Beer Fish Tank

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gglucky13

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I've just started brewing a while ago but I've been keeping fish for a while now. Which brings me to my idea, when making a 5 gal batch put a gal or so of washed sanitized sand into the bottom of a 6 gal carboy during the second fermentation to bring the liquid level up and also give the yeast some little pockets to settle into at the bottom, in the sand, hopefully resulting in even less sediment in the final product. Anyone heard of anything like that done before or any reason it's a horrible idea?
 
Not sure that it would be needed, but I would want sterilized, not sanitized. If I was really going to do something like this I would boil the sand!

I'd suggest you play around with fining agents if you feel you need clearer beer.
 
Errr... bad idea. You will undoubtedly siphon up sand when you go to bottle/keg. You would have to stay so far away from the sand when racking to bottles/kegs, you wouldn't be able to get near the beer you could out of the carboy, etc.

Lastly, I still think you would get some sand no matter how careful. So instead of yeast sediment, you'd get sand sediment in your brews. I know some less-seasoned beer drinkers are hesitant about the yeast sediment, I can only imagine if you told them the bottle had grains of sand in it!!
 
I would think adding sand would INCREASE the sediment in your fermenter. I guess I don't understand what you are trying to do. +1 on looking up "fining agents" (irish moss, whilfloc tablets, insinglass, gelitin, etc.) or "cold crashing" if you are looking for clearer beers.
 
deathweed said:
I would think adding sand would INCREASE the sediment in your fermenter. I guess I don't understand what you are trying to do. +1 on looking up "fining agents" (irish moss, whilfloc tablets, insinglass, gelitin, etc.) or "cold crashing" if you are looking for clearer beers.

Or patience and being careful when racking normally does the trick!

I've fined some beers with gelatin and had great results, but not much clearer than any beer I brewed and didn't start drinking until 6-8-10 weeks later.
 
RoaringBrewer said:
Or patience and being careful when racking normally does the trick!

I've fined some beers with gelatin and had great results, but not much clearer than any beer I brewed and didn't start drinking until 6-8-10 weeks later.

Agree 100% Just throwing out ideas:D
 
You're creating a solution that has no problem.

get the right equipment (a 5gal secondary), or just be gentle. extra headspace doesn't guarantee any oxidation issues.
 
I think if you used the coarse pebble sand it would be alright, but again, you really don't need to. I'm talkin the 1/8" and bigger grains.
 
EvilTOJ said:
I think if you used the coarse pebble sand it would be alright, but again, you really don't need to. I'm talkin the 1/8" and bigger grains.


ok, you said this and for some reason a lightbulb went off.... Say get some fine gravel or very course sand and after washing VERY thouroughly, put it in the bottom of your boil kettle with a stainless steel braid on your dip tube. Not only would this form nucleation centers for bubbles during the boil to help keep boilovers down, but it could in effect form as a filter to keep the hotbreak and watever hop material out of your chiller/carboy/whatever....

Someone want to give it a shot and let me know how it goes?:D
 
I'm all for experimenation and innovation. However, I have a strong feeling that if you do this fish tank idea, you will take your first sip of the first bottle opened and exclaim...

"The feast...... is ruined!"
 
Hrmm. On the flip side, a retired better bottle with some ports in the bottom for ariation tubes might make for a cool looking fish tank.

Only thing is, you would have to find a very narrow dip net with a long, long handle if you ever want to be able to scoop dead fish out of the bottom through that little hole at the top.
 
If you really want to combine fish tanks and fermenting beer, go buy some aquatic plants and a grow light (freshwater aqualight CFL). The CO2 from the fermenter can be piped directly into your fishtank(use an inline water bottle with sanitizer). When you combine CO2, great lighting, and aquatic plants...you're going to have some beautiful aquascapes. Plus, you have to clean your fish tank less since the fish poo gets consumed by your fast growing plants...everyone wins!
 
deathweed said:
ok, you said this and for some reason a lightbulb went off.... Say get some fine gravel or very course sand and after washing VERY thouroughly, put it in the bottom of your boil kettle with a stainless steel braid on your dip tube. Not only would this form nucleation centers for bubbles during the boil to help keep boilovers down, but it could in effect form as a filter to keep the hotbreak and watever hop material out of your chiller/carboy/whatever....

Someone want to give it a shot and let me know how it goes?:D

You can actually get this pebble type stuff from laboratory supplies for doing just that. You drop a few in a beaker that you're boiling and it keeps it from "bumping"(because most lab glass is smooth and has few nucleation sites). Many of the fishtank gravels I see are plastic coated to make them easier to clean and I sure don't want non-food-grade low-temp plastic cooking in my wort.
 
i once thought about using sand as well, but as filter media. make a canister filter with cleaned/boiled sand for the filter. but i figured i'd just let it sit in the secondary to clear up. my 2 pennies
 
Brew Runner said:
You can actually get this pebble type stuff from laboratory supplies for doing just that. You drop a few in a beaker that you're boiling and it keeps it from "bumping"(because most lab glass is smooth and has few nucleation sites). Many of the fishtank gravels I see are plastic coated to make them easier to clean and I sure don't want non-food-grade low-temp plastic cooking in my wort.


yes, this was exactly what I was thinking, the good ole marble boiling chip:D Other than being a little more difficult to clean up (hosing down all the boiling chips) a thin layer at the bottom of a keggle over a stainless braid could help "filter" out some of the larger break and hop materla when you are transfering.
 
I hate to call any idea stupid. It goes back to that whole thing about why highway lanes are the width that they are. If you're not familiar with it, ask me :p Until you try it and find out it doesn't work, it's not a stupid idea. I used to have a fish tank that had a sand filter so I would think that you might be able to. But if you're going to do that, why not use a paper filter or a screen or something that's easier to clean?

I've actually be considering some sort of a centrifuge, which is basically the ultimate lab tool for separating liquids and solids. The only thing stopping me is the thought of spinning carboys.

Mor.
 
Dude that would scare the **** out of me! Go into a room and see this contraption spinning at 100mph with one carboy on either arm, I think that would be one of the circles of hell for a homebrewer. It has the chance of horrible pain and death, plus a couple ruined batches of beer.
 
I doubt very much if a carboy could withstand any kind of centripetal acceleration.


As for the sand thing, I use marbles all the time when making wine so that I do not have to top off in the secondary. The lees (not sure of the beer term, Im making my first batch now!) settle nicely into the bottom and makes it a bit easier to siphon off the good stuff
 
Hmmmmmmm...

I had been toying with the idea of sterilizing my unused 70 gallon fish tank and using it as a primary....

I kinda thought that was what this thread would be about. Sand?? No, I think I would get all of the sand out first.
 
I think I like the marble idea. But this would make yeast awashing a bigger pain in the ass. The fining agents would probably be your best idea.
 
conpewter said:
Dude that would scare the **** out of me! Go into a room and see this contraption spinning at 100mph with one carboy on either arm, I think that would be one of the circles of hell for a homebrewer. It has the chance of horrible pain and death, plus a couple ruined batches of beer.

For carboy swinging around, yes, but the thing I was thinking of doesn't involve anything heavy moving any faster than you can carry it. I may be a brewer, but I do think of safety also. ;)
 
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