Best and/or Worst Brewing Gadgets You've Ever Purchased

[SIXFOOTER]

Hmm, best..
Vinator for sanitising bottles and bottling wand, good tools
Don't know that I have a worst, least used maybe is the blow off cap I got for my big carboy

 

[muse435]

Best - Brewers Best kit, got me into brewing

Worst - three piece air-lock, the old fashion is simpler and just woks great.

 

[smh]

Seems like a stupid thing to be excited about, but I bought a stainless steel canning funnel from Lee Valley Tools: (http://www.leevalley.com/us/gifts/page.aspx?p=46945&cat=4,104,53214&ap=2)

This thing is wicked. The removable base (small nozzle) is perfect for filling bottles. If you make things like ginger beer with lots of sediment, it's easy to sandwich some cheese cloth in the threads of the small nozzle to make a great filter. It's slow but saves some hassle.

S

 

[Cookiedds]

Best:
~Giant Stainless Steel Whisk from Rebel Brewer, nothing mixes a mash better or easier and doesn't require power tools and such.
~Autosiphon, works perfect every time as long as you've fitted it with the correct size tubing (otherwise you will get air bubbles coming through).
~Barley Crusher.
~10 gallon Rubbermaid converted mash tun with false bottom.
~Yeast stir plate, yeast bank, flasks.
~7 tap keezer with perlick creamer faucets.

Worst:
~Bottles and everything that goes with them

 

[CDbrews]

This is old stuff but Ill play...
Worst: aqarium pump oxygen thing.... Took it outta the box and put it right back in.. shaking a carboy is so much easier


Best: Lots of things but I think kegerator takes it

 

[bctdi]

Best: by far was my Ranco 2 stage temp controller / chest freezer setup.....makes brewing great beer easy! 2nd best : kegging system (bottling sucks!)



Worst: cheap dial thermometer....I was screwing up beers with this thing and didn`t even know what happened until later ( the crazy thing was that it was accurate at freezing and at boiling, but off by 10-15 degrees between 130 and 170)

 

[BrewThruYou]

Best:
MLT Conversion (Home Depot rubbermaid)

Worst:
5gal glass carboy...i don't secondary, so it's been used once to make apfelwein and then it just sits.
Plastic Emily Capper. Snapped one of the plastic guides on one side...probably will break the other side before long.

TBD:
Stir plate (Just shipped)
Barley Crusher (Just shipped)
Vinator (Will buy soon)
Bench capper (Will buy soon)

 

[Jknapp]

I've found this thing to be close to useless.

Is that true?? I was thinking of getting one for dispensing.. Does it not work for that?

Best:
Thermapen
Electrifying my kettle
Tankless Water Heater
Autosiphon clip (austin homebrew)
Digital Scale

Worst:
All those flip-top bottles i bought from the guy on craigslist & had to clean. Need to order my keg setup.

 

[arondee]

Best:
Kegmeister full size kegerator with full 20# CO2 tank and 2 guage regulator off Craigslist for $25
Keggle: $60 from a friend
3 Ranco temperature controllers pre-wired off Craigslist again for $30 each
Holiday Chest Freezer: $30 off Craigslist
What can I say? I'm super cheap. The craigslist app for Android has saved me buckets of money because I'm the first to know when something I'm interested in gets posted.

Worst:
My digital thermometer sucks. It takes too long to reach the correct temperature I can't hold my hand in the keggle for too long because it's too hot. Can anyone recommend a cheap thermometer that's really long?

This scale from amazon. It's way too small to measure hops on.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000O37TDO/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

 

[motobrewer]

Is that true?? I was thinking of getting one for dispensing.. Does it not work for that?

Best:
Thermapen
Electrifying my kettle
Tankless Water Heater
Autosiphon clip (austin homebrew)
Digital Scale

Worst:
All those flip-top bottles i bought from the guy on craigslist & had to clean. Need to order my keg setup.

works fine for me, for remote dispensing. goes thru those little cartridges like no tomorrow tho.