Primary Fermentation

I am new to home wine making and have started my first 6 gallon batch this month. I had purchased a six gallon plastic bucket of italian juice and I am using a five gallon glass carboy for primary fermentaion. My question is can I use the six gallon bucket the juice comes in as the primary fermentation vessel? Is there an airlock that I can buy that maybe screws on the spout after you remove the cap? That way I would not have to remove the juice from the six gallon bucket it comes in.

Thanks

you can use your bucket as a primary if you want. just needs to be food grade, which it is if you bought juice in it, assuming it wasn't sold off the back of a truck by a guy named Lefty. I'm sure you can find a drilled stopper that will fit the spout in the lid, and just fit an airlock into it that way.

only problem i can foresee is if the lid is a one-time seal, like with the tear-off band, it may not fully seal in the future. if that's the case, you'll want to limit it to a primary vessel and not let anything sit in it too long after active fermentation subsides.

welcome to the board and happy brewing!

You don't need an airlock for primary fermentation. Just place a clean towel over the pail to keep dust and bugs out. There may be some foaming during the primary stage and the bucket may overflow so place it inside a tub.

I am new to this and I do not have alot of equipment. I have two 5-gallon glass carboys and this year I decided I would just work with these and see how it goes then next year I will purchase some more equipment after I get some advice from some experienced home wine makers. I would like to get a couple of those damigianes with the spouts. I was thinking about purchasing a couple of 5.2 gallon danigianes and using the six gallon buckets the wine comes in for primary fermentation and then rack into the 5.2 gallon damigianes. In theory that would leave me some extra for topping off.

How does that sound???