What size tube for airlock blowoff

Hey all,

I am going to try a couple firsts for my next batch. One will be my first time brewing a lager. Second will be my first time brewing with a carboy as my primary. The one carboy I own is a 6 gal glass one. It would probably be ok without an airlock, but I want to be careful. So, for my blowoff I plan to use my 3 piece airlock with a smaller tube. So, does anyone know what size of vinyl tube works for this application? Also, does anyone have any great ideas of how to keep the other end of the tube in a bucket?

Take a look at my picture. If this is what you are trying to do then you will need 1/2 inch inside diameter. I dont do anything fancy to keep the hose in the pitcher. It just stays in.

You could do it that way, or a 1" tube fits pretty snuggly in the neck of the carboy without an airlock.

I use a 1 gal. gatorade jug to capture my trub. I seems to help keep the hose in place.

Liquidicem said:

You could do it that way, or a 1" tube fits pretty snuggly in the neck of the carboy without an airlock.

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yeah, I wanted to avoid the larger diameter tube because of it's crappy bending radius.

foppa78 said:

Take a look at my picture. If this is what you are trying to do then you will need 1/2 inch inside diameter. I dont do anything fancy to keep the hose in the pitcher. It just stays in.

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Yeah, that's exactly what I want to do. That's surprising that the hose doesn't need to be pinned down in some way during the blowoff. It seems like my siphon tubing goes all over the place when racking.

I know this is an old post but can we use any 1/2 inch hose (Home Depot/Lowes) or must I get it from a brew shop? Just curious cause my brew shop sells it but its a LONG way to drive for a tube.

DMBFan2 said:

I know this is an old post but can we use any 1/2 inch hose (Home Depot/Lowes) or must I get it from a brew shop? Just curious cause my brew shop sells it but its a LONG way to drive for a tube.

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Teflon/Silicon and as long as it's sanitized I can't imagine why you can't. I get my tubing through the local hardware store.

Just curious because the brew store is labeling theirs as antimicrobial airlock tubing but I have a hard time believing its any different than regular tubing you'd find at a hardware store. I have some unused 1/2 inch in my garage and have been eyeing it for some time.

DMBFan2 said:

Just curious because the brew store is labeling theirs as antimicrobial airlock tubing but I have a hard time believing its any different than regular tubing you'd find at a hardware store. I have some unused 1/2 inch in my garage and have been eyeing it for some time.

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Yeah, I can't really speak to what they are selling, but hardware tubing works perfectly fine as far as I'm concerned. Or you can just buy some "food grade tubing" from the interwebs...which is probably the same as the hardware store's anyways.

If the tubing is sterilized I don't see why it wouldn't work. Sometimes I wonder if the tubing is the same stuff at a hardware store and the restaurant supply stores and beer supply stores just put "food grade" on the label so they can get a few $$ more for it.

@DMBFan2 - A good, short read
http://homebrewacademy.com/homebrewers-guide-tubing/

That's a great read. Thank You. So I can use the vinyl as an airlock hose. It wont be taking any high temps so it should be fine. I'll be at Lowes or HD today and will look for the Silicon tubing. It's easier to work with.

Thanks again for the reference!

DMBFan2 said:

That's a great read. Thank You. So I can use the vinyl as an airlock hose. It wont be taking any high temps so it should be fine. I'll be at Lowes or HD today and will look for the Silicon tubing. It's easier to work with.

Thanks again for the reference!

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I use vinyl for siphoning off the wort; however, it has the issue the guys noted (re: bending). I think I'll buy some silicon tubing now ... not sure why I didn't look into this ages ago.

Edit: Just got 10' of tubing for my racking cane for $11 on Amazon (Silicon)

Purchase thin wall tubing if there is a choice. Much easier to work with. The thick wall tubing retains the curl of the spool and adds more stress weight on the three piece airlock.

Cut the off narrow bottom of the air lock to decrease pressure when the krausen begins pushing through.

If you use a tube over an airlock and you don't remove the hops when transferring to the fermenter, the hops can clog the opening and give you a blow-out. And I'm not guessing about this.