Glass or plastic?

[Caffinehog]

Glass or plastic for primary and secondary?

I find if I use glass, I end up with skunky beer. Yeah, I could put a sweatshirt over it... But I'm moving over to a V-vessel to overcome my problems.

[Tweek]

short of stainless it is no contest for glass imo. Plastic has too many downsides. The only real downside of glass is its fragile.

[Caffinehog]

And it lets light through to ruin your beer!

Unless you have a brown glass carboy...

Anyone have one of those????? If you do, let me know where you got it.

[Stodbrew]

Mine's all stainless. :D

Sorry, couldn't resist.

[Tweek]

Originally posted by Stodbrew
Mine's all stainless. :D

Sorry, couldn't resist.

bastard!


Caffinehog, I have never had an issue with that. I have a few towels that I use for my brewing that I keep the carboys wrapped in. It also helps to insulate them at the same time.

[DreamWeaver]

I use a plastic primary, like the one Charlie Papazian uses in his book. And 6 gallon carboy for secondary. Cover the glass carboy with a dark garbage bag. If it's good enough for CPAP, it's good enough for me! :D -DRWeaver-

[laneto]

I put a dark t-shirt over the carboy and use one of my wifes old hair clips to keep in place. I've never had skunky beer while using that method.

[barley ben]

I don't have a problem with light. I keep my carboys in a Rubbermaid cabinet type thing. Plus I keep the blinds down in my beer room. They only get a tiny bit of dim light when I check to see how things are going. Have yet to have a skunkyness problem, just every other possible problem.

[kgaugler]

I've never had a problem with light. I have a jacket (old ski parka) that fits very nicely over my carboys to keep the light out. Unlike some folks on this forum, I don't trust plastic because it IS permeable to air.

[wortchillergoal]

A paper grocery bag fits nicely over a 5 gal carboy. All you need is a small hole for the air lock.

If wort could talk, it would probably sau treat me like a woman you are trying to seduce.

[Tweek]

Originally posted by wortchillergoal
A paper grocery bag fits nicely over a 5 gal carboy. All you need is a small hole for the air lock.

If wort could talk, it would probably sau treat me like a woman you are trying to seduce.


put me in a dark corner and ignore me?

[wortchillergoal]

Originally posted by Tweek
put me in a dark corner and ignore me?

Well at some point you want her in a dark corner, then later you can ignore her.

[stronk]

I don't trust plastic because it IS permeable to air

Well, It may be permeable to air (although I would have to disagree, but that's not the point), but throughout primary there is going to be CO2 pressure inside the plastic bucket (albeit small pressure). If the plastic is at all gas-permeable, the gas will be flowing out of the fermenting wort. Of course, this would not be true in secondary and if you believe in the permeability theory it would certainly be best to use a glass secondary.

I have no problems, because I don't use a secondary (except for young-tasting beer, of course :)).

[Caffinehog]

Originally posted by stronk
If the plastic is at all gas-permeable, the gas will be flowing out of the fermenting wort.

Sadly, this is not entirely true. What matters is the pressure of the TYPE of gas that's present. Oxygen flows from high oxygen concentration to low oxygen concentration. It doesn't matter if the oxygen concentration is 1 ppm outside the container and the concentration of another gas in the container is 1,000,000 ppm. The oxygen will flow in if it can seep through. Of course, if air is flowing out an opening, the kinetic energy of the moving air will knock the oxygen backwards so it won't flow in. However, in static, or nearly static systems, the only thing that matters is the concentration of oxygen outside and the concentration of oxygen inside. This is close to static everywhere but at the airlock.

Yeah, it's wierd, but it's the nature of things.

[DreamWeaver]

The food industry has used plastic buckets for years. Storing food & edibles for months at a time. Plastic may expand and contract but if air can penetrate it , it would also leak. Primary fermentation for a week or so isn't goina do yer brew any damage. Some folks still open ferment. They aren't too worried about oxidation. The common problem I see is maybe the rubber stopper leaking air and in both, plastic & glass has this fault. So we're even. I can buy 4 buckets for the price of a carboy and 15 carboys for stainless & if mine gets a scratch I'm out $4.50. Thats my story & I'm stickin 2 it! -DRWeaver-

[Brownbeard]

How long do you leave the beer in primary that enough air is going to permeate the bucket and effect the beer? I have used a plastic primary several times with no issues whatsoever. I personally do not believe that plastic is permeable enough to be an issue at all, let alone for a short week in primary. I have seen lots of talk on this issue, but no evidence to back it up. I like the glass better, for visual purposes.

[CapsFan1974]

I don' think that plastic's permeability (sp?) is the issue. The problem with plastic is that once it's been scratched, there's no way to adequately sanitize it. The beer killing buggers get into those cracks and no amount of chlorine or whatever is going to get to them.

It's not that hard to throw a t-shirt or a towel over the glass to keep the light out.

[Tweek]

Originally posted by CapsFan1974
I don' think that plastic's permeability (sp?) is the issue. The problem with plastic is that once it's been scratched, there's no way to adequately sanitize it. The beer killing buggers get into those cracks and no amount of chlorine or whatever is going to get to them.

It's not that hard to throw a t-shirt or a towel over the glass to keep the light out.

Aye, that is the big issues with plastic. And I know a lot of guys would say that it is soo much cheaper that they would just toss it and get a new one. The problem with that philosophy is when do you recognize there is a scratch? If it is a big one hopefully you catch it when it happens. A small one? well perhaps that takes an infected batch or two to figure out, and that sucks.

[Fast_Eddy]

Originally posted by Tweek
Aye, that is the big issues with plastic. And I know a lot of guys would say that it is soo much cheaper that they would just toss it and get a new one. The problem with that philosophy is when do you recognize there is a scratch? If it is a big one hopefully you catch it when it happens. A small one? well perhaps that takes an infected batch or two to figure out, and that sucks.

I agree - just not worth it to waste a batch or two.

Plus after you throw away 4 buckets you would've paid for the carboy.