USPlastics conical owners... Questions for you!

Hey guys, I know some of you have gone with the US Plastics conicals and are fermenting in them. Here are my Q's:

1) Do you like them?
2) Do you feel it's a good value?
3) Did you buy the stand with them or did you make one?
4) Where do you put your racking adapter?
5) Can you compare it to an SS conical?
6) How many licks does it take to get to the center of a tootsie pop?

Thanks.

1. Have a 15 gallon from Tank-depot. HBT member. Yes I like it.
2. Excellent value
3. No, made one from leftover pipe from something else.
4. 5-6 inches from bottom
5. Never used a SS Conical. As long as you clean with Oxyclean and no scrubbing the plastic should last a long time.
6. Tootsie would be pissed if I told you.

1) Do you like them?,Yes I have 6 115 gallon units
2) Do you feel it's a good value?absolutely
3) Did you buy the stand with them or did you make one?yes, I bought their stand because it was a pkg. deal
4) Where do you put your racking adapter? about 10" from the bottom of the cone
5) Can you compare it to an SS conical? no, comparison, stainless would be better, but for the price I couldnt pass them up for so much capacity.
6) How many licks does it take to get to the center of a tootsie pop? 3

What the heck are you doing with 6 115 gallon conicals?

MSUConrad said:

What the heck are you doing with 6 115 gallon conicals?

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www.chattahoocheebrewingcompany.com

How would one control temp on these? I would assume the plastic would insulate fairly well and make temp control by ambient means fairly hard...

Maybe a coil of stainless steel tube into the tub and a pump?

mmb said:

How would one control temp on these? I would assume the plastic would insulate fairly well and make temp control by ambient means fairly hard...

Maybe a coil of stainless steel tube into the tub and a pump?

Click to expand...

http://www.stpats.com/index.htm
cooling plates for wine tanks about 2/3rds the way down the page i think.

i'm curious to how you set up the cooling plates up with the conicals. That seems like a rather ingenious way to keep your temps instead of going stainless and jacketed... saving $$$$$$$.

Ahh... Very nifty.

I'd rather have relations with a garbage grinder than deal with St. Pats.. have to kitbash something together.

juvinious said:

i'm curious to how you set up the cooling plates up with the conicals. That seems like a rather ingenious way to keep your temps instead of going stainless and jacketed... saving $$$$$$$.

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it was real simple and it works great actually., Basically I ran a single 1" insulated copper trunk line down one wall and looped it back into the cold room where I have 2 55 gallon ss drums filled with a glycol and water solution with a sump pump in one of them. the water/glycol runs continuously when any temp. controller calls for cooling, the sump turns on and recirculates down the trunk line and through an asco solenoid valve through the plate chiller and back into the trunk line and the back into the top of the second ss drum. there are one way gate valves that stop back flow into the trunk line.
every plate chiller after the first one has a little bit warmer water running through them but it still has more than enough cooling ability to handle 6 going all at once. I can maintain temps down to 50 degrees with no problem and if needed I can isolate one through a separate line and bring the temp down to nearly freezing to crash if need be. typically only 3 or 4 of them are going at any one time so I have no problem maintaining temps. I helped a friend with a 15 gallon plastic conical and a homemade copper coil submerged in it by running it through a single circuit cold plate placed in his old refrigerator freezer where he also keeps a 2 1/2 gallon bucket of glycol/water and a small inline pump. works great