Aging mead in plastic.

A lot of the material that I have read is a bit old, so I thought I would ask.

What are your thoughts on aging mead in plastic bottles?

Some people say that it will oxidize in anything plastic, and others aT that PET Better Bottles are fine.
Others say that if it is a #1 in the triangle it is the same as a better bottle.

So, out of curemeocity, I looked at some of the bottles at my local grocery store. Half the bottles were #1 PETE. Including a few gallon jugs.

Seems like a inexpensive way to age mead in portions. Not to mention if I want to try different variations after fermentation.

Any thoughts?

Thaumatourge

I age my mead in glass.

I think it depends how long you plan to age it. If your lookin to age it for a year or less if say go for it. If your looking to have it sit there for 5, I would go for the glass. I'm not sure exactly where the crossover is though!

I get quite a few of the class one 4 gallon bottles from the local recycling center for free, good to have friends working there and worth stopping by and inquiring, you never know what useful vessels you can get, they usually also have a bunch of 1gallon wine bottles that come in handy. They work great for primary/secondary fermenters, #10 stopper fits them perfectly.

I haven't tried to age anything long term in them, so unfortunately can't say if they are good for that or not.

i 2nd rack my meads in plastic vittle vaults 4.7 gallon containers and the benefit is that you don't have to cover them up to keep light out, however they are harder to clean and sanitize than glass plus they hold in the smell of the flavor you create so if you use them use them for short term storage use the same flavor mead as before. i use them for only a month and then i bottle dirrectly from them useing an installed plastic spiget about 2 1/2 inches from the bottom so to not disturb any leftover sediments on bottom.makes bottling so much easier.

I made a RIS a number of years ago. I know, not a mead, but the idea is the same.

I ran out of glass to age it in and had to use plastic. It sat in the plastic for about 8 months and, come bottling time, it tasted terrible. The plastic is permeable and allowed O2 to enter through the walls. Needless to say, the batch had to be dumped. I wouldn't age a beer in plastic longer than a couple of months. I bet it can probably go longer, but I wouldn't risk it, based on my experience at least.

Edit. Double post

Interesting, do you know what type of plastic it was? I bottled a fizzy mead in plastic because I was paranoid of bombs. Its been in them now for quite a long time, probably 8 months also and they taste fine. I think the bottles at PET.

Ha ha! the controversy continues....

Ok, so it seems it's probably about the type of plastic (mainly).

A good while ago, there was stuff about plasticisers being leached from the plastic, if certain types of materials were stored in them - alcohol being one of them - it is, after all, a solvent.

Now as I understand it, some plastics are also very slightly air permeable. Polycarbonate being one of them (the material that plastic water cooler bottles are made of). It seems that you can ferment in it (I do.....), but it's not suitable for long term storage, as it will pick up staining and smell after a while. Plus, the small amount of air/O2 that get through, can cause an oxidised type taste (a bit like a hint of sherry).

As far as I can find out, both PET (polyethylene terathylate) and HDPE (high density polyethylene) don't suffer from that - whether that's "at all" or "to a lesser extent" I've seen the "better bottles" used for fermenting (PET) and also commercial IBC's (intermediate bulk containers) used for shipping high strength commercial spirit (95.6% ABV). But again, I don't think they're used for long term storage/ageing.

That seems to be down to glass and/or oak barrels. Now glass is definitely not air permeable, so no micro oxygenation would occur, but of course, that's also one of the reasons why oak is used, partly for the flavours that are imparted from the wood, but also because of the micro oxygenation, both elements as part of the ageing and post-ferment flavouring techniques.

All said and done, I suspect that storage in glass should be considered as the better option, though I understand that some of the "new world" wineries are trialing various types of plastics for the same reason (cost, etc etc).

Don't forget, that a lot of the modern wineries have continued to use glass to age in i.e. bottles, but they have storage stillages to stack the bottles in for optimum storage space usage, as well as climate/temperature controlled storage facilities (some of the ones locally to me, use this method and have won some quite important, international awards for the quality of their wines).

We as home brewers, don't usually have such facilities, which is why bulk storage is suggested as a reasonable compromise, as it reduces variations in taste from bottle to bottle, as it reduces temperature swings that we experience seasonally.

Insomniac said:

Interesting, do you know what type of plastic it was? I bottled a fizzy mead in plastic because I was paranoid of bombs. Its been in them now for quite a long time, probably 8 months also and they taste fine. I think the bottles at PET.

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From experience Chris, they can still explode, given the right conditions. Just that while it can hurt a bit when some of the plastic hits you, it tends not to cause cuts/lacerations, like with "flying glass".......

Oh, I know they can still explode, but you at least have some sort of idea how carbed they are by squeezing and it doesn't shrapnel in the same way

fatbloke said:

Polycarbonate being one of them (the material that plastic water cooler bottles are made of.

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Perhaps it's a regional thing but most water cooler bottles being produced now are class 1 PET bottle. Just mention non-PET or non bps free plastic water bottles around here and the gate s of hell open up with all it's fury and might, not that may of us didnt grow up eating and drinking out of the sinful plastic and have lived to talk about it.

Screw plastic, go natural: http://www.katu.com/news/va?vaid=c132b1f16279c06171a38e81dc8f8007

TheBrewingMedic said:

Perhaps it's a regional thing but most water cooler bottles being produced now are class 1 PET bottle. Just mention non-PET or non bps free plastic water bottles around here and the gate s of hell open up with all it's fury and might, not that may of us didnt grow up eating and drinking out of the sinful plastic and have lived to talk about it.

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Sure, I follow that, but when I asked, the water people said that they changed from using polycarbonate made with BPA 6 or 7 years ago, and that the bottle makers have stated that no BPA is used in their making.

So given that the EU is mega-fussy about stuff like that, we have to take it that the bottles are safe to use, well for fermenting in anyway. I still like to store my meads in 1 or 5 gallon glass (I've got a couple of bigger carboys, but don't have the craneage facility to lift them when they're full ).

Perhaps I should consider getting some better bottles, as there doesn't seem to be any such issues connected with PET. I'll have to have a think about it and then research for the best price.......

Now there is one of my points of confusion. I thought that better bottle's PET was the same as PETE. Is this incorrect? If they are the same then using a #1 soda bottle would be the same as using a mini better bottle.

Thaumatourge said:

Now there is one of my points of confusion. I thought that better bottle's PET was the same as PETE. Is this incorrect? If they are the same then using a #1 soda bottle would be the same as using a mini better bottle.

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Here's your answer

fatbloke said:

Here's your answer

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That actually answers a bunch of questions about permeability and such thank FB :rockin:

Thank you all. I think I understood the aplicable information on wiki. Not being a chemist and new to this stuff. Seems like the reason that some people have had success and some have not is because some of the bottles have that secondary layer added. I would assume that better bottles do, hence them working for people. I guess that unless there turns out to be a way to know if they have the layer of not, I will stick with glass.
Thank you for everyone's input.