Rackerman

Recipes 

Variable Volume Tanks - can they be used for beer? Here's a description from Morebeer's site:

"Variable Volume Tanks are popular with many home wine makers. The basic idea behind a Variable Volume Tank (sometimes shortened to V/V Tank) is the “floating” lid assembly. This stainless steel lid fits inside the body of the tank with about an inch of space all the way around. The concave rim of the lid has an inflatable bladder – much like a bicycle inner tube – stretched around it. By inflating the bladder with the included hand pump, you can hold the lid in place at whatever level you wish inside the tank.

The major advantage of a Variable Volume Tank is that it can adapt to changes in your total volume of wine in order to remain “full” at all times. Variations in yield, as well as losses from racking and sampling, will no longer send you scrambling for top up wine or filling up your containers with the cheap bulk stuff!"

So, if one were to use for beer you'd have the following:

Negatives: no conical, no yeast recapture, primary fermenter only, open (kinda) top - prone to infection.

Positives: price, stainless, open fermentation styles

Any thoughts?

Rick500

Recipes 

I guess I don't see what the point would really be.

giligson

Recipes 

Wine sits around aging for a very long time - generally longer than beer. I would see little application for this in beer brewing. For wine I always have some extra that doesn't fit in the carboy in smaller containers and use this for topup.

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Rackerman

Recipes 

So, more info - someone is selling a couple of 200 and 300 liter stainless tanks I've yet to see and while I'm still waiting for a price I want to see if anyone knows more about them, specifically whether or not they can be modified to the beer world.

The benefit for me would be a variety of capacity and potentially the price. However, I know next to nothing about fermenting wine. The variable volume fermenter has a bladder that is essentially an adjustable top. I like the idea of being able to rack 50, 100, 150 or more liters and not have to worry about oxygenation. I doubt the inflatable tube has the strength to withstand much psi, but, like I said I know nothing about the wine fermentation process, so... anyway, here's a link to the fermenter:
200L (53G) Variable Volume Fermenter | MoreWine

I guess it could work as a secondary?