Glass carboy vs. plastic bucket

radiodome21 said:

My kit came with a plastic bucket and a bottling bucket. No interest in a carboy. Buckets are easier to carry and clean. As long I hear activity in the airlock I know I'm good. Since I now keg my beer I'm going to use the bottling bucket as another fermenter.

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This got me thinking... Scary, I know. Hahahahaha
But, could you use the spigot on the bottling bucket for transferring into a bottling bucket.... Or would that not work by sucking up trub?
Seems it would be easier than siphoning from fermenter to bottling bucket on bottle day.
Please advise. Thanks

AnOldUR said:

Unless you scale your recipe up to 7-8 gallons and use two 5 gallon carboys.


hmmm . . . I always thought that stuff was yeast. Transfer to secondary a few days after fermentation ends and I've got plenty of fresh yeast for my next batch with no need for a starter.

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Well, the 5 gallon carboy holds just that amount...5 gallons. Okay, okay, 5 gallons PLUS 4 cups. I know as I have checked. Now, depending on the beer ingredients and yeast the trub level will vary. I have measured .75 gallons of trub on the bottom of my fermentor in one batch...plus leaving a little beer behind gets you close to 1 gallon of volume not used for bottling.

Yes, it is yeast...and settled hops and what ever else got past your screen. A lot of folks don't rack onto a "primary yeast cake", so..it is waste. I wash my yeast to use again.

A 6.5 gallon carboy will allow enough room in it so you can get a full 5 gallons bottled. I'm pretty new at this, but I'm getting 52 bottles regularly, even with racking to a 5 gallon secondary.

ScottageCheese said:

This got me thinking... Scary, I know. Hahahahaha
But, could you use the spigot on the bottling bucket for transferring into a bottling bucket.... Or would that not work by sucking up trub?
Seems it would be easier than siphoning from fermenter to bottling bucket on bottle day.
Please advise. Thanks

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Be careful of splashing and aerating your beer...it causes nasty flavors. Siphoning is nice and slow...easy to control the flow too.

Bucket for me. I do not do secondaries. I just let my beer ferment and brighten in the fermenter until it goes in the bottling bucket or if I'm lazy right into the bottles with sugar tabs.

bosco

I have 2 buckets, a 5 gallon BB and glass carboys in 5, 6 and 6.5 gallon sizes. I use both buckets and the 6.5 as primaries and always rack my beers into a secondary to clear them or to dry hop in. My 6 gallon is currently holding a Pomegranate/Cranberry Sour for next Fall, I will probably buy more buckets, because the glass carboys are difficult to move around without disturbing any trub in them.

Mouse

CA_Mouse said:

I will probably buy more buckets, because the glass carboys are difficult to move around without disturbing any trub in them.

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Milk crates . . .


Just because you can't see what's going on in a bucket doesn't mean it isn't happening. Actually the flexibility of a bucket make disrupting the trub more likely to happen.

Every few months I keep coming back and searching this question. I like the bucket because it is first and foremost cheap. It is also much lighter than glass. It is probably the main reason I don't at least have one glass carboy. Been working on my upper body, but I think I would probably have nightmares of broken glass and beer all over the stairs between the kitchen and the basement. Buckets have than nice built in handle and can take some dings. It's also nice that you can reach in and easily clean everything. It probably doesn't have the life span of a unshattered glass carboy, because no matter how careful you are when washing,get tiny scratches and I assume eventually enough stuff will get stuck there and cause problems. One thing I wish is that I could see the beer. That could be solved by using better bottles, but then those are more expensive than buckets. All give an take. I'll probably stick with buckets for the time being.

I'm a glass carboy man. I used to use buckets, but the occasional infection steered me toward glass. My original plastic primary is long gone, but I'm still using my original glass carboy from six years ago. Once you have had to throw out two buckets, the carboy makes better economic sense.

Transporting is easy, as the gentleman above posted milk crates work ideally. Cleaning is also easy. A quick scrub with a carboy brush and then a soak with PBW and it is sparkling clean. I like how I can verify there is no residue with glass, plastic I was never sure.

I use 6.5 gal carboys for 5 gal batches. Only had one blow off when I pitched an insane amount of yeast by accident. Never an issue otherwise.

I had to find a use for my secondaries when I stopped using them for that purpose. Glad I did... YMMV and to each their own though.

I use them all for various purposes. I start all of my wine in plastic buckets before moving them to glass secondaries for clarification and aging...some get to age in wooden barrels. Have tried a couple different brands of buckets and lids and have never been happy with the lid durability: they crack after X amount of uses. I never put my beer into the buckets. I used some Better Bottles in some collaboration brewing...but really don't care for them. That said...there is no question that glass is fragile and has the potential to break and slice one up! If you don't have the strength to properly manhandle a 5 or 6.5 gallon glass carboy, you may want to stick with plastic. I know a lot of people don't like the bother of a secondary...but, IMHO, this cuts corners on the quality. Depends what you want out of your final brew. A few styles may be better suited to skipping steps, others not so much.

8 Gallon Brewcraft Fermentation Buckets > Everything

You can brew pretty much anything in them and never need a blowoff, some RIS's with certain yeast may get a bit crazy but thats rare.

I rarely use my carboys now, really only use them for long term aging for things like Ciders or other things that take 6+ months since I keg.

I love my 6.5 gallon glass. They're only around 50lbs full. I curl that with one arm. When they're wet they can be slick but you just gotta be careful. I like that I can see in and even judge clarity. I love that don't have to worry about scratching them.

m3n00b said:

I love my 6.5 gallon glass. They're only around 50lbs full.

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I like carboys too, and a bucket is still 43-44.
People say carboys are so heavy, but they forget most of the weight is the beer, not the container.

kitchenbeer said:

I like carboys too, and a bucket is still 43-44.
People say carboys are so heavy, but they forget most of the weight is the beer, not the container.

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:rockin:

I would think it comes down to cost and space, at least for me. Right now I use my brew bucket with a spigot for fermentation, and for bottling. I didn't want to purchase a carboy for 2 major reasons. They cost more than the bucket, by a lot. And I knew I could snatch my dad's carboy since he can't really do much brewing lately (and his back is bad enough so carrying it empty can really kill him).

If my carboy is empty I'll use it to rack and clarify a little and get the trub out of the bucket so its nice and clean for bottling. Otherwise I'm going to mostly be using it for aging of barley wines, belgian styles, meads, ciders of the sort.

I think the best thing is to have both around, but the way I always looked at it is the big brew buckets with spigots are best for beginners (and, if it turns out you don't like brewing, then its not like you invested a butt load on all nice equipment).

I do things a little bit backwards but with good reason. IF I'm going to be dry-hopping I will use the carboy for primary, then bucket for secondary so I don't have to deal with trying to get a bunch of hops out of a carboy. If there is no secondary, I will just use a carboy.

I may be over simplyfing here, but has anyone thought about putting some of their wort into a clear plastic soda bottle? I realize the rate of fermentation may be different, but it will give you an easy and
cheap fermenter. by the way, leave the soda lids slightly loose or you will find out what a plastic bottle bomb sounds like.

You could use either. If your planning on fermenting over a month, then I would use the carboy as the secondary

i use glass carboys, i don't like the idea of all the chemicals in plastic getting into my beer, if i will dry hop ill do primary in a 6 gal carboy and then into a bucket because its easer to get hops out of a bucket then a carboy. i think that the only thing here that does not hold bacteria is glass, stainless steel or copper, so i think the choice for me has to be glass

I'm all in with the PET Better Bottle-type plastic carboys, for both primary and the rare times that I secondary. Even being careful, I've dropped a (fortunately empty) glass carboy, and the shrapnel was scary. Nobody hurt, thankfully, but I had shards embedded 1/2" deep into the hardwood kitchen cabinet doors. I'll make a lot of sacrifices for good beer, but bleeding to death isn't one of them.

PET is light, indestructible, transparent, easy to clean, and won't transfer flavors. With just a very little bit of precaution, you'll never scratch them and they'll last forever. Best of all worlds, if you ask me.

ras07 said:

I'm all in with the PET Better Bottle-type plastic carboys, for both primary and the rare times that I secondary. Even being careful, I've dropped a (fortunately empty) glass carboy, and the shrapnel was scary. Nobody hurt, thankfully, but I had shards embedded 1/2" deep into the hardwood kitchen cabinet doors. I'll make a lot of sacrifices for good beer, but bleeding to death isn't one of them.

PET is light, indestructible, transparent, easy to clean, and won't transfer flavors. With just a very little bit of precaution, you'll never scratch them and they'll last forever. Best of all worlds, if you ask me.

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its still plastic if it scratches it can cause off flavors in your beer, i feel like the people that are choosing plastic are sacrificing making a better beer with no extra chemicals in it because you don't want to pay a little more... i just think that is sad, i don't have a lot of extra money that i can spend on brewing and i wont brew till i have the right tools to make it work

avm221 said:

i feel like the people that are choosing plastic are sacrificing making a better beer with no extra chemicals in it because you don't want to pay a little more... i just think that is sad, i don't have a lot of extra money that i can spend on brewing and i wont brew till i have the right tools to make it work

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Is there actually any evidence that food grade fermentation buckets leach "chemicals" into fermenting beer? By evidence, I mean tested in a lab under the same conditions you would encounter in fermenting beer...

I thought there was a thread a while back that talked about estrogen-like compounds in plastic or something like that...... but, it seemed that the conditions were much more extreme than fermenting some beer.

I know there are concerns with some types of plastic, under some kinds of circumstances - but is there any conclusive proof - or even a single "experiment" that has been conducted to substantiate any of this in relation to fermenting beer in food grade buckets??

Seems like it would be a cool experiment (real/controlled/lab setting) for one of the various podcasts to carry out. Or aha, or something.....

My back likes the plastic ones more than the glass.

avm221 said:

its still plastic if it scratches it can cause off flavors in your beer, i feel like the people that are choosing plastic are sacrificing making a better beer with no extra chemicals in it because you don't want to pay a little more... i just think that is sad, i don't have a lot of extra money that i can spend on brewing and i wont brew till i have the right tools to make it work

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For a lot of us, it has nothing to do with cost. IMO, buckets are easier to handle, clean and get the wort/beer in and out, not to mention they won't send me or a loved one to the ER if one happens to break at the wrong time/place. Better bottles? Same hassles as with glass, but without the safety concerns. I have two glass carboys I never use anymore because it's just not worth the hassle. As far as getting off-flavors from plastic, that's a dubious claim, in my opinion, though I admit that I once bought into this fallacy way back when I shelled out the cash for the two carboys I have. I've since gotten over it and my life is better as a result. As far as long-term aging, corny kegs do the job perfectly and come with the added bonus that there is no need to transfer when aging is done.

LLBeanJ said:

For a lot of us, it has nothing to do with cost. IMO, buckets are easier to handle, clean and get the wort/beer in and out, not to mention they won't send me or a loved one to the ER if one happens to break at the wrong time/place. Better bottles? Same hassles as with glass, but without the safety concerns. I have two glass carboys I never use anymore because it's just not worth the hassle. As far as getting off-flavors from plastic, that's a dubious claim, in my opinion, though I admit that I once bought into this fallacy way back when I shelled out the cash for the two carboys I have. I've since gotten over it and my life is better as a result. As far as long-term aging, corny kegs do the job perfectly and come with the added bonus that there is no need to transfer when aging is done.

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Well said - my exact reasoning for buckets as well. I also use kegs for long term aging.

LLBeanJ said:

For a lot of us, it has nothing to do with cost. IMO, buckets are easier to handle, clean and get the wort/beer in and out, not to mention they won't send me or a loved one to the ER if one happens to break at the wrong time/place. Better bottles? Same hassles as with glass, but without the safety concerns. I have two glass carboys I never use anymore because it's just not worth the hassle. As far as getting off-flavors from plastic, that's a dubious claim, in my opinion, though I admit that I once bought into this fallacy way back when I shelled out the cash for the two carboys I have. I've since gotten over it and my life is better as a result. As far as long-term aging, corny kegs do the job perfectly and come with the added bonus that there is no need to transfer when aging is done.

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+1. The case against food grade plastics for fermentation is weak.

I, too, come back every couple months to ponder glass carboy vs plastic buckets. I go back and forth. I use one, then the other. I like not having to pull the lid off to see what is happening inside during fermentation. I do 3.5 galLon batches, partly because the weight is more manageable for me. I've never dropped a carboy yet, but the thought makes me shudder. Because of the weight, awkwardness of moving them around and potential for catastrophe, I'm thinking about stashing the carboys and going straight buckets.

Even the need to pop the lid on a bucket doesn't really come into play with me. I have a chest freezer ferm chamber. To monitor and control the temp, I have a SST thermowell for the temp probe that I insert into the bucket lid grommet where the airlock normally goes. As a result, I don't use an airlock. I also don't bother snapping the lid closed. If I need to sneak a peak or take a gravity sample, just lift the lid and then set it back down.

Braufessor said:

Is there actually any evidence that food grade fermentation buckets leach "chemicals" into fermenting beer? By evidence, I mean tested in a lab under the same conditions you would encounter in fermenting beer...

I thought there was a thread a while back that talked about estrogen-like compounds in plastic or something like that...... but, it seemed that the conditions were much more extreme than fermenting some beer.

I know there are concerns with some types of plastic, under some kinds of circumstances - but is there any conclusive proof - or even a single "experiment" that has been conducted to substantiate any of this in relation to fermenting beer in food grade buckets??

Seems like it would be a cool experiment (real/controlled/lab setting) for one of the various podcasts to carry out. Or aha, or something.....

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It was always my understanding that the whole BPA issue was more often caused by heating products in the plastic containers. I could have completely missed the point of the discussion because SWMBO and a chemist friend were talking about the BPA controversy and I was drinking beer. Not to mention the fact that (again, could have totally missed the whole conversation) that the BPA isn't extremely dangerous to adults, its mostly a danger to babies and younger people since their hormonal systems can get knocked off balance easier.

And, I am pretty sure, but, I don't think most of us give our beer to babies and teenagers.

I'll betcha a person could pull the airlock out, lower a length of sanitized aquarium tubing down to carefully "suck" out a gravity sample and then stick the airlock back on.
The effort it takes to get the lid off annoys me and makes me jostle the bucket a little.

There's a lot of misinformation on plastics in this thread. People are either making stuff up completely, or just spreading something they heard. Don't trust the government, don't trust the companies...trust the science. Trust physics. I make fantastic beer. Just scored a 42 in a contest yesterday, and go figure...I did it in plastic. Approaching 50 batches and not a single infection....and I haven't grown breasts or a third arm either. Is everyone using glass to avoid the plastic boogeyman also using a glass sample taker? Stainless racking cane with no poly tubing attached? Gasp! God forbid you have an autosiphon!!!! Silicon tubing might get ya too! Ok...I digress.....

To each their own. I have no problem for people opting to go with glass, but I prefer better bottles for the weight difference and to avoid this (warning, graphic images in these threads):
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f85/carboy-brewing-accident-313454/
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f39/im-switching-better-bottles-graphic-340281/

There's boogeyman danger, and theres proven danger. Plastic gives you one, glass the other. Please use a carboy hauler if you use glass.

jbaysurfer said:

There's boogeyman danger, and theres proven danger. Plastic gives you one, glass the other.

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if you read those glass threads, glass is only dangerous if you brew drunk and do stupid things with it.

You may want to check into fermenting in a keg. I love using a Sanke keg to ferment in.

Better Bottles and the "house brands" from sites like AHS and midwest boast BPA free (if you care). I know you shouldn't necessarily just categorically believe their hype but one mentions "anti-wetting". Well, I just bought 6 recently and was washing them and I could actually see the water "sheeting" off the sides when I dumped them. Even starsan foam had trouble hanging on (not my experience with glass carboys). Meanwhile while I retire my glass carboy collection, I had one that I thought looked pretty clean except for the thin line that was at the top of the fermenting beer (secondary). Being rushed and lazy, I threw 1/2 cup of bleach in and started filling with cold water. It was scary how green the water was from the very start. I thought it was clean but apparently there was a nearly clear film of residue (from dry-hopping?). Anyhow, I am hoping that anti-wetting works as advertised in real fermentation use. I nearly sliced the tip of my thumb off when my capper crushed a Sam Adams bottle...Another time I was moving growlers and bumped 2 together. One shard bounced down my thumb leaving 2 cuts above the knuckle and a reasonably deep cut on the knuckle. I then looked at the thread about glass carboy injuries...and decided to retire the fleet. But...do what you want! PS I also bought a good immersion chiller instead of no-chilling because I did not like what the hot wort did to the buckets...seems like a good opportunity to leach or even break and spill. 5 gallons of 200* wort on the foot isn't a pretty thought either.

kitchenbeer said:

if you read those glass threads, glass is only dangerous if you brew drunk and do stupid things with it.

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Glass is only dangerous when it breaks. (but don't clink em TOO hard )

kitchenbeer said:

if you read those glass threads, glass is only dangerous if you brew drunk and do stupid things with it.

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jbaysurfer said:

Glass is only dangerous when it breaks. (but don't clink em TOO hard )

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Glass is only dangerous when it slices you to ribbons.

I wonder how many of the "disaster" posts with graphic pictures were brewer who had not touched a drop.

I read one where the brewer was cleaning, in his words, "very carefully" and just set the carboy down "gently" on a cement surface when it shattered.

They are heavy, get slippery and are just too dangerous for me. Drunk or sober!

jbaysurfer said:

I make fantastic beer. Just scored a 42 in a contest yesterday, and go figure...I did it in plastic. Approaching 50 batches and not a single infection....and I haven't grown breasts or a third arm either.

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If you haven't grown breasts you're doing it wrong.

avm221 said:

its still plastic if it scratches it can cause off flavors in your beer, i feel like the people that are choosing plastic are sacrificing making a better beer with no extra chemicals in it because you don't want to pay a little more... i just think that is sad, i don't have a lot of extra money that i can spend on brewing and i wont brew till i have the right tools to make it work

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So don't scratch it. It's not at all hard to prevent scratches.

Has absolutely nothing to do with money for me ... I had three glass carboys, and after breaking one (stone cold sober, btw) I gave the other two away and paid good money for PET.

I'll admit I don't know everything about the health risks of plastic, but my life is filled with plastic ... if it wants to kill me, it's got plenty of opportunities whether I brew in PET or not. I've done enough research to convince myself that the health risks of flying glass shards are quite real, while the health risks of PET are, as far as I can tell, at most theoretical.

kh54s10 said:

They are heavy, get slippery and are just too dangerous for me. Drunk or sober!

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Amen to that. I'm a lot older, slower, and clumsier than I used to be ... and I was never that quick or coordinated to begin with. Glass carboys in my brewery is just asking for trouble.

I prefer the glass carboys over the plastic bucket type of fermenter as I have had problems in the past with plastic buckets becoming not air tight. I had a wheat beer almost make a huge mess with blow off because the CO2 that developed from fermentation could not properly escape the bucket. The beer turned out great, but that incident was the second time it happened with a bucket so I'm not going to chance it anymore and use a glass carboy for all primaries.
The plastic carboys I've seen all have deep corrugations in the sides to add strength to the walls of the carboy and IMHO those deep corrugations would make it difficult to clean the carboy effectively.

Nicegirl said:

I prefer the glass carboys over the plastic bucket type of fermenter as I have had problems in the past with plastic buckets becoming not air tight. I had a wheat beer almost make a huge mess with blow off because the CO2 that developed from fermentation could not properly escape the bucket. The beer turned out great, but that incident was the second time it happened with a bucket so I'm not going to chance it anymore and use a glass carboy for all primaries.
The plastic carboys I've seen all have deep corrugations in the sides to add strength to the walls of the carboy and IMHO those deep corrugations would make it difficult to clean the carboy effectively.

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If you're guessing about that cleaning thing, you guessed wrong. The BBs are very very easy to clean. I have owned all 3 types and I use BBs exclusively now. The only downside to BBs which I'm surprised hasn't been brought up, is that they come in a 6G max size, whereas glass comes in a 6.5G size. Ironically, the reason I no longer own a glass carboy is because it slipped from my hands as I was cleaning it!

The rationale that you almost had a blowoff because somehow the non-airtight bucket didn't let Co2 "properly escape" is a head scratcher to me. Maybe I'm just not reading it right....C02 is a gas. Air is a gas. If they aren't airtight that decreases the chances of blowoffs, not increases.