Plate chillers

I'm thinking of trading in the immersion chiller for a plate chiller. Right now it's between the 40 plate cowboy chiller and the Shirron chiller any thoughts or recommendations. This will be gravity feed for the time being.

Check out this dudadiesel page. Even if you don't buy from them, they provide some good information on plate chilers in general, and you can look at the different plate count & length configurations with their respective cooling "ratings" to get some ideas on what might work.

And a lot of what will work is dependent on your water supply temperature - and flow rate (volume/time). Lower temperatures/higher rates can get away with shorter chillers/fewer plates.

fwiw, I have a DD 30-long (B3-23A 30) and with my well water running in the low 50s pretty much year round I can drop from post-boil down to mid-60s in one pass as fast as I can get the wort through the chiller...

Cheers!

+1 for the dudadiesel.

I looked at a plate chiller, but I would have to change over too many things to go that route. We've got a well that puts out 55F water, and at this time of year, that lets my 25' copper immersion chiller get the wort <70F in about 15 minutes. That'll do until something changes.