid-computing team and help mankind by donating spare computer power for medical research such as cancer; we're in the top 7%, and we beat the MillerTime team: http://tinyurl.com/b7ofs The life that your computer can help save ... might be someone you love.

[Speyedr]

You may want to check with the B3 guys on this. I read somewhere on their site about a converted keg they used to try just what you're talking about, and that it didn't work out. I don't know much more about it, but if you e-mailed any one of them I'm sure they would be helpful.

Good Luck!

Rob

[Danno]

I've worked around heat pipes a bit but I'm not very familiar with Peltier devices. I don't see why it wouldn't work. Heat pipes are very efficient. Intel used them on their processors at one time. I don't know if they still do. They wouldn't use them unless they were. They are also very common is the plastics idustry (where I work) to improve temperature consistency across hot manifold systems (they prevent hot spots).

What kind of questions do you have?

[billvelek]

You may want to check with the B3 guys on this.

... snip ...

Thanks, Rob. But who are the "B3 guys"?

Bill Velek

[billvelek]

I've worked around heat pipes a bit ... snip ...

What kind of questions do you have?

If they are oriented in a vertical position, will a heat pipe work _efficiently_ without a wick? The reason I ask is that I read something to suggest that they can still work without one, but nothing was mentioned about efficiency. I can't recall the source, but it was saying, essentially, that the wick is to permit return of condensate to the heat source when aligned horizontally. Since condensate will run down the wall by gravity if the pipe is vertical, is there a need for a wick. The reason I ask is that I'm tempted to make a simple heat pipe by myself to check into this if I can't find a source for one at a very reasonable price.

How important is the internal pressure? I.e., does the refrigerant need to be under a vacuum to work well? If so, that probably wipes out any prospect of making one myself.

Thanks for any info.

Bill Velek

[Danno]

I think one would work efficiently if mounted vertically if the right liquid was chosen (proper boiling point for the liquid being cooled and with the appropriate heat pipe design). The wick is designed to allow virtually any alignment of the pipe. It uses capilary action to bring the liquid to the warmer surface for evaporation.

The internal pressure and the liquid are the key to making a heat pipe work with your system. Selecting them is way out of my league. Here's a couple of links I found:

http://www.benchtest.com/heat_pipe1.html - Homemade one
http://www.thermacore.com/hpt.htm

I was surpissed to see how many hits were tied to CPU cooling. Even Ebay offers up a handfull of CPU coolers based on heat pipes.

[JAWSFREE]

You may want to check with the B3 guys on this.

... snip ...

Thanks, Rob. But who are the "B3 guys"?

Bill Velek

Beer,Beer,and More Beer....http://www.Morebeer.com

[Speyedr]

Thanks for clearing that up for me Jaws..
Also, I was mistaken. Tehy ahd done some work with TEC chips... I got confused... AGAIN...