4.5 gallon carboy???

[squigley]

I'm a somewhat new brewer...brewing about 6 months or so. On my very first batch, I made a totally rookie mistake: I poured my boiling hot wort directly into the plastic carboy (Better Bottle off brand). I thought I would put in cold makeup water and it would all even out at about the right temperature.

Anyway, when I poured in the hot wort, it actually deformed my carboy and shrunk it. It was originally a 6-gallon carboy, and after this incident I thought it was about 5 gallons. So that's what I've been brewing with for the last 6 months. After getting frustrated numerous times with serious blowoffs (over 1 gal liquid lost for higher OG beers), I decided to buy a new carboy (6 gallon Better Bottle brand). Now, I've got this extra carboy sitting around. I planned to use it as a secondary fermentation vessel (especially so I could brew beers at a faster pace than 1 every 3 weeks). I thought it was 5 gallons, but now I've measured again, and it's really more like 4.5 gallons. So there's no reasonable way, without trashing 1/2 gallon, to make it into a secondary.

I'm in a pretty tight apartment, and can't afford to waste any extra space. Any thoughts on how to salvage this 4.5 gallon carboy, or should I just toss it?

 

[Yooper]

Make a three gallon batch for your 4.5 gallon better bottle, or make a 4.5 gallon batch of wine or cider?

 

[vinnythering]

I agree with Yooper. I would make cider with it.

Also, I want to see this thing. I'm picturing something Quasimodo-esque in my head.

 

[squigley]

You can clearly see the deformed shape at both the top, and the bottom. You can also see where I "thought" it was 3 gal and 5 gal. Not the case!

 

[passedpawn]

There's about 10 more dumb mistakes you need to make yet. Then you can call yourself a veteran brewer. Now go break a hydrometer and drop something unclean into your wort.

 

[vinnythering]

Well I guess I have a few more mistakes to make yet. Thanks. :cross:

 

[gypsyhead]

You've still yet to mistake a bag of PBW for priming sugar, so you're on the right track bud. Yeah, this is now your experimental fermentation vessel, ie. you don't really trust drinking 5gal of whatever it is, but 3, yeah, 3 gal sounds about right.

 

[Lmuggs]

If you ever get more space and want to do all grain, you can cut the bottom off the deformed BB, turn it upside down and use it as a grain hopper for your mill. I know this because of a "mistake" I made that dented one of my better bottles. It's working great and I didn't have to throw it out ;-)

 

[squigley]

Nice, that's a great idea. Maybe something few years if I end up moving.

 

[squigley]

Alright, well problem solved for now! I've never brewed cider before, but after doing a bit of research it seemed extremely easy, very scalable, and cheap. 3.75 gallons of cider in the carboy! I don't know why I didn't try this sooner.