Chill Filter Jacketed Tank Questions

[Patio29Dadio]

I have a couple of Letina 1200 liter variable lid jacketed forklift tanks.  They get a lot of use in the distillery.  Getting ready for our first chill-filtering and just realized that I am not quite sure about the connections.   There are two 3/4" male FTP ports at the top of the jacket, and one 1/2".   My plan was/is to run glycol from my chiller output to one of the top ports and then output from the second 3/4" port on the tank back to the input of the chiller loop.  The bottom is just a drain.

The problem is that we use these tanks for production and don't really want to use them with glycol in the jacket.   I also do not want to just dump it as it is expensive.   How do others deal with this?  Do you actually drain off the glycol in the jacket into a container to pour back into the chiller glycol tank?  Seems like a pain.  What I am I missing?

[starcat]

You want to port Glycol into the bottom rather than the top cooling port. Bottom in, Top out. IN your case I might install some valves on the glycol ports, so you can drain " most " of the glycol back and put it back in your chiller well. A small amount left in the jacket will not hurt anything. If the jacket is full you can get destructive hydrostatic expansion if things are heated up. The ideal situation is not to be moving things around all the time and to have jacketed vessels as permanent fixtures. Any time you are porting to and disconnecting from your glycol loop there will always be small losses. It is possible to use quick connect fittings.

Its always a good idea to have spare glycol on hand for emergencies related to things that were not planned. Some small submersible utility pumps are useful to have around when dealing with lots of glycol issues. Little Giant makes a decent one.

 

Star