Plate cooler.

[lazy farmer]

Forgive my basic questions.
upto this spring we have been using borehole water to run the plate cooler alongside an ice bank.
however continuing problems with the borehole water having too much iron in it causing problems within the plate cooler had meant them only lasting two seasons before needing changing has meant a change over to mains.
this is obviously an expensive exercise as the water currently only gets used for wash down. Which could be done with borehole water.
my question is could we set up a dedicated tank with mains water in it that could be used and recycled instead? We currently have a 20,000 tank not doing anything. Or will the water heat up too much making it too inefficient?
no doubt there’s an obvious answer.
Thanks in advance.

 

[frederick]

Forgive my basic questions.
upto this spring we have been using borehole water to run the plate cooler alongside an ice bank.
however continuing problems with the borehole water having too much iron in it causing problems within the plate cooler had meant them only lasting two seasons before needing changing has meant a change over to mains.
this is obviously an expensive exercise as the water currently only gets used for wash down. Which could be done with borehole water.
my question is could we set up a dedicated tank with mains water in it that could be used and recycled instead? We currently have a 20,000 tank not doing anything. Or will the water heat up too much making it too inefficient?
no doubt there’s an obvious answer.
Thanks in advance.

Can't see that working. Your going to have a lot of water at 18degrees or more. It won't cool before next milking. Only any good if you can then send this warm water on to other things that would have used mains, but would like that tank to empty at least once a day.

Rough maths your plate cooler is using about 6 cube a day 300 days. £3 a cube approx £5500 a year. Put borehole water in at 1000 a year. That leaves you with about 2.5k you could spend on stopping the water messing up the plate cooler.
Could you not do something simple with a pump to dump any acid wash waste water through the plates to clean the iron side.

Borehole water might even be a bit cooler than mains so more efficient.

 

[onesiedale]

silly question, but how does an excess of iron actually lead to the plate cooler needing replacing?
As said above, a simple diversion arrangement to send wash water though, and subsequantly another diversionr dumping to waste should work ok.

 

[pappuller]

Forgive my basic questions.
upto this spring we have been using borehole water to run the plate cooler alongside an ice bank.
however continuing problems with the borehole water having too much iron in it causing problems within the plate cooler had meant them only lasting two seasons before needing changing has meant a change over to mains.
this is obviously an expensive exercise as the water currently only gets used for wash down. Which could be done with borehole water.
my question is could we set up a dedicated tank with mains water in it that could be used and recycled instead? We currently have a 20,000 tank not doing anything. Or will the water heat up too much making it too inefficient?
no doubt there’s an obvious answer.
Thanks in advance.

Oxalic acid will help manage your iron issues in your borehole, we flush our borehole every 4 weeks with oxalic acid and it cleans the pump and lines , our borehole water is used for cattle drinking, plant washing and tank wash after it has been through the cleaning plant, one of the best investments we've made here tbf

 

[rustyspring]

We have a double plate cooler and on the side that should be the mains side the water circulates continuously from a fruit juice container through the plate cooler and then back through the washdown water tank via a coiled water pipe in the wash down tank. Milk comes in the tank at 10/11 deg C.

 

[Wisconsonian]

silly question, but how does an excess of iron actually lead to the plate cooler needing replacing?
As said above, a simple diversion arrangement to send wash water though, and subsequantly another diversionr dumping to waste should work ok.

Yes, is your plate plugging up with iron deposits? or is it rusting through from the iron? or the acid to remove the iron?

 

[In the pit]

Would one of these be better

 

[dinderleat]

Could you not just use the ice bank water and not use the bore hole stuff if it’s that much if an issue?

 

[frederick]

Could you not just use the ice bank water and not use the bore hole stuff if it’s that much if an issue?

Cooling 1,000 litres of milk from 37°C to 15°C involves removing 25.5kWh of heat from the.

So the electrical cost to cool 1000 litres is £6.12 at 24 p kWh. So mains water at £3 a cube (just a guess I don't buy any) is still a better bet plus it reduces the risk of warm milk if there is a mechanical failure. Loosing a tank of milk due to it being hot will cost thousands.

 

[upnortheast]

Could you not just use the ice bank water and not use the bore hole stuff if it’s that much if an issue?

There will be a cost cooling the ice bank water

Have you costed putting proper filters in to remove the iron from the borehole water ?
Then no maintainance on your plate cooler & probably less iron crud in other parts of your system

As @frederick says above the sums show £2500 / year benefit using borehole water.
Should be a decent ROC doing the job right

 

[frederick]

There will be a cost cooling the ice bank water

Have you costed putting proper filters in to remove the iron from the borehole water ?
Then no maintainance on your plate cooler & probably less iron crud in other parts of your system

As @frederick says above the sums show £2500 / year benefit using borehole water.
Should be a decent ROC doing the job right

You might need nearer 2 cube water per cube if milk to get best cooling.

 

[George Mitchell]

Change it to a tube cooler, not just as efficient but full bore flow for both water and milk, and zero maintenance. Could have more than one in series if you wanted. Probably plenty of packo ones about. We had a 2 stage one when milking in the parlour, ice water and borehole, tank was cool before parlour finished washing. Single stage one on the robots, but put far more water through/l of milk, which goes to drinking troughs and volume washer, nothing wasted

 

[O'Reilly]

Can't see that working. Your going to have a lot of water at 18degrees or more. It won't cool before next milking. Only any good if you can then send this warm water on to other things that would have used mains, but would like that tank to empty at least once a day.

Rough maths your plate cooler is using about 6 cube a day 300 days. £3 a cube approx £5500 a year. Put borehole water in at 1000 a year. That leaves you with about 2.5k you could spend on stopping the water messing up the plate cooler.
Could you not do something simple with a pump to dump any acid wash waste water through the plates to clean the iron side.

Borehole water might even be a bit cooler than mains so more efficient.

Should only be £2 per cube for mains. On the other hand, replacing a plate cooler isn't cheap.

 

[O'Reilly]

Forgive my basic questions.
upto this spring we have been using borehole water to run the plate cooler alongside an ice bank.
however continuing problems with the borehole water having too much iron in it causing problems within the plate cooler had meant them only lasting two seasons before needing changing has meant a change over to mains.
this is obviously an expensive exercise as the water currently only gets used for wash down. Which could be done with borehole water.
my question is could we set up a dedicated tank with mains water in it that could be used and recycled instead? We currently have a 20,000 tank not doing anything. Or will the water heat up too much making it too inefficient?
no doubt there’s an obvious answer.
Thanks in advance.

You supply Barbers? Ask Mr Barber how they clean plate coolers, think they have a different take on it.

 

[Kiwi Pete]

Forgive my basic questions.
upto this spring we have been using borehole water to run the plate cooler alongside an ice bank.
however continuing problems with the borehole water having too much iron in it causing problems within the plate cooler had meant them only lasting two seasons before needing changing has meant a change over to mains.
this is obviously an expensive exercise as the water currently only gets used for wash down. Which could be done with borehole water.
my question is could we set up a dedicated tank with mains water in it that could be used and recycled instead? We currently have a 20,000 tank not doing anything. Or will the water heat up too much making it too inefficient?
no doubt there’s an obvious answer.
Thanks in advance.

We had 3 tanks (100,000 l) to get the necessary volume to have cool water right through milking (750 cows 54 bail) for the cooler.

Main benefit aside from reducing water use was having a decent reserve for emergencies, like when you show up in the morning and the other tanks are mysteriously empty as a pump's tripped or cows have smashed their trough.

 

[DairyNerd]

Just a related thought: do you get many cow problems which could be attributed to mineral imbalence? Milk fever, RFM's, dopey calves? I think iron is antagonistic towards many other minerals; at least calcium and copper from memory but possibly others.

 

[Blue.]

silly question, but how does an excess of iron actually lead to the plate cooler needing replacing?
As said above, a simple diversion arrangement to send wash water though, and subsequantly another diversionr dumping to waste should work ok.

This^^^
Only needs x2 three way taps,once washing switch the taps so the wash water goes through the water side and returns to the wash trough.

 

[frederick]

This^^^
Only needs x2 three way taps,once washing switch the taps so the wash water goes through the water side and returns to the wash trough.

Needs a completely separate circuit. I would be very wary about redirecting the milk side to the water side because that also means the water side could accidentally be left open to the milk side and instead of 1000 litres of milk you get 3000 litres of white water.

 

[lazy farmer]

Should only be £2 per cube for mains. On the other hand, replacing a plate cooler isn't cheap.

Currently 2.35 a cube here with a 20%+!price rise coming.

Needs a completely separate circuit. I would be very wary about redirecting the milk side to the water side because that also means the water side could accidentally be left open to the milk side and instead of 1000 litres of milk you get 3000 litres of white water.

Can easily see that happening here.

 

[lazy farmer]

silly question, but how does an excess of iron actually lead to the plate cooler needing replacing?
As said above, a simple diversion arrangement to send wash water though, and subsequantly another diversionr dumping to waste should work ok.

That has got me thinking. Our cleaning which was once done by borehole water is now done with mains perhaps that was the problem on the milk side rather than the water. Which other than being orange was clean.