question about racking

[priceposey]

when racking or transfering from the primary fermenter to the secondary or to the bottling bucket,will it be ok to just use the siphon hose?and is it ok to take the lid off of the fermenter when doing this?
also,after you have sanitized your equipment and you have used any particular piece of equipment,what do you rest it on to make sure it doesnt become contaminated? a towel , paper towel, or what?

thanks in advance

[Dave A]

A racking cane and clip are alot easier than just using the hose, but if you can do it without sucking yeast (etc) off the bottom or sucking air bubbles (too close to the surface) than it won't hurt anything.

I always take the lid off, hasn't been a problem yet (I have enough other problems, thank you).

I keep a spray bottle of sanitizer handy. I've been known to spray a plate to put things on, but lately I just spray the countertop. As long as it's non-porous you should be OK (tile grout is porous, tile countertops are hard to sanitize. Formica, Corian or stone are much better) An occasional re-spray will get anything that lands on there and leave it wet, don't wipe after each spray.

[Beerconnoisseur]

If you're using a plastic bucket as a fermenter, you almost HAVE to take the lid off. I suppose if you were really crazy about it, you could drill a hole for an auto-siphon, and cork it with a solid stopper when the auto-siphon wasn't in use. But that's pretty extreme.

Generally, I simply try to minimize the lag time between sanitizing equipment, and using it for beer. Once the beer has finished fermenting, the alcohol content keeps most bacteria from growing, so it's not as much of a concern as you might think. Remember, the Germans used to drink beer in the Middle Ages, because it was significantly safer to drink than the local water supply...

[yonkersbrewer]

What makes this place great is the conversation and the chance to get something more out of it than appears on the screen. Reading the thoughts about how to deal with sanitized equipment gave me a thought. I have a damn small kitchen and little room to put anything down. Dealing with sanitzed stuff is a pain. I just figured out what to do in the small space.

I am going to take my brew kettle (on Saturday which will be a bottling day for me) put an inch of water in it, put the top on and steam the top and inside for ten minutes. Just a guess but that ought to be enough to sanitize it all pretty well. While still hot I am going to throw out the water and cover it and let it cool. That way I will have a vertical space to lean my auto-siphon, racking cane etc that I can trust to be bug free.

Am I missing a problem here? What do you all think?

[Beerconnoisseur]

...is keep my bottling bucket full of sanitized water, for as long as possible. I soak any needed equipment in that, and when it comes time to bottle, I pour some into a smaller bucket (that I keep the bottles in while bottling, to minimize sticky beer on the kitchen floor), and pour the rest out on the driveway. The smaller bucket goes under the bottling bucket spigot, so if for some reason the transfer tubing to the bottle filler comes loose, the mess created is also minimized.

For the most part, I just set equipment on the kitchen table. It's clean enough that sanitizing problems are not a major problem within the 15 minutes it takes to start bottling.

If you are really anal, you could try resting it on sheets of Saran Wrap. I cover my bottling bucket with these before bottling, to keep germs from falling in. But that's just one option.

The challenge you may run into using boiling water to sanitize, is if it gets too hot, some of the plastic pieces might melt. An extra bucket will set you back $5, and you don't have to worry about burning your hands on hot, sanitized equipment, or having it melt.