jalgayer
Well-Known Member
What does everyone think about using those water cooler style bottle s for a sour? I know they say not to for beer but would they be ok for sours?
I know they say not to for beer but would they be ok for sours?
With the exception of 'Better Bottles', I have not seen any data or claim that other plastic containers are similar to glass in their O2 permeability.
I don't think it is BS.
Personally I would be concerned with leaving any beer in plastic for anything more than a couple of months.
If plastic BAGS permitted that much gas exchange, they wouldn't be such a problem when they are zip tied over your head. I'm sure a plastic bucket or bottle will be just fine.
stop parroting garbage you have never experienced
If plastic BAGS permitted that much gas exchange, they wouldn't be such a problem when they are zip tied over your head.
Somehow, beer has been aged in OAK barrels for millenia... It seems to me that is oxygen permeability were an issue, then England, Belgium, and Germany would be covered in clay vessels, not old barrels.
El_Exorcisto said:Insanity yes, I'll grant you that. But so is the neurosis behind: sanitation, oxygen permeability, yeast pitching, mashing temps, stuck fermentations, secondary, etc... The point being that oak permits measurable amounts of air to pass. If a dowel is cut with the grain right, you can blow through a red oak dowel. White oak much less so, but infinitely greater than plastic. If oak worked, then plastic should work wonderfully.
I have done low budget quick beers in a water bottle, that I got the water in.
I only rinsed after racking and returned it when I bought another bottle of water(no cleaning)
Besides, it would seem to me that during fermentation (and often well into aging) you have positive pressure from the co2, how can air leak in when co2 is fighting to get out? Am I looking at that wrong?
what they are saying Nowuries, is that the plastic water bottles are oxygen permiable, IE: they actually let oxygen THROUGH the plastic. Do I buy all that jazz?? no. Do they let oxygen in? Sure, im sure they do, but not enough to matter IMHO. Its a huge debate of garbage as far as im concerned. I have 3 brews going in plastic water bottles as we speak, and I will put money on them turning out just great, and not have some "horrid VINEGAR taste" to them. I think its blown out of proportion, and over rated. Just my .02
Not that I disagree with your broader point, but I think the concern is about aging. The CO2 pressure differential quickly drops out relatively soon after fermentation ends, especially if there are changes in temperature (even relatively modest ones).
what they are saying Nowuries, is that the plastic water bottles are oxygen permiable, IE: they actually let oxygen THROUGH the plastic. Do I buy all that jazz?? no. Do they let oxygen in? Sure, im sure they do, but not enough to matter IMHO. Its a huge debate of garbage as far as im concerned. I have 3 brews going in plastic water bottles as we speak, and I will put money on them turning out just great, and not have some "horrid VINEGAR taste" to them. I think its blown out of proportion, and over rated. Just my .02
Science really really disagrees with you. The O2 permeability of any plastic is easily researched. Science uses a lot less anecdotal evidence and a lot more... science and numbers.
The process someone else uses to make a PET bottle may or may not be the same and yield different results.
I hear this sentiment a lot, but I don't hear a lot of "science and numbers" from either side on the issue. I'm baffled by how vitriolic this conversation always gets. NERDIEST. FIGHT. EVER.
I'd love to see some numbers on this issue because, as you say, I don't have anything other than anecdotal experience, and I've often wondered about the kinds of scales involved in material permeability. I don't think anybody is disputing that a sheet of HDPE allows more oxygen to permeate than a sheet of glass, but I think the question of whether or not it is a practically meaningful difference is an interesting and (as far as I've seen in my limited experience) unsolved one. So, rather than just being sarcastic, why don't you get the ball rolling for us with some data?
The Better Bottle website says "Virtually impermeable to oxygen"
According to Raj Apte ( http://www2.parc.com/emdl/members/apte/GingerBeer.pdf ) the material Better Bottles are made of (PETG) has an oxygen permeability about 1/6 as much as HDPE. A standard 5 gallon HDPE bucket lets in 220 cc/L per year, I assume the Better Bottle will let in about 1/6 of that or 37 cc/L per year. A regular wine barrel lets in about four times less at 8.5 cc/L per year.
I think you can reasonably assume that a barrel may let in a bit more than the math says because as a small headspace develops due to evaporation the wood above it will dry out and become more permeable.
This is all just a back of the envelope scratch calculation to give you an idea of approximately how much oxygen is getting in there. I sent an message to the folks at Better Bottle requesting any oxygen permeability stats they have, hopefully they will get back to me with some hard data.
After a series of emails with Walter, Better Bottle Tech guy, I have some interesting things to report. First they believe that the 400 cc-mil/m2-day-Bar Raj gives for PETG is probably for a extrusion blow material which is different from what Better Bottles are made from, this is good news as it drags the oxygen permeability down closer to that of a regular barrel (how close I dont know). They believe that the minimal amount of O2 coming through the plastic is dwarfed by the amount coming from the airlock/stopper which are made of much more permeable materials.
He also shot down my Brett lives on the walls because there is O2 argument. Apparently it is a biofilm, which is just something that some microbes form on wet surfaces when they are in a low nutrient environment (like fermented beer). I have seen this before on infected bottles of beer, but I have never seen it before on a carboy/fermenter.
I still think Better Bottles are a great choice for aging sour beers because it really comes down to the results.
Some of my sour beers get pellicles, others don't. I actually don't notice much flavor difference between the ones that do and the ones that don't.
I'm still very happy with my results from aging in better bottles and glass carboys with airlocks. I think micro-oxygenation is one of the last issues you need to worry about.
Good luck!
Good god... I stand corrected, and am totally blown away at the fact that an oak wine barrel lets in that little oxygen compared to plastic.
If plastic BAGS permitted that much gas exchange, they wouldn't be such a problem when they are zip tied over your head. I'm sure a plastic bucket or bottle will be just fine.
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