What % of tanks in cellar are actively cooling?

[jasimmon]

I have been working with coolfit on the piping and they say we are right on the line between two different pipe diameters. The question was ask how many of the tanks will be cooling at a given time, that is jackets open. I can't see this being a 100% but have no idea what realistic estimate is. If it is 75% or under they can go with the smaller pipe and save us money. If it is 75% or higher we have to step up the size. Do you have any idea the answer? We do 60% lagers so hold at 30 for a few weeks.

[dfalken]

I have been working with coolfit on the piping and they say we are right on the line between two different pipe diameters. The question was ask how many of the tanks will be cooling at a given time, that is jackets open. I can't see this being a 100% but have no idea what realistic estimate is. If it is 75% or under they can go with the smaller pipe and save us money. If it is 75% or higher we have to step up the size. Do you have any idea the answer? We do 60% lagers so hold at 30 for a few weeks.

Just figure out what percentage of the time in your fermentation cycle you are actively cooling. Say your cycle is 30 days and you fully open the jackets after 10 days, then you would be actively cooling 20 out of 30 days or 66.66% of the time. If you had 30 fermenters 20 would have the jackets fully open and 10 wouldn't. If you had 6 fermenters, 4 would be fully open and 2 wouldn't on average at any point in time.

[Fullcourt]

I sympathize with your desire to save money, but going with the larger pipe size will allow for expansion in the future. Either more tanks or replacing smaller tanks with a larger size.
You don't want to have to redo the cooling system just to add tanks.

[BrewinLou]

High side we run open about 2/3 capacity. If you ever plan to expand go bigger. If not EVER go smaller.