Crap. Broke my siphon...now what?

[adamjackson]

I've always brewed with an auto-siphon and live out in the middle of nowhere. A 1 litre growler fell on it in the sink and cracked it..this was a plastic siphon which is very surprising.

Anyway, so I'm stuck. It's either drive an hour tomorrow afternoon to buy another or order one and wait 5 days to brew this beer..already have a starter going.

I could just pour the wort from kettle right into the carboy but it's hard to do by myself. Thoughts?

 

[cmcgeehan151]

Buy a plastic funnel, a plastic pitcher. Sanitize both (pitcher inside and out) dip pitcher in kettle, pour through funnel into carboy.

 

[adamjackson]

Buy a plastic funnel, a plastic pitcher. Sanitize both (pitcher inside and out) dip pitcher in kettle, pour through funnel into carboy.

I have a pitcher and funnel and funnel filters that I can stick in there. Good temporary fix until the replacement arrives.

 

[GilSwillBasementBrews]

You could start your siphon manually. Either fill hose with water and keeping the end capped stick one end in your wort and then release your thumb off the other end, while holding it below the kettle, let the water drain out and the suction should pull the wort into the hose creating a siphon. Just run the water off into a glass or pitcher then once the wort starts flowing stick the other end in the carboy.
Or
Suck on the end of hose till you pull wort then cap hose. sanitize end if hose Then uncap into the carboy.

 

[Mikespunchlist]

I started brewing back in 1981 and brewed for a short time and gave it up for 25 years or so and when I started back one of the newfangled devices someone had invented was the auto-siphon. I thought it was the neatest damned thing until the LHBS guy showed me the bottling wand (you know that thing with a spring valve in it that stops the flow when you're bottling?). WOW! Before those things we used a thing called gravity flow siphon. If you push the tube down into the liquid then cap the end with a finger and pull it out until the level is below what is in the bucket it should start the siphon and flow out of the tube. Not having an auto-siphon is not a show stopper.

 

[rifraf]

Put one end of the hose in your beer. Jam the narrow end of a turkey baster in to the other end of the hose and such on the large end of the turkey baster. Once you have beer through about half the hose put the end of the hose in your destination vessel and let it flow.

 

[griffondg]

Do Gil's first method...works great.

 

[ChessRockwell]

I like the pitcher and funnel method. I had to re-read the whole thread to figure out why the hell you even needed an auto-siphon on brew day. I've never siphoned anything on brew day, but then I realized you were using a carboy. Gotcha!

 

[bobeer]

Buy a plastic funnel, a plastic pitcher. Sanitize both (pitcher inside and out) dip pitcher in kettle, pour through funnel into carboy.

I do this with all my brews when I brew alone. No issues.

 

[adamjackson]

Just racked to the keg. Solution was that I kept the part of the auto-siphon that didn't break (the tube that the plastic tube fits onto). The external piece of the siphon broke but internal was fine. So, I put that into the beer, started the siphon with my mouth and things were fine. It was harder to start it but I got to taste some of my beer the old fashioned way.

Thanks all.

 

[FuzzeWuzze]

If its just a crack in it, why not just tape it? Just use any type of tape you have and wrap the crap out of it.

Unless it shattered into a million pieces it should work just fine with tape holding it together or even covering small holes.

 

[adamjackson]

If its just a crack in it, why not just tape it? Just use any type of tape you have and wrap the crap out of it.

Unless it shattered into a million pieces it should work just fine with tape holding it together or even covering small holes.

Outer tube was broken in half with a few pieces that are so small a tape job is impossible.

Ordered a new one already but it'll be here for a week or so...will just use half the auto-siphon + mouth hack to get this working for my next few batches.

 

[AmandaK]

Starting a siphon with your mouth sounds like a great way to get new infections.

Perhaps you try the more sanitary way of filling your siphon hose with sanitizer, put one end in the beer, the other end in the next container (or outside of the container at the same height for a bit to get the sanitizer out) and physics to start your siphon. That's how I rack out of my kegs and buckets with a SS racking cane.

 

[adamjackson]

But fermented beer is far less likely to get an infection than wort. I think that's just being overly careful. Siphon tubing was completely sanitised with star-san + keg was starsanned...maybe I'll gargle some listerine next time to reduce even further?

 

[Whattawort]

But fermented beer is far less likely to get an infection than wort. I think that's just being overly careful. Siphon tubing was completely sanitised with star-san + keg was starsanned...maybe I'll gargle some listerine next time to reduce even further?

Double shot of PGA followed by a belch on a flame should sterilize your mouth sufficiently. Take pictures so the rest of us can be educated though.

 

[AmandaK]

But fermented beer is far less likely to get an infection than wort. I think that's just being overly careful. Siphon tubing was completely sanitised with star-san + keg was starsanned...maybe I'll gargle some listerine next time to reduce even further?

Far less likely is not a chance I like to take when some of my batches take a year to complete or more and can cost upwards of $50 in ingredients alone. But hey, to each their own.