Bottling bucket as a secondary fermenter

[The Brewed Palate]

I am in the 2nd half of my primary fermenting of an IPA I brewed last thurs. and am planning on dry hopping it on Friday (1 week mark). As a new homebrewer I currently do not have a carboy to use as a secondary fermenter.

What are the pros and cons of using a bottling bucket as a secondary fermenter?

Cheers!

 

[SumnerH]

1. One week in primary is too sort. I'd leave it at least 1 week after FG stabilizes, ideally 2.
2. I'd skip the secondary and just dry hop in the primary rather than using the bottling bucket for secondary. Note that the modern trend is away from using secondaries for most beers anyway. See, for instance, https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f163/secondary-not-john-palmer-jamil-zainasheff-weigh-176837/

 

[forcera]

It you use your bottling bucket as a secondary you are going to have yeast settle out right next to where you are pulling the beer from when you bottle. Also as was said above most people are trending away from using a secondary. One if the few times I do a secondary is if I want to get the beer off of the yeast cake and then cold crash the beer to get even more yeast out.

 

[smata67]

You will need to prime your beer and make sure it is mixed in well. This will disturb the sediment. To solve this problem, there are priming tablets you can add directly to the bottles and not have to disturb the brew. These are called "Prime Tabs" oddly enough. But it is best to move to a bottling bucket at the time of bottling.

 

[The Brewed Palate]

Ok I was going to dry hop in the primary anyways. I just thought I'd ask the more experiences homebrewers on this forum it using a secondary fermenter was a better idea.
I'll leave the beer in the primary for a total of 2 weeks and dry hop in the second week. Then siphon the beer to the bottling bucket after that and possibly let the beer settle in there to let any sediment float to the bottom.

 

[Yooper]

Ok I was going to dry hop in the primary anyways. I just thought I'd ask the more experiences homebrewers on this forum it using a secondary fermenter was a better idea.
I'll leave the beer in the primary for a total of 2 weeks and dry hop in the second week. Then siphon the beer to the bottling bucket after that and possibly let the beer settle in there to let any sediment float to the bottom.

I wouldn't let the beer settle in the bottling bucket- first, you want to add priming sugar to carb up the beer and you want that evenly distributed. Secondly, you don't want to leave the beer exposed to air that long (I guess you could keep the lid on it, but it has a very wide headspace) and third, if you're using a bottling bucket, the spigot is near the bottom. So even if you let it settle, you'd be sucking up whatever settled in the first (or last) bottle anyway.

So, let the beer sit longer in primary if it's not clear. Don't put the beer in the bottling bucket until it's ready to bottle. You can let the beer sit a couple of weeks, then add the dry hops, wait 3-10 days, and then rack to bottling bucket and bottle.