Autosiphon causing aeration?

Hi all,

I have an autosiphon I purchased a couple years ago. What I am finding is that I'm having a hard (impossible) time getting the siphon to transfer liquid without there being a 'cavity' of air right where the hard plastic racking tube connects to the hose. I've put a hose clamp on it, so the air must be coming from one of the edges. This 'cavity' doesn't disturb transferring from primary to secondary other than adding air, but when I try to bottle using it I often lose the seal and have to pump again.

Any tricks up your sleeves?

Regards,

Jason

Get a smaller diameter hose. Are you using the same tubing from a couple years ago? If so, it's time to replace it. I replace mine after just a couple uses, tubing is cheap.

Silicone anyone? I resolved this issue myself by working the tube further up the arm. For example, my tube cover the bend all the way to the elbow. Forget the clamps, IMO, by time they are tight enough you have stressed the plastic.

Also, I find that sometimes priming over the top of the plunger can help to minimalize air entrainment at the start of the plunge.


Prost!

I resolved my issues by carefully tightening the hose clamp, which of course cracked the plastic. But no more bubbles, at least.

Why hasn't someone made a stainless version of this thing yet? They know we like shiny things that don't break.

BarleyWater said:

Get a smaller diameter hose. .

Click to expand...

I agree. You are probably using 3/8" tubing. Get some 5/16" tubing and it will work much better.

I also slide the hose further up the plastic. If bubble persist I can squeeze the hose at the point of contact with plastic and the air runs away

I have kind of the same problem but it doesn't cause any off-tastes, plus the siphon hose is already so damned hard to get on and off of the autosiphon. So I just ignore it.

balto charlie said:

I also slide the hose further up the plastic. If bubble persist I can squeeze the hose at the point of contact with plastic and the air runs away

Click to expand...

That's my fix if/when this happens. Just pinch the tubing where it connects to the racking cane for the first couple seconds of flow.

Berserker_Brew said:

That's my fix if/when this happens. Just pinch the tubing where it connects to the racking cane for the first couple seconds of flow.

Click to expand...

Ditto. If you can read this you are drunk.

I freaked out the first time this happened to me because I thought it was going to ruin my beer. I ended up pouring some sanitizing solution down the big tube of the autosiphon.

More recently its become more of a pain for me to use the autosiphon than just a plain racking cane. Less to clean and sanitize and no more bubbles in my siphon.

Berserker_Brew said:

That's my fix if/when this happens. Just pinch the tubing where it connects to the racking cane for the first couple seconds of flow.

Click to expand...

bingo! a quick pinch will burp that air pocket.

Often the leak is not at the top of the cane, but at the bottom around the seal of the plunger. If this is your source you can backfill the tube with Starsan, or what I do is let the siphon sit in the carboy for a minute and it will fill with beer, then just don't lift the plunger too high so it spills all over.

The other tip is to not siphon so fast!!!!!!!. The faster you siphon, the more likely you are to suck air in. If you are getting bubbles, either raise the receiver of lower the source so the differnce in height between the two is less.

Not to sound sadistic, but I’m glad to see others frustrated by the same problem. My recent autosiphoning adventures have been the cause of more expletives in my family than my 2-year-old who still won’t sleep through the night. (I’m considering brewing-up a 1.200 barley wine very soon. It’ll be just… for… her.)

I think my prob is the tubing size. I recently went to 3/8” and I believe that’s when the problems started. My problems went well beyond the little space right at the mouth (which, in the past, I was able to quickly fix by pinching)… no, no. I had dehydrated old man pee-trickling all the way down to the carboy opening level, at which point aeration wasn’t even the word for what was happening. Whitewater is what it was. A terrible, terrible sight to behold.