Who still ferments in buckets? Only me?

[Jordan Logo]

I've been fermenting in buckets for awhile now as a necessity as carboys don't really fit that well in my mini fridges that I use to ferment in, but I was looking at switching to a stainless steel brew buckets and wanted to see if any of you guys still ferment in a bucket, and why you haven't switched over yet.

My biggest thing is price... I mean do you really get that much better of a product at the end of the day?

 

[hopkincr]

Still use a bucket as main fermenter. Have plastic carboy if 2 brews going at same time. It works, no reason to change.

 

[Jordan Logo]

Still use a bucket as main fermenter. Have plastic carboy if 2 brews going at same time. It works, no reason to change.

How do you usually do your transfers to keg? I usually just attach to my spigot and put light pressure to limit oxygen. My biggest thing is that sometimes trub will cover my spigot causing me to put that into my keg. Any suggestions on this?

 

[WBB]

I have glass carboys, speidels, and anvil SS. I always seem to use the anvils and the others sit idle. I suppose if needed, I would put the speidel into action, but I only have two fermentation chambers. The SS is easier to clean and I can xfer with light co2 pressure. It’s really a preference thing and if it works for you. Do I want a conical? Yes. But the anvils work right now for me, for my objective, which is to make beer that I enjoy and so do my neighbors.

 

[bracconiere]

i brew 10 gallon batches, so have to use use plastic, or mortgage the house for a SS 15 gal fermenter.....my plastic 15 gallon bucket are only $20....

 

[IslandLizard]

Raises hand.

I started out with glass carboys in 2009, moved onto 6.5 gallon plastic brew buckets in 2013/2014 mostly for easy of handling.
Carboys are still in use for mixed fermentation sours. They don't require much handling, they just sit there for a couple years.

All brew buckets I ever acquired are still in use, some are from 2013.

 

[Jordan Logo]

Raises hand.

I started out with glass carboys in 2009, moved onto 6.5 gallon plastic brew buckets in 2013/2014 mostly for easy of handling.
Carboys are still in use for mixed fermentation sours. They don't require much handling, they just sit there for a couple years.

All brew buckets I ever acquired are still in use, some are from 2013.

glad to see someone like you is still using plastic buckets! Ahaha! What’s your way of transferring to keg? And if you use a spigot for closed transfers, how do you deal with trub around the spigot?

 

[IslandLizard]

glad to see someone like you is still using plastic buckets! Ahaha! What’s your way of transferring to keg? And if you use a spigot for closed transfers, how do you deal with trub around the spigot?

As long as the lids seal well there's nothing wrong with using buckets, and they come with a built-in handle.

Always transfer into 100% liquid pre-purged kegs through the liquid out post. Keg CO2 is routed back into the bucket through the airlock stem.

Near-closed transfer using a stainless racking cane with an inverter tippy. The cane goes through a 1" drilled stopper in the modified lid (I added 2 stoppered, 1" holes). Sometimes I slide a special homemade filter over the bottom of the racking cane to keep suspended dry hops from transferring. Very useful with "short order" IPAs and NEIPAs.

The bucket lid remains on, but to get the last 1/2 - 1 gallon out I remove the 2nd 1" stopper to be able to see the position of the bottom of the racking cane. The 5 gallon bucket headspace is mostly filled with CO2 by then. It's as good as it gets right now.

Notes:
The bucket gets tilted toward the end of the transfer, say with a good gallon left. This is to keep the siphoning well deep, thus reducing the amount of beer left behind, usually not more than a quart using this method, if that.

 

[Hoppy2bmerry]

I have buckets of various sizes, and a couple fermonsters of different size and a couple glass carboys. The glass is rarely used. Buckets are cheap enough to replace, with that said, if you can afford the SS go for it. As long as you care for it properly it could be the last you buy, well, until you get an itch for a conical I suppose.

 

[Jordan Logo]

As long as the lids seal well there's nothing wrong with using buckets, and they come with a built-in handle.

Always transfer into 100% liquid pre-purged kegs through the liquid out post. Keg CO2 is routed back into the bucket through the airlock stem.

Near-closed transfer using a stainless racking cane with an inverter tippy. The cane goes through a 1" drilled stopper in the modified lid (it has 2 extra stoppered, 1" holes). Sometimes I slide a special homemade filter over the bottom of the racking cane to keep suspended dry hops from transferring. Very useful with "short order" IPAs and NEIPAs.

The bucket lid remains on, but to get the last 1/2 - 1 gallon out I remove the 2nd 1" stopper to be able to see the position of the bottom of the racking cane. The 5 gallon bucket headspace is mostly filled with CO2 by then. It's as good as it gets right now.

Notes:
The bucket gets tilted toward the end of the transfer, say with a good gallon left. This is to keep the siphoning well deep, thus reducing the amount of beer left behind, usually not more than a quart using this method, if that.

That's actually a great idea of adding a second hole to be able to put a racking cane in there. What size did you drill the second hole to fit the racking cane? I'm guessing you drilled another hole to fit a #7 stopper with a hote drilled into the stopper to fit the cane?

 

[grampamark]

I use buckets and Better Bottles. Plastic has been working fine, for me, for 9 years; I don’t feel any need to change.

Questions like the one in the OP always remind me of what could be called “The Great Fundamental Truth About Hobbies”. That’s just a 25-words-or-less way of acknowledging that, for some people, a hobby is about the end result; for others, the hobby is about accumulating the hardware associated with the hobby.

 

[VikeMan]

I'm still using plastic buckets. They hold starsan solution, PBW solution, and catch crushed grains from the mill.

Seriously though, I used a bucket for my first batch, switched to glass carboys so that I could see what was going on, and later to a SS Conical, so I could minimize oxygen, take samples easily, and do closed xfers safely. I still use carboys for doing fruit beer secondaries.

 

[BandonBrewingCo]

As far as I can see the buckets are the most commonly used fermenter on this side of the Atlantic. €15 for a 33 liter bucket with spigot and air lock probably explains it.

Stainless steel has less chance of infection but I've only ever had one infection out of hundreds of batches and I may have been sampling my own produce while brewing so I won't blame plastic buckets either.

Oh, and the buckets are coming with see through lids now from some suppliers so that's an added bonus

 

[Jag75]

My beer taste way better coming out of my Cf5 then my plastic fermenters..........
That's my story and I'm sticking to it

 

[Sandbrew]

I use almost all glass carboys, mainly because I spent money and them and they work :shrug:. But to add to discussion, when I do use plastic buckets (only thing that'll fit in my freezer for lagering), I notice zero difference in taste.. Some of my brew buddies say they switched from glass carboys back to plastic buckets because they broke enough glass carboys to warrant the change, and have also noticed zero difference in taste. So it seems like it really just boils down to what's easiest/best for each person?

 

[McKnuckle]

If the bucket matches your batch size, has a spigot that adequately drains beer while leaving most trub, and seals enough to keep out O2, then what the heck - keep using it. Even the pressure aspect isn't critical, if you can transfer to a purged keg using gravity, feeding back CO2 from the keg into the top of the bucket as mentioned by @IslandLizard .

The main benefit of fancier fermenters is that they make some of the above easier to accomplish. Some examples being the rotating pick up tube in the Anvil and SS Brewtech buckets, or the pressure and sealing perfection of kegs (as fermenters).

 

[jrgtr42]

I mostly use plastic buckets for primary - I don't leave in for more that a month at the outside (usually it's 3 weeks) and I don't open other than brief gravity checks right before packaging.
I do have a couple plastic better bottles (6.5 gal,) 2 6.5 gal glass carboys and 2 5gal glass carboys -
I only use the glass for extended aging, both beer and cider.
I've used the better bottles a couple times for primary, I don't see much difference in those, other than it's harder to clean out after, and harder move around. (I do keep the glass in milk crates at all times, and the better bottles when full)

 

[Transamguy77]

Brewing 10 years now and only have ever used buckets, and my stuff was used when I started so who knows how long they were in use before me. They are simple and cheap.

 

[FloppyKnockers]

Plastic buckets here. You can get 30 - 40 batches out of one before they get so etched and stained it just feels like a bad Idea to keep using it for fermentation. A replacement is ~$14. Hard to justify SS if it cannot pay for itself in my lifetime.

I keep transfers simple with an auto-siphon into a keg.

 

[NitrogenWidget]

I have 3 plastic buckets i just gave a good cleaning to.
I also have 2 glass carboys that I only use for cider, wine, and now hard seltzer.
I use an auto-siphon for those.

but, I just got two 13 gallon vittle vaults.
i'm going to install spigots, ferm locks, and gas ball lock connectors so I can start doing closed transfers to kegs.

I just have to figure out spigot height.
no idea where the trub level would be in those sized vessels for 11 ish gallons of beer.

 

[hopkincr]

How do you usually do your transfers to keg? I usually just attach to my spigot and put light pressure to limit oxygen. My biggest thing is that sometimes trub will cover my spigot causing me to put that into my keg. Any suggestions on this?

I still bottle. So transfer to bottling bucket and go from there.

 

[Immocles]

Looks like you're definitely not the only one!
I don't use my one bucket super often anymore. I love my siphonless fermonster, and a bmb is the backup after that. It gets used for cider/mead primaries mostly. Occasionally I'm gifted a 5 gallon kit ( which I rarely brew that much volume ), and the bucket seems to get the call from the bullpen on those batches. Probably because of the handle and all the stairs, now that I think about it.

 

[bleme]

I started with a glass carboy but less than a year later had the opportunity to buy 20 buckets for $10. I've used buckets ever since for beer and only use the carboy for stuff that needs more age, like meads and ciders.

 

[IslandLizard]

That's actually a great idea of adding a second hole to be able to put a racking cane in there. What size did you drill the second hole to fit the racking cane? I'm guessing you drilled another hole to fit a #7 stopper with a hote drilled into the stopper to fit the cane?

Yes, I drilled two 1" holes:
One for the drilled racking cane stopper (closer to the edge).
The other (closer to the center) for adding dry hops (loose) and stirring while streaming CO2 in through the airlock hole. Then for spying at the end of the transfer.

Although I can do the transfer myself, it really helps to have another person present assisting for the trickier parts. Such as holding the bucket in place so it doesn't roll away when under a 30-40° angle, while keeping the bottom of the cane against the side inside the well.

Really need that extra hand as someone needs to pull the QD off the keg as soon as trub starts to get sucked up. I'm still quick enough.