Idea for cheap dwc chiller, thoughts?

Diysoulgrower · Jan 30, 2020

I'm not really running into issues on my dwc but I always like to have a plan in my pocket just in case. I was thinking should I need to chill my res I could purchase a 12v wireless chest cooler, a water pump, and bucket to keep water in, put inside the cooler. Then put the pump into the water in the cooler, pumping cold water through a SS wort chiller placed into the res, running back into the cooler on a constant loop, turned on/off via an aquarium temperature controller. The cooler comes with an adapter for household use. Does anyone see any flaws in this idea? The whole thing would cost about 120.00 and you could add more pumps into the cooler res for individual reservoirs, should you need to.

Diysoulgrower · Jan 30, 2020

Iceless** not wireless

FourthCity · Jan 30, 2020

It would not be powerful enough to reduce temperatures they work by keeping heat out of the cooler which has to be closed to be effective. By constantly pumping warm water into the cooler you are basically expecting it to be functional while open.

Diysoulgrower · Jan 30, 2020

FourthCity said:
It would not be powerful enough to reduce temperatures they work by keeping heat out of the cooler which has to be closed to be effective. By constantly pumping warm water into the cooler you are basically expecting it to be functional while open.

I would run holes through one of the walls and seal them with expanding foam

MIGrampaUSA · Jan 30, 2020

FourthCity said:
It would not be powerful enough to reduce temperatures they work by keeping heat out of the cooler which has to be closed to be effective. By constantly pumping warm water into the cooler you are basically expecting it to be functional while open.

Actually, he's got me thinking. This really isn't that difficult. Drill an entrance and exit into your cooler. A small freezer would work better. Here's the secret. Small flexible copper tubing. A box of it isn't cheap but it's already coiled. The smaller the ID, and the more coils you have of your water circulating through your freezer, the better chilling will occur. You must seal where the copper tubing comes through the door. I think I would epoxy it in place, and then run silicone around the epoxy to make sure you have an air tight seal. Attach your "in" hose to the piece of copper tube coming out of the freezer with a hose clamp. Repeat for your "out" hose. This can be done. However, due to the price of copper, I don't know how cost effective this would be. You might find you could buy 2 hydroponic chillers for the cost of a box of copper. You could substitute the coiled copper for a car type radiator. Or an oil cooler, etc

Diysoulgrower · Jan 30, 2020

MIGrampaUSA said:
Actually, he's got me thinking. This really isn't that difficult. Drill an entrance and exit into your cooler. A small freezer would work better. Here's the secret. Small flexible copper tubing. A box of it isn't cheap but it's already coiled. The smaller the ID, and the more coils you have of your water circulating through your freezer, the better chilling will occur. You must seal where the copper tubing comes through the door. I think I would epoxy it in place, and then run silicone around the epoxy to make sure you have an air tight seal. Attach your "in" hose to the piece of copper tube coming out of the freezer with a hose clamp. Repeat for your "out" hose. This can be done. However, due to the price of copper, I don't know how cost effective this would be. You might find you could buy 2 hydroponic chillers for the cost of a box of copper. You could substitute the coiled copper for a car type radiator. Or an oil cooler, etc

I started this idea thinking about using my mini fridge to hold the cold water, I dont want to mess up the fridge just in case but I figured a cooler would have no lines in the side due to all the hardware being on one side. It wouldnt pump the rdwc rez water it would pump water that is being chilled in the cooler through a wort chiller placed in the rdwc res

MIGrampaUSA · Jan 30, 2020

Diysoulgrower said:
I started this idea thinking about using my mini fridge to hold the cold water, I dont want to mess up the fridge just in case but I figured a cooler would have no lines in the side due to all the hardware being on one side. It wouldnt pump the rdwc rez water it would pump water that is being chilled in the cooler through a wort chiller placed in the rdwc res

What I can say is there are more than one way you can do this. However you decide you want to approach it, the more you spread out the water through whatever method you choose, the more cooling you will have. The secret is making sure everything is air tight. You can use pumps, timers, "normally closed" solenoid valves ... keep it simple or make it fancy. You can pump into a reservoir inside a freezer or cooler and using a cycle timer, pump water, let it sit and chill, etc.

FourthCity · Jan 30, 2020

Diysoulgrower said:
I would run holes through one of the walls and seal them with expanding foam

Your missing my point, by constantly pumping warm water through it can't do its job. Its not about you sealing the water lines, if you had a completely sealed, closed cooler, and you exchange warm beers for cold beers via teleportation faster than the cooler can chill them, then before you know it the cooler will be full of warm beers, and in the case of the reservoirs you are not even starting with cold water. You could make this work but the coolers would have to exchange water with the reservoirs at set times after they have had a chance to cool the water they are holding, it wont work with a constant flow. The biggest issue I see is that I think you would need the capacity of the coolers to be equal to or greater than the capacity of your reservoirs to see any useful results, which would quickly send the costs higher than a traditional chiller. If you want to try something cheap and somewhat experimental, but that already works on proven science, I would use a radiator from a car with an electric fan and pump your water through that. If you google there are even algorithms to size the radiator and the amount of airflow from the fan based on the number of gallons per minute being pumped through it and the ambient temp of the water. You could probably get all the parts you need from a junkyard, less the water pump, for under $50.

MIGrampaUSA · Jan 30, 2020

FourthCity said:
Your missing my point, by constantly pumping warm water through it can't do its job. Its not about you sealing the water lines, if you had a completely sealed, closed cooler, and you exchange warm beers for cold beers via teleportation faster than the cooler can chill them, then before you know it the cooler will be full of warm beers, and in the case of the reservoirs you are not even starting with cold water. You could make this work but the coolers would have to exchange water with the reservoirs at set times after they have had a chance to cool the water they are holding, it wont work with a constant flow. The biggest issue I see is that I think you would need the capacity of the coolers to be equal to or greater than the capacity of your reservoirs to see any useful results, which would quickly send the costs higher than a traditional chiller. If you want to try something cheap and somewhat experimental but that already works on proven science I would use a radiator from a car with an electric fan and pump your water through that. If you google there are even algorithms to size the radiator and the amount of airflow from the fan based on the number of gallons per minute being pumped through it and the ambient temp of the water. You could probably get all the parts you need from a junkyard, less the water pump, for under $50.

The introduction of timers and in the case of the reservoir, picture it more like a manifold. My idea involves controlled flow to drop temps 5-10 degrees. Pump kicks on, moves water to be chilled. Shuts off. Timer starts it's count down. Pump kicks on, moves water on down the line. Constant flow cooling can also be done ... at a much higher cost of course.

Where I work, we call this kind of information exchange "collaborating." I spend a lot of time on the road. A typical road trip would have a mechanical engineer, a software engineer, an electrician, and a couple of mechanics. We do this type of stuff all the time to try to work through problems we see in the field.

Let's help him iron out the design to a working concept. You're absolutely correct about constant water circulation through the cooler. He's running RDWC I think he said. Add Y fitting to his nute reservoir. Add normally closed solenoid. Timer kicks on, valve opens and pump turns on. Moves liquid to be cooled. Pump shuts off. Solenoid valve closes. Timer starts its count down. How much time? 1/2 hr - hr .... testing works that out.

Or use a temperature switch instead of a timer.

MIGrampaUSA · Jan 30, 2020

I'll be honest and draw back to a post I made earlier ... can be done but is it cost effective? Probably not for most people. A mental tally of parts costs suggests he would be better off buying something already made ....

FourthCity · Jan 30, 2020

MIGrampaUSA said:
The introduction of timers and in the case of the reservoir, picture it more like a manifold. My idea involves controlled flow to drop temps 5-10 degrees. Pump kicks on, moves water to be chilled. Shuts off. Timer starts it's count down. Pump kicks on, moves water on down the line. Constant flow cooling can also be done ... at a much higher cost of course.

Where I work, we call this kind of information exchange "collaborating." I spend a lot of time on the road. A typical road trip would have a mechanical engineer, a software engineer, an electrician, and a couple of mechanics. We do this type of stuff all the time to try to work through problems we see in the field.

Let's help him iron out the design to a working concept. You're absolutely correct about constant water circulation through the cooler. He's running RDWC I think he said. Add Y fitting to his nute reservoir. Add normally closed solenoid. Timer kicks on, valve opens and pump turns on. Moves liquid to be cooled. Pump shuts off. Solenoid valve closes. Timer starts its count down. How much time? 1/2 hr - hr .... testing works that out.

Or use a temperature switch instead of a timer.

We are on the same page about the setup, not so much the effectiveness. It's not about being unwilling to collaborate or help, from my point of view I think I am. The op asked if anyone saw any flaws, I did, and I did not want to encourage spending $120 on something with questionable merits.

MIGrampaUSA · Jan 30, 2020

FourthCity said:
We are on the same page about the setup, not so much the effectiveness. It's not about being unwilling to collaborate or help, from my point of view I think I am. The op asked if anyone saw any flaws, I did, and I did not want to encourage spending $120 on something with questionable merits.

I think we've drawn the same conclusion.

I think I would freeze 2 liter bottles filled with water and cycle those in and out instead of spending money

bunkerking · Jan 30, 2020

DIY Mini-fridge chiller

I picked up a mini-fridge on Craigslist a while back for cheap with the thought of trying to make a chiller out of it. I finally got it done and it has been running for about a week now. Between the hot weather a few weeks back and my lights, I was having trouble keeping my temp down below 82...

www.reeffrontiers.com

Metzen's Mini Fridge Glycol Chiller Conversion

I'm transitioning from a fermentation chamber to a glycol cooling system using a converted mini fridge with a freezer compartment as a chill source. I had read a few comments on this approach on these forums but nothing that provided much detail on build or examples. I'll keep this thread...

www.homebrewtalk.com

maybe something like this.

bunkerking · Jan 30, 2020

MIGrampaUSA said:
I think we've drawn the same conclusion.

I think I would freeze 2 liter bottles filled with water and cycle those in and out instead of spending money

Correct me if im wrong but... Cant you add salt to the bottles to lower the freezing point and get the bottles colder? (last longer)

MIGrampaUSA · Jan 30, 2020

bunkerking said:
DIY Mini-fridge chiller

I picked up a mini-fridge on Craigslist a while back for cheap with the thought of trying to make a chiller out of it. I finally got it done and it has been running for about a week now. Between the hot weather a few weeks back and my lights, I was having trouble keeping my temp down below 82...

www.reeffrontiers.com

Metzen's Mini Fridge Glycol Chiller Conversion

I'm transitioning from a fermentation chamber to a glycol cooling system using a converted mini fridge with a freezer compartment as a chill source. I had read a few comments on this approach on these forums but nothing that provided much detail on build or examples. I'll keep this thread...

www.homebrewtalk.com

maybe something like this.

That's along the idea I was thinking. However, the "OP" wants to chill his reservoir using a chiller there. I think he would get more if he directly chilled his nutes. However if I really wanted to keep costs down. 1 and 2 liter bottles of frozen water would do that rather cheaply.

MIGrampaUSA · Jan 30, 2020

bunkerking said:
Correct me if im wrong but... Cant you add salt to the bottles to lower the freezing point and get the bottles colder? (last longer)

Can't correct you because you're NOT wrong. Same concept for making ice cream in one of those old crank ice cream makers. Add water, ice, and salt. Why salt? To drop the temp of the ice water.

Mytwhyt · Jan 31, 2020

Been working on the heat problem myself.. I finished two new igloo grow buckets with attached 36x36" scrog screens.. By eliminating the heat producing electric water pumps, I think I can keep the temps down to a manageable amount.. This is a proof of concept grow, I have a 1/0hp chiller I can fall back on.... I filled the system yesterday, and drained it 2 hours later.. 2 leaks, one because of an assumption on my part, the other was forgetting to fix a problem with the reservoir.. I'll post my progress later today..

Two recurlating Igloo grows, aka Waterloos

I did this single igloo grow with an igloo as the reservoir.. Worked great, just a pia changing the frozen water bottles.. This will be the same, without, the frozen water bottles.. The screens will be 24x36" this time.. High yield, fast turn around is what I aim for. 4 months is the goal.. I...

www.thcfarmer.com

Hellbent60 · Feb 10, 2025

I know this post is 5 yrs old, this is how Ikeep my temps cool. Buy a used water cooler off kijiji or facebook market place ( $15- $35 ), one that you would normally put a 5 gal jug in the top. Now tear it apart so that you are left with the compressor and the cooling coil. Some of the cooling coils are coated in a protective plastic and some are not. If the one you have doesn't have a protective coating on it just wrap a plastic bag around the coil so you don't get any oxidation in your nutrients. Place the coil directly into your nutrient reservoir. Buy a device that will monitor your water temp. I use the Inkbird ITC-308 ($50). Plug the compressor into the cooling plug on the device and set your water temps at desired temp. I set mine at 67 F and have the cooling compressor kick on a +2 deg. I hope this helps people.

Idea for cheap dwc chiller, thoughts?

Idea for cheap dwc chiller, thoughts?

Diysoulgrower

Diysoulgrower

FourthCity

Diysoulgrower

MIGrampaUSA

Diysoulgrower

MIGrampaUSA

FourthCity

MIGrampaUSA

MIGrampaUSA

FourthCity

MIGrampaUSA

bunkerking

DIY Mini-fridge chiller

Metzen's Mini Fridge Glycol Chiller Conversion

bunkerking

MIGrampaUSA

DIY Mini-fridge chiller

Metzen's Mini Fridge Glycol Chiller Conversion

MIGrampaUSA

Mytwhyt

Two recurlating Igloo grows, aka Waterloos

Hellbent60

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Privacy & Transparency