Stirbar retriever

I built my stirplate this week. Pretty fun project actually. It was fun to get back to some circuits type stuff. Anyway, I found myself pouring out whatever was in the flask when I wanted to switch to a different stirbar. This seemed like it would be inappropriate when it came time to do a real starter, so I glued a small rare-earth magnet to the end of my plastic spoon like so:





And what do you do when you have a brand new stirplate but no need for a starter any time soon?

Lemonade!

Thanks a lot to MrSalty for the tutorial on how to put a stirplate together.

Cheers,

i keep a magnet stuck to my plate. when it's time to pour out the starter - i just remove the etra magnet - place it on the side of the flask - it pulls the stir bar to it ...then pour with no fear of "fermenting your stir bar"

brewhead said:

i keep a magnet stuck to my plate. when it's time to pour out the starter - i just remove the etra magnet - place it on the side of the flask - it pulls the stir bar to it ...then pour with no fear of "fermenting your stir bar"

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Me too...

You can even use the magnet from the outside to slide the stir bar all the way up and out of the flask. That is generally how we do it in a lab to avoid contaminating whatever is in the flask.

I grab the little magnetic timer off the fridge and use it to hold the stir bar in place so I don't toss it in the fermenter.

After fermenting my stirbar, the first time I used one, I sanitized my telescoping magnetic pick-up tool and used it. I decided that it just had too many places for nasties to hide. Now, I simply pour carefully from the flask. I can get all but a few drops out and leave the bar behind.

I've gone through more stir bars than I care to admit. I have no idea why I can't get it through my thick skull, but I forget about it almost EVERY time.

I, too, use a magnet on the outside of the flask to remove (or at least pin in place while I pour) my stir bar. I've forgotten and dropped it into the fermenter before... but you can just as easily get it out of the fermenter with a magnet on the outside as you can with a flask, so it's really not a big deal. Using a strong magnet (I use a hard drive magnet, just like on my stir plate) helps a lot.