Primary in bottling bucket?

Is it a bad idea to do primary in the bottling bucket so you can use spigot to get sg readings?

Some people do primary fermentation in a bucket with a spigot. You just have to make sure that you get the spigot throughly cleaned and sanitized due to the fact that it may contain some old sticky wort that can harbor bacteria.

Not advisable though, to bottle directly from the spigot if you primary ferment in such bucket. You'll get a lot of trub in the bottles.

no i was thinking about primary in the bottling bucket just so i could do gravity readings then using the spigot to transfer to a better bottle or something then cleaning up the bottling bucket and using it to bottle when secondary is done. edit is there a way to do gravity readings without having to fill the test tube 3/4 full? seems like a waste of potential beer.

What size tube are you using?

I use the plastic tube that my hydrometer came in, takes maybe 1/4 cup, just enough to test the gravity and provide a small tasting.

it's about a foot tall and about 1.5 inches in diameter or so.

ahh, one of those big ones the HBS sells, easy solution is to chop 4 or 5 inches off with a hacksaw

allright cool i will try that never even occurred to me

All that will do is make your hydrometer tube shorter. It won't mean you'll need any less beer to take a reading.

Most likely this will make the tube shorter than the hydrometer and you won't be able to use it at all, at least not for any readings above the top of the tube.

so is there a smaller tube i can buy? like thinner

Tombstone0 said:

All that will do is make your hydrometer tube shorter. It won't mean you'll need any less beer to take a reading.

Most likely this will make the tube shorter than the hydrometer and you won't be able to use it at all, at least not for any readings above the top of the tube.

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I think the OP is talking about this type of test tube : http://www.northernbrewer.com/brewing/economy-test-jar.html

it's 14.5 inches long, unfortunately hydrometers are much shorter, meaning you have to fill the tube with more wort just so the hydrometer sticks out for spinning, retrieval and such.

Chopping it shorter means you can use less wort and still access your hydrometer.

I have no idea why they make them so tall, the extra width is nice, but the height is a waste.

pimento said:

I think the OP is talking about this type of test tube : http://www.northernbrewer.com/brewing/economy-test-jar.html

it's 14.5 inches long, unfortunately hydrometers are much shorter, meaning you have to fill the tube with more wort just so the hydrometer sticks out for spinning, retrieval and such.

Chopping it shorter means you can use less wort and still access your hydrometer.

I have no idea why they make them so tall, the extra width is nice, but the height is a waste.

Click to expand...

In that case cutting it shorter would help.

I have one that's pretty wide (my hydrometer in the tube it came in can fit inside it with room to spare), but it's about the same height as my hydrometer. I would use the tube it came in but I dropped it and it cracked on the bottom, so it leaks.

Tombstone0 said:

In that case cutting it shorter would help.

I have one that's pretty wide (my hydrometer in the tube it came in can fit inside it with room to spare), but it's about the same height as my hydrometer. I would use the tube it came in but I dropped it and it cracked on the bottom, so it leaks.

Click to expand...

yeah that looks like it. pain in the ass to use because you need to fill it to about an inch to the top or the hydrometer won't float and will just sink to the bottom

Skaggz said:

Some people do primary fermentation in a bucket with a spigot. You just have to make sure that you get the spigot throughly cleaned and sanitized due to the fact that it may contain some old sticky wort that can harbor bacteria.

Not advisable though, to bottle directly from the spigot if you primary ferment in such bucket. You'll get a lot of trub in the bottles.

Click to expand...

I agree that you shouldn't bottle directly from the spigot, but I have primaried in a bucket and used the spigot to go to bottling bucket with pretty much zero trub.

I dump everything into the bucket and My trub line in the bucket is still not up to the spigot, so I don't know where people are getting this. Maybe the hole on mine is up higher? At any rate, get a separate bottling bucket so that you can mix the priming sugar in without disturbing a lot of the sediment.

When I do this, I don't take samples from the spigot, I just spray it with starsan and cover with Al foil after I fill the bucket. This way, it stays reasonably clean and I don't have to worry about anything growing in it during fermentation. I would recommend the same to you also, and just take samples from the top.

I have plain PET 35l (8US gal) buckets with tight lids... and with spigots, they are interchangeable one day they are fermenters, other day priming buckets.

btw, its convenient to draw sample from spigot, just have to keep in mind, that first one will contain lots of yeast since it manages to settle in the spigot as well, but no worries, second sample will be fine.

if you cool crash when fermentation is done prior to bottling, until you have to tip fermenter (obviously, you cant use any tubing inside or you will draw yeast cake), beer will be perfectly clear.

Drawbacks - you have to prime each bottle, you cannot use any tubing to gather beer from bottom or you will end up sucking in yeast cake, last few bottles, after tipping fermenter, will have more yeast, you lose your bottling bucket to another batch of beer

Pros - easy and convenient, no need to sanitize another vessel for bottling, just bottling wand, taking sample readings is very easy and without risk of infecting, no need to sanitize test jar each time and you get 1 more "fermenter"

just my experience. I think I'm getting lazy cause my last few batches I bottled directly from fermenter, just cold crashing for few days prior bottling.