Boiling hot wort in glass carboy...

[Scimmia]

A true autoclave process is what you describe. To your point, though I don't state this in my description, I do heat mine to 250 deg. F for 30 minutes then reduce heat to 220 deg. F during the boil process prior to filling. I didn't say this in the original description because I didn't want to confuse people more by adding temperature adjustments through the process. I'm confident that the temperatures achieved are sufficient to kills any/all the Staphylococcus and other bacteria that are in a "normal" kitchen.

'fraid not. You're heating it to 250F in a dry environment. Sterilization with that setup would take ~12 hours. You aren't even coming close to killing bacterial spores.

 

[C2H5OH]

The weirdest part to me is that you sanitize it before putting it in the oven, therefore this is a completely unnecessary step.

But to each there own.

True, but since I have already made the solution for other sanitizing purposes, what can it hurt?

I also like the idea of some of the water inside my carboy turning to steam to ensure my desired results.

Note how many threads there are asking "Is my brew infected", "What sanitizing solution is best?", "I don't know if my primary was sanitized"...

I never have to concern myself with those questions, because there is never a doubt.

 

[nutty_gnome]

I'm a fan of no chill and I practice no-chill brewing. The only new posible pro presented by the OP is heat sterilizing the carboy. There is inherent dange in moving and handling hot glass.
My take on this: It is FAR FAR simpler & safer put a tight lid on the boil pot at flame-out and walk away; let it cool naturally. Then, when it is cool, transfer to a starsanned carboy, pitch, and airlock.

A $2 lid pot lid makes the rest of the idea obsolete.

Those are my thoughts.

 

[nebben]

Sorry man, I'm glad it worked for you this time, but this seems like an operation where the benefits are negligible and the costs of failure are high.

I can sanitize my carboy for pennies. Iodophor is cheap.

Even a simple mistake or equipment failure is catastrophic with the OP's method. Broken glass at ~190-200F and wort are going to burn your flesh off and also slice it to pieces. It's like a grenade going off in your kitchen.

1000 batches lost because you took a poop in your carboy (will a batch get ruined if I **** in it?) are still cheaper than the resulting hospital bills for the above mentioned scenario.

If you like the no-chill method and like to heat your fermenter, get a plastic one that is designed for heating, or a stainless steel one. Either way, you wont have the danger of your fermenter being destroyed and causing massive damage to your physical self. I'm not joking around at all, this could maim you for life if it failed.

 

[C2H5OH]

'fraid not. You're heating it to 250F in a dry environment. Sterilization with that setup would take ~12 hours. You aren't even coming close to killing bacterial spores.

In your efforts to be a contrarian, I think you're missing the point. The purpose of this procedure isn't to turn my carboy into a surgical tool. I am merely preserving the "sterility" of my wort by not using wort chillers and soaks and baths and other methods that could create an infected batch...

What can I say, I don't like to eat fillet Mignon on a paper plate.

PS: The residual water in the carboy that turns to steam is more than what I need to kill what might be in my carboy.

 

[Scimmia]

In your efforts to be a contrarian, I think you're missing the point. The purpose of this procedure isn't to turn my carboy into a surgical tool. I am merely preserving the "sterility" of my wort by not using wort chillers and soaks and baths and other methods that could create an infected batch...

What can I say, I don't like to eat fillet Mignon on a paper plate.

PS: The residual water in the carboy that turns to steam is more than what I need to kill what might be in my carboy.

No, my point is that you're not getting sterilization, so what your lengthy and potentially dangerous procedure produces isn't necessarily any better than what can be accomplished in 30 seconds with StarSan. Unless you're putting the carboy (or your entire oven) under pressure, that residual water/steam in the carboy isn't going to do much good at all, as it would just leak out of the oven as it expands, well before reaching the necessary temps.

 

[conpewter]

Glad it works for you! I'd be afraid of stressing the carboy but if you've done it 50 times each then you are probably fine with those carboys. Not something I feel the need to do, but it's your beer

 

[C2H5OH]

Glad it works for you! I'd be afraid of stressing the carboy but if you've done it 50 times each then you are probably fine with those carboys. Not something I feel the need to do, but it's your beer

Thank you, Conpewter, for taking the time to read through and not leaving harsh criticisms.

:rockin:

 

[BierMuncher]

Keep the discussion civil please.

 

[annasdadhockey]

Keep the discussion civil please.

Sorry, Just trying to keep someone from giving noobs a potentially life threatening idea. Won't happen again.

 

[mhermetz]

- Extra work
- Dangerous.... (I don't care if you say it isn't if taken the right steps. Sooner or later you will make a mistake and be severly injured)
- Why?? seriously? why....

filling under "first horrible idea of 2010"

 

[broadbill]

In your efforts to be a contrarian, I think you're missing the point. The purpose of this procedure isn't to turn my carboy into a surgical tool. I am merely preserving the "sterility" of my wort by not using wort chillers and soaks and baths and other methods that could create an infected batch...

What can I say, I don't like to eat fillet Mignon on a paper plate.

PS: The residual water in the carboy that turns to steam is more than what I need to kill what might be in my carboy.

Wait, wasn't one of your "pros" for this method that you are actually sterilizing the carboy with hot wort instead of just sanitizing? What is actually left in the "pro" column for this method then? As far as I can tell, it takes more time, is potentially hazardous, and doesn't really making things better or more efficient.

 

[annasdadhockey]

Just keeping a tally...So that's 1 person that thinks this is a good idea, and 34 people that think it is either a waste of time, potentially hazardous, or both. I'd say it's too close to call.

 

[nebben]

I know what most of you are thinking; "NO WAY!" "That's just crazy!" etc...

...but before you prejudge, please read through.

WARNING: This technique is for experienced brewers possessing intuition and common sense abilities.

Pros:
(1) The hot wort will stay sterile in the transfer. (not just "sanitized") thus reducing the chance of having an infected wort in the primary.
(2) No need for wort chillers and the inherent costs and problems they can cause.

Perhaps the cons were misrepresented in the OP's post...my thoughts are in red below:

Cons:
(1) 3rd degree burns possible and extremely painful surgery required if carboy ruptures due to thermal shock or dropping on floor. Anyone nearby will also suffer burns.
(2) Breaking carboys are bad, but 190F+ carboys breaking with hot wort in them is even worse.

....

My list for Iodophor (my sanitizer of choice)

Pros:
(1) At the proper concentration, it can sanitize anything it is in contact with if left for 2-5 minutes.
(2) Can sanitize plastic, glass and all metals
(3) It is quick (10 minutes or less from storage closet to ready for beer)
(4) Iodophor is cheap. As low as pennies per use

Cons:
(1) Can hurt your eyes if you splash into them
(2) Can leave a stain on some plastics
(3) Has the ability to stain grout or clothes

I don't use Star-san, but I would bet its list of cons is even shorter.

3rd degree burns are serious. They can require painful skin grafts, make infection a likely possibility, and cause a lifetime of suffering. Putting molten wort in a fragile container that has been known to break under the best conditions seems like an unreasonable gamble, especially when alternatives like a heat tolerant plastic fermenter or a stainless fermenter are out there.

 

[C2H5OH]

I understand that there are many out there that would never, under any circumstances, perform this technique. This thread was created to satisfy anyone's curiosity as to theory of whether you could or not. We could debate how unsafe or how unpractical this idea may be for you, but the bottom line is it can be done. I do it this way, and will continue to do it this way. I suspect that there may be at least one other person out there that might read this and realize this as something they would like to try.

Would you criticize the people that smelt steel for its inherent dangers or the astronauts that fly to the moon, or someone who makes a pill from mold that makes people better? Experimenting, taking risks, and doing things "outside the box" is what made this country once prosperous.

These days you have a better chance of being seriously injured or killed by someone's exploding underwear.

 

[malkore]

I see a major flaw: heating and cooling glass will cause stress fractures over time and eventually the carboy will fail.

I've seen an old carboy with stress fractures...its not pretty.

This also is WAY more work and WAY more dangerous than mixing up a gallon of star-san.
its a fairly complicated solution when a dozen easier (and safer) methods have been working for decades...nay...thousands of years.

 

[nebben]

I understand that there are many out there that would never, under any circumstances, perform this technique. This thread was created to satisfy anyone's curiosity as to theory of whether you could or not. We could debate how unsafe or how unpractical this idea may be for you, but the bottom line is it can be done. I do it this way, and will continue to do it this way. I suspect that there may be at least one other person out there that might read this and realize this as something they would like to try.

In a mythbusters kind of way, it is kind of cool to hear that it has been done. I'll give you that.

Would you criticize the people that smelt steel for its inherent dangers or the astronauts that fly to the moon, or someone who makes a pill from mold that makes people better? Experimenting, taking risks, and doing things "outside the box" is what made this country once prosperous.

Making steel is inherently dangerous. I don't do it, but some will, and they are paid for doing that job. What alternative is there to making steel? There aren't many non-hazardous ways of doing it. The same can be said for astronauts. If one fool went to the moon in a garbage bag and survived, I'd probably rail them for it too. NASA might have a better handle on that kind of operation than the company that makes Hefty bags.

What it comes down to is the alternatives. There are easy alternatives to your process that lessen the dangers dramatically. Why risk life and limb when you can not risk it for almost no cost?

 

[homebeerbrewer]

As someone who experienced a broken carboy, I'm not inclined to try this method. Mine had luke warm water in it when it broke (I don't know the exact temp, but it wasn't hot), and I'm still suffering from it. I don't really call it suffering, since I don't feel anything in two fingers and a thumb, but I may be like that for the rest of my life. I wouldn't want the kind of damage boiling wort would have done.

 

[mattmcl]

I do have to admire the maverick spirit. I haven't used a hydrometer to determine if it's time to bottle in 20 years of brewing, and I take an endless amount of ****e if I bring that up, but hell, that's how I do it.

 

[C2H5OH]

It's all good!

We're all brothers-in-brew, just with a differing point of view.​

 

[carnevoodoo]

We need a new forum for bad ideas. One misstep and you're f'ed. Sure, you might have done this 50 times or 100 times or whatever, but what happens that one time that your hand slips and you drop 5 gallons of boiling sugar water?

You've made it work, good for you. It is still an awful idea and realistically, this thread only opens up people to unproven, dangerous methods. This is just plain stupid, and I hope the thread is a practical joke.

 

[Brewers_Haven]

Nothing good can come from this. The carboy itself was not meant to oscillate between these temperatures. I couldn't see it making through one cycle let alone repeated expansion and contraction. As opposed to taking such drastic measures, just use star san.

 

[jtrainer]

If I told you, 100 years ago, that someday hundreds of people are going to climb into an aluminum tube and travel thousands of feet in the air from one coast to the other in less than a day's time at hundreds of miles per hour, you might have said the same then too.

I still do..... remember Richard Reid and or the Panty Bomber.... I apply the same logic to submarines.... why get into a boat that is designed to sink....

 

[passedpawn]

This whole process is very dangerous. I'd think it was a joke, but by now there are a bunch of brewer's probably considering doing it and the inevitable injuries won't be funny.

I used to juggle bottles (I was pretty good at it!). It worked fine for a long time. Then once my luck ran out. I don't do that anymore, I would not recommend anyone else does, either.

 

[annasdadhockey]

No risk, when care is taken in the process.

I used to juggle bottles (I was pretty good at it!). It worked fine for a long time. Then once my luck ran out. I don't do that anymore, I would not recommend anyone else does, either.

According to C2H5OH, if care was taken in your process, you'd still be juggling bottles.
"Hey, watch me stick my head in that tiger's mouth. As long as care is taken in the process, I'll never get hurt".

ACCIDENTS HAPPEN!!!!!

 

[C2H5OH]

If you think what I do is scary, definitely don't watch this...



No joking around, because the dangers are real. Here is an example of what a difference of temperature of approximately 130 deg. F can do.

 

[northernlad]

I think the most clear and concise way to put our concerns and comments is this:
Can you toss yourself over Niagra Falls in a barrel and survive? YES.

 

[McKBrew]

I wonder if I can do this with my better bottle

 

[jiggs_casey]

Why would you even attempt this?

Aside from the risk of burning your or your funnel jockeying friend, I would think that as this cools, you run the risk of implosion. If nothing else, it would make it difficult to remove the bung as it has probably now been sucked tightly into the top of the carboy.

In my opinion, the minimal of risk of infection isn't worth the extra effort...

 

[kaiser423]

We need a new forum for bad ideas. One misstep and you're f'ed. Sure, you might have done this 50 times or 100 times or whatever, but what happens that one time that your hand slips and you drop 5 gallons of boiling sugar water?

You've made it work, good for you. It is still an awful idea and realistically, this thread only opens up people to unproven, dangerous methods. This is just plain stupid, and I hope the thread is a practical joke.

I too require a demonstrated safety rating a couple orders of magnitude higher than 2% before I decide to take a risk this large.

Especially for something that at this point, I see providing negligible benefits.

I like no chill, and it is nice to know that everything has that extra level of sanitary that boiling liquids provides, but I'm not too sue that I'd take it to this level.

Nice work on having the cojones to do this though....I'd require big rubber boots and all types of fun things before I'd try this.