Got bored

I've been brewing 5 gallon batches at a time and really would like to try something else. I'm curious at nature and was thinking about buying 3 of the Mr. Beer 2 gallon fermenters and experimenting with different yeast strains.

I'll have more to come in my next few posts but I'm thinking about taking a base recipe for 5 gallons, scaling it down to 2 gallons and fermenting with one strain of yeast, changing the recipe slightly and then brewing with a different type of yeast, etc.

Overall gameplan,

Take base recipe and scale down to 2 gallons. Place in fermenter 1 with yeast A. Take base recipe and add like malto dextrin/lactose and place in fermenter 2 with yeast A. Take base recipe and add slightly different grains and place in fermenter 3 with yeast A.

I'm really trying to formulate my own recipe so I can get a great tasting brew. Has anyone tried this? What were their results? Any suggestions for me?

Nothing wrong with the Mr. Beer fermenters, I have several, but they are relatively expensive.

Better to go to the bakery department of one of your larger grocery stores and get 3 gallon icing buckets (sometimes they have 5 gallon ones too). Usually they will give them to you, but sometimes charge a nominal fee.

Your only expense for the fermenters would be the time it takes to clean the icing out, and the air lock.

As far as the game plan... sounds like a good way to learn.

I've done this to make single hop beers to highlight flavor differences.
Instead of Mr. Beer fermenters I went with glass carboys. My LHBS had some 3 gallon ones. I found a local water store, the type that sells water for water coolers. I had them sell my a 2.5 gallon glass carboy.
So I did 5 gallon batches, split them into 2.5 gallon batches, and used my 3 and then 2.5 gallon carboys for fermenters.
I liked this better than going with the Mr. Beer thing.
But thats just me.
Here's the 3 gallon one:
http://www.northernbrewer.com/brewing/3-gallon-glass-carboy.html
I couldn't find a link to the 2.5 gallon one...

Wow, and I thought at $10 a pop the Mr. Beer kegs were expensive..... but they are cheap compared to those carboys (they are nice though).

I think $10 each is perfect for my little experiment with smaller batches. I think this will help if I want to lager my beers, too. I don't have a lot of room in an apartment to lager sometimes. The upcoming winter should help though.