When considering purchasing a new heat exchanger, for a new or existing brewery, there are a few things that you will need to provide so that it can be sized appropriately. Having the incorrect information, like your flow rates or ground water temperatures, can drastically affect the pricing of the unit and extend knockout times and production, costing you thousands of dollars. Accurate information is crucial in setting up a smooth brewery operation. While the heat exchanger is a small piece of the puzzle, in the large scheme of production, it does however play an extremely vital role to producing great beer.

The quality of your beer can be directly affected by how quickly you can cool your beer wort down to yeast pitching temperatures. Finding out your desired knockout time and your capabilities to do so are a key aspect. First, start off by finding out what you have available for water. There are sites and charts that provide local ground water temps throughout the year, this will help you know what to expect in the summer months. It is best to size the unit with the worst-case scenario water temperatures, to prevent extended knockout times during the summer. In the cooler months you can always cut back on your water flow rates to get you to your knockout temps. Next, if you are using ground water you will want to do a flow test to know what your max water flowrate is. You can do this by purchasing a flowmeter or by doing a 5-gallon bucket test. If you are using a Cold Liquor Tank you should be able to contact your brewery systems integrator and based off your pump sizes they should be able to provide you with max flow rates, if you don’t already know. Once you know your water flow rate and temperature you then can decide if you will need a dual stage heat exchanger with a glycol section to finish the knockout. This is purely based off the fact that your ground water temps exceed your final knockout temps. If a glycol section is to be added it is important to know what the chillers capacity is. It is recommended that you speak with your chiller manufacturer to see what the BTU load it can support, along with the flow rates.

Once you have collected your water temps and flow rates and have figured out if you will be needing a dual section heat exchanger, for additional cooling, it is all down hill from there. Thermaline has integrated a heat exchanger sizing calculator on their website that allows you to enter all your data that you have collected and provide you with a size, and the cost of the unit you will be needing. If there are questions about how to size your heat exchanger for your process or what may be the most efficient way to use your heat exchanger you can always reach out to Thermaline who is standing by to help.