Has anyone ever heard of the BrewCap?

I was recently digging through my homebrew equipment and came across the "Brew Cap" made by BrewCo. The date was 1984. My uncle had given me this thing a while back and up until now I have not used it.
I did, however, just brew a batch and am trying it out. I think the thing is great. I cannot find any info. about it or the company on the internet. Does anyone make these things or something similar? If not, why not?? It seems like a great idea- simulating a big-boy setup that's usable for anyone with a glass carboy. Maybe it's too hard for some people to flip a full carboy after a long brew and a couple or few homebrews. Or perhaps there are inherent problems that I will discover after my experience. I will post my results.

so, what is it?

The brew cap is a plastic cap with two holes that mounts onto a glass carboy. One hole allows a 1/2" i.d. rigid hose to pass through and the other has a mini shut-off valve. After you put your wort and yeast in the carboy, you put the brew cap on and the rigid hose goes to the bottom and the valve is shut off. Then you flip the carboy onto a stand and use a flexi line attached to the rigid pipe into a pot of water for initial blow off, as an airlock. So you end up with an upside-down carboy with a "bleeder" valve at the bottom to remove dead yeast after fermentation. You can condition in the carboy and then bottle directly without having to rack off into another bucket or whatever. I never used to condition my beer but I think removing the inactive yeast is a great idea.

You may want to search under Fermentap.



Kinney Baughman first designed and marketed the BrewCap.

I tried it out and had quite a few problems with it. The shoulders of a carboy do not have enough angle to allow the yeast to settle out properly.

Others have tried the idea over the years. The Fermentap is the latest example.

My suggestion is to save up your money and buy a proper sized and designed conical fermenter. I am presently using conicals offered by MiniBrew Fermenters : Minibrew, Manufactured by the Hobby Beverage Equipment Company

I found this page re the Brewcap: BrewCap

And I remember seeing something like this somewhere for sale...

This is it! Fermentap | Fermentap


And of course, there is already a thread here about the diy style AND the fermentap: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/carboy-conical-maybe-87663/

Wayne1 said:

You may want to search under Fermentap.

Kinney Baughman first designed and marketed the BrewCap.

I tried it out and had quite a few problems with it. The shoulders of a carboy do not have enough angle to allow the yeast to settle out properly.

Others have tried the idea over the years. The Fermentap is the latest example.

My suggestion is to save up your money and buy a proper sized and designed conical fermenter. I am presently using conicals offered by MiniBrew Fermenters : Minibrew, Manufactured by the Hobby Beverage Equipment Company

Click to expand...

I hear you on the conical fermenter, just that they are not giving those things away! I like the idea of making a carboy a conical by inverting it and will check out the Fermentap.

I will look at the thread re. conical carboy... Thanks for the link.

The Fermentap looks like the modern day equivalent for sure. I read the thread on the idea of carboys as conicals and the main concern seemed to be would the cap hold under pressure. I will post my results using the Brew Cap. Too, in response to Wayne1 ( I attempted to quote you and respond directly- but I don't see my response anywhere, new guy over here) but what I said was basically that I think stainless conical tanks rule, they just are not cheap. The other problem I am reading about the brew cap is that since the carboy isn't really conical enough, trub/goo gets trapped in the shoulders. We will see how this thing goes and I will post my results.

Looneytunes,

Been there, done that.

I met Kinney at the AHA conference in Estes Park, CO way back in '85

He gave me a BrewCap to try. At that time, there was also a large tie wrap to hold the cap in place. I had all kind of problems with the trub settling out.

Another problem is you are limited to roughly 4.75 gallons in the carboy if you are using a 5 gallon carboy. Final yield might be 4 gallons taking into consideration blow-off and trub.

The plastic conicals are a good, happy medium between a 6.5 gallon carboy and a stainless conical, IMHO.

Enjoy your experiment. That is really the only way you will know for sure how it works.