Can a plastic water jug be a carboy?

[McLainsAleHouse]

I'm just wondering since I saw plastic carboys advertised. I have a bunch of empty water-cooler jugs in my basement and I was wondering if sanitized... could it be a carboy? Or is there something fundamentally different about the plastic?

 

[Johnnyhitch1]

you should only use carboys made of Polyethylene terephthalate or PET for short. it will not leach flavors or impart plastics into your beer. FIRST POST! lol hope this helps

 

[dbhokie]

Anything could be a fermentation or conditioning vessel. The Better Bottles and such are more specifically made for for brewing because they are a higher grade of food grade plastic (PET), meant to keep oxygen out, and minimize or eliminate leeching. I would think it would be fine, but maybe not for extended aging. Some of them may be made higher quality, dunno. One way to see I suppose. Just clean it well first. But you know you can get food grade plastic 6-8 gallon buckets quite cheap.

 

[Revvy]

Plenty of folks use them, but try to find a <1> or <2> recycle code on the bottom. You don't really want to use a <7> But if you can find <1> and <2> go ahead and use them.

There's a million threads on this topic.

 

[badbrew]

I think you could possibly get away with using it once. I'd toss it after that.

 

[broadbill]

I think you could possibly get away with using it once. I'd toss it after that.

why do you say that?

 

[dbhokie]

Since a polycarbonate plastic there is possibilities that it can leech, and it is not completely non-porous (at least at a very small level). Which makes them a bit more difficult to clean. Right now people are pressuring the water industry to use #1 or #2 PET plastic, Polyethelene. There are studies that suggest polycarb plastic can leech Bisphenol A, and that can pose a serious health risk. There are those that say even more so with a more acidic product. However, there are movements in town to ban distilled water, because it is not healthy enough, and not natural as well. Experience should guide wisdom. You can always try and if you don't like don't use, but I think he is saying that probably because of the grade of the plastic, permeability, and how much harder it would be to clean due to this.

If you have ever used a fermenting bucket, they stain eventually no matter how much care you put into cleaning them right after, or not. The glass in glass carboys is non-porous, or there are no interconnected pore spaces through which liquid or gas can travel. Plastic is porous. Food grade PET plastic is less so.

Could it be absolutely fine? I'm sure it could be, and different manufacturers use different plastic. Check what Revvy said about the numbers. Just because something may "technically" not be ok, doesn't mean that it will not suffice.

 

[badbrew]

why do you say that?

I guess OP was talking about something else. I was referring to these:

 

[dbhokie]

I think more this. Give or take a little design difference.

 

[Revvy]

I guess OP was talking about something else. I was referring to these:

No when someone asks this, usually once a day, they're refferring to plastic water carboys, your ubiquitous "culligan" or whatever brand name, bottles.

 

[shadows69]

I use plastic water bottles all the time to lager in. I use to do wine in them and never had a problem. I think the ones I use say primo on them is something like that, I'm not at home to look.

 

[jeepinjeepin]

I use plastic water bottles all the time to lager in. I use to do wine in them and never had a problem. I think the ones I use say primo on them is something like that, I'm not at home to look.

Primo bottles are #7.

 

[McLainsAleHouse]

Thanks guys! I appreciate the input. Pretty new at this, I just bottled my first batch today of Oat & Caramel brown ale and it's coming out great, I poured myself a pint before carbonation. I drove myself crazy worry about sanitizing and possibility of infection but it seems as long as I'm not a total retard, it's hard to screw up.

I'll probably end up going with a better-bottle plastic carboy since they're not as expensive as glass.

 

[BakRivrBruen]

I've used 5 gallon poland spring jugs that I stole from work (pisses off the delivery guy but whatever) I've always assumed that they were food grade since they contain drinking water. They come in handy when all my fermenters are full and I get an itch to brew a smaller batch. I never noticed any off flavors or oxygenation from lagering.