Carboy Safety idea

[popester]

Thank you for the pictures and responses. What I actually had in mind was that the clamp and handle on the sides would give the abbility to hold onto the carboy during (wet and slippery) cleaning. I do think that if Lufah(whos handy work is most excellent) were to extend the strapping up and around the neck with some sort of belt or draw string that would hold the carboy in the harness when turned upside down it could possibly aid the cleaning process by giving you something to hold on to. Just a thought.

[Lufah]

I make them tight enough that I can flip them upside down and hold it with the straps. I dump the trub out of the bottom that way.

Travis

[popester]

I would have never though that would work. Awsome, thats what I get for ASS-U-ME-ing that it would slip out. Sounds like thats the trick, too bad I am not crafty enough to make something like that.

BTW: I wanna see pictures of whatever you decide to make that (steamer) $50 steal out of.

[Lufah]

Here is a copy of a post I made to another forum...

This is for a 5 gallon carboy. I should be pretty easy to adjust for other sizes. Ok here is how I have done this. Using 1 ½ inch nylon webbing cut one 35 inch piece this will be the top horizontal strap. Sew it into a loop with a 1 inch overlap. That will give you a 34 inch loop. Then cut 3 32” pieces. These will be the vertical supports. Space them evenly around the 34” loop pin and sew into place. I then flip the whole thing over and sew the bottom together were the 3 support straps meet. Then cut 2 31” pieces. These will be the handles. Space them evenly pin and sew into place. I sew boxes and then x them using a triple strait stitch. SWMBO says if you can’t use that to go over the same thing three times. She showed me how to use the machine in about 5 minutes. I can’t do anything fancy, but this is really easy. I’ll post links to pix of one I have done. If you have questions or anything let me know. I hope this makes sense I’m pretty tired. I’ll be making another carrier in the next day or two. If anyone wants me to I’ll take step by step pictures and post them. Let me know if anyone wants that. I think I’m just rambling now…


Travis

[Denny]

Puh-leez. Carboys are superior in many ways. You can see the fermentation ocurring without exposing the wort to contamination. You can see if there are any problems cropping up. Glass is less prone to bacteria-hiding scratches. Glass is impervious to oxygen. Glass is a better insulator. Carboys are easy to use in closed-system transfers (racking with CO2 pressure.)

So there's 6 reasons to use a carboy right off the top of my head.

I beg to differ...after years of using carboys I switched to buckets after breaking 2 carboys within 2 hours and losing 6 gal. of precious double decocted pils. I have no regrest, and I firmly believe carboys ARE not superior. You can see fermentation in buckets WITHOUT having to open them and even if you do open them, so what? That will NOT contaminate your beer. You can see if there are problems cropping up in a carboy? So what? What wo7uld you do about it? And you can see the same theing anyway by opening the lid of the bucket. Scratches in buckets are not a big deal...sanitizer can get to anywhere bacteria can. And they're cheap to replace if they get too badly scrtahed to use. I can buy 3 buckets for what 1 carboy costs. Buckets are impervious enough to oxygen that you don't need to worry about it unless your beer is gonna be in one for months. Glass may be a better insulator, but I don't see whty that really matters. As to closed system transfers, in 225 batches I've never done one or wanted to.

Now, let's look at the advantages of buckets. They're cheap to buy. They store in less space than carboys since you can stack them up. They're WAY easier to clean and harvest yeast from than carboys. They're easier to carry. I've made award winning beers using buckets, and a good friend (who has never used anything BUT buckets) has brough home NHC gold with beers fermented in buckets.

In the end, use what you want to use. But don't blindly fall for the old myth that carboys are better. USE YOUR HEAD!!!

[LiquidTao]

In the end, use what you want to use. But don't blindly fall for the old myth that carboys are better. USE YOUR HEAD!!![/quote]

Double decoc..lost..that had to suck. Well I have an open mind, any bucket brewing horror stories out there. I have to say I started with buckets and never had a problem. It was extract brewing, I never used a secondary, and the beer sat on the trub for 7 - 10 days tops before racking to bottles.

Another point I had heard was that plastic lids leak, pulling in O2. Not a big deal during primary fermentation with CO2 pumping out. But for a secondary and any lengthy aging plastic is not the way to go. Also there is much more beer surface area exposed to the O2 in the buckets headspace vs. whats exposed in the carboy.

I admit glass is heavy and slick as hell and I have to be so much more careful than when using a bucket. Of course dropping a bucket doesnt cause it to explode into deadly shards not to mention the cleanup

So maybe, as I think someone has already mentioned in the forums, plastic for primary and glass for secondary.

Or...use your glass carboy with a brewcap, forget secondaries all together, and have a poor mans conical. Easily harvest yeast and only one thing to sanitize and have to clean up later. You cant do that with buckets. Ya, inverted for the win??

EDIT - Er...well you could use a plastic carboy so that argument wont work ...hmmm I dunno.

[Boo Boo]

Well, I have 2 plastic carboys and 1 glass one. I find the glass one better if for no other reason than in my mind it don't transfer any unwanted flavors. I know really that if cleaned properly there is no taste transfer, but the glass seems better. I primary in plastic buckets without any trouble. I have seen carboy handles which clamp to the outside of the carboy around the middle, but I like the strap shown in the above pictures. I don't use anything other than the one around the neck.

[N8]

I don't think there is really any difference in either glass or plastic. It's all going to be a personal choice. I've used glass for years with no problems, others have. I've used plastic with no problems with infections.
Now, I use 10 gal cornies with a quick-connect on the gas line and a hose running into a bottle of idophor. They don't break or scratch.