plastic primary?

hey, I have an IPA sitting in my primary, I am using my plastic bucket as my primary and my glass carboy as my secondary. I have heard you don't want to keep it in the plastic primary for more than a week, is this true? Should I move it to secondary after 1 week, or should I wait until 2? Sorry for being a super noob....

There is no problem at all with keeping it in plastic for over a week.

Many of us actually use plastic carboys (better bottles) and keep the beer in there for several weeks until transfer. If you plan on moving to the secondary you should wait until fermentation is done. Fermentation is done when you get no change in a hydrometer reading over consecutive days.

As Zen stated, no problem. I keep mine in the buckets for 4 to 6 weeks on every batch. Sometimes I use a secondary and sometimes I go right to bottle. Either way is good. Don't be scared to leave your brew in plastic for a month or two.

I leave my beers in primary for a month and ALL my primaries are plastic. That is one of those homebrew myths that we have shot down here....

Relax.

Revvy said:

Relax.

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Don't you mean RDWHAHB?

homebeerbrewer said:

Don't you mean RDWHAHB?

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no. that acronym sucks. can't stand it.

I once left a RIS in primary for over 6 months, in PLASTIC, ogh the horror.

The beer turned out GREAT.

Do I make myself clear?

ITs pretty hard to screw up a good beer.

Classic post...

Like above... Plastic buckets are great. That's all I use for safety reasons.

I've gone 5 months with no ill effect.

Secondary? Why bother, it's old school and over rated....
If you really want to secondary to clear the beer, fine but wait a good 2-3 week before you xfer it.... IMO. Certainly a gravity reading will tell you if it's ready.

I find when when my beer hits the F.G. itrasnfer it to the 2ndary.The gravity drops even more,thats why i use a secondary not to clear it.

The #2 HDPE plastic wouldn't be FDA approved if the wort / beer could react with it. I, too, am glad to see these kinds of myths (Star San!) dispelled in this forum. These kinds of products are used and completely FDA approved in the food storage, food processing, and food service industries on a massive scale. If there were issues, we'd all know by now.

I wish the plastic VS glass would just disappear.

Dave R said:

I wish the plastic VS glass would just disappear.

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Me too!

jtrainer said:

Classic post...

Like above... Plastic buckets are great. That's all I use for safety reasons.

I've gone 5 months with no ill effect.

Secondary? Why bother, it's old school and over rated....
If you really want to secondary to clear the beer, fine but wait a good 2-3 week before you xfer it.... IMO. Certainly a gravity reading will tell you if it's ready.

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in my last couple batches I got a lot of sediment in my bottles, I was hoping a secondary would take care of some of that. Also, I have never used one, so I thought I'd try it out.

aardvark830 said:

in my last couple batches I got a lot of sediment in my bottles, I was hoping a secondary would take care of some of that. Also, I have never used one, so I thought I'd try it out.

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Me too. My first kit came with two Better Bottle carboys and the last batch I did had very bad stains in the primary. I thought if I had moved to a secondary it would have made cleaning easier.

But I think a big reason to rack to secondary is so you can get another batch going in the primary. Especially if you have something that should sit for a long time. I just read another post on what does well in warm weather and some of the Belgian ales take a few weeks so having a secondary would be nice.

The one thing I think would be good about glass is knowing you can use just about anything to clean it. I worry a TON about using a brush with my BB plastic. I'm very concerned about scratching it. Then again, it is nice to be able to drop it without breaking it.