Brewing Facility Requirements

[Nil]

Hello All, I am in the process of planning a small brewing operation. I did a good research on the requirements, yet I have been unable to find specific manufacturing facility requirements.

There are a couple of questions such as:

1) Am I allow to perform fermentation in plastic buckets? Some small wineries does used plastic buckets for wine making.

2) Tubing construction materials requirements: I found that copper is not allowed to draft systems.

Any direction will be highly appreciated.

Thanks, Nil

 

[swackattack]

Probrewer.com

 

[SimonHucko]

1) yes, surprisingly as long as you get your floor plan approved and licensed by the TTB, you can use whatever the hell you want to brew. that is unless your local health department or licensing agency decides they want to regulate things, then you may have to answer to them (which I think is the exception rather than the rule). there's a nano near me that ferments in plastic conicals, and the brewpub I work at uses an old homebrew setup for their pilot system. as long as things are food safe and you know the risks of running a commercial setup in plastic (faster wear/tear, higher chance of infection) you should be good to go.

2) stainless, beer line, (re-enforced) silicone tubing... I'm guessing since you're asking about plastic buckets you're looking at a small scale system, so you don't need to worry about commercial hoses. don't use copper for anything, it can form a poisonous oxide that can leech into your beer. bad times.

+1 to probrewer.com, they're the pros and can give you more specific guidance. good luck!

 

[Nil]

Thanks, guys.