Erlenmeyer Flask Cracked

[Drk93TT]

Well after nearly 3 years of use it cracked. Apparently using this thing on an electric stove can cause this from what I just read.. took a while to crack but for me finally did.

It was a 2L borosilicate glass.. NOT pyrex but it was purchased from a big homebrewing outlet.

I didn't notice it was cracked until after I pitched my starter... hope its alright.. pray to the brew gods for me !

The starter looked and smelled normal so hope thats good enough to not develop any kind of infection. Didn't see any glass or anything in the starter, just the crack and a little gummy yeast on one corner outside of it.

I just purchased an actual Pyrex brand flask and a burner plate from amazon.. lesson learned.

Heres some pics for proof in the pudding.. The burnt/char is on the outside of the flask not inside.

 

[Bilsch]

Brewers will get much better service from higher quality borosilicate glassware brands like Schott, Kimax and Pyrex. Stay away from the cheap stuff like bomex or non branded glass.

 

[govner1]

Pyrex is borosilicate & so is Kimax. Many (most) of the crap from China is borosilicate but is poorly made with very inconsistent wall thickness & often lots of seeds (bubbles).

 

[day_trippr]

Heating a flask directly upon an electric element seems inherently risky to me, regardless of presumed flask quality. Wrt to even heat transfer, electric elements suck.
All of my 2 and 5 liter e-flasks are borosilicate but I've always boiled in a pot, cooled down to a safe handling temperature then filled the flask(s) and cooled to pitching temp.
Sure there's a lack of convenience (more stuff to clean) but otoh I've never cracked a flask...

Cheers!

 

[kh54s10]

If the electric stove is an exposed coil element, it will heat the flask unevenly increasing the chance of failure. I have a glass cook top so I feel the temperature differences might be less. But I have also found that heating the DME in a pot, cooling it, then putting it in the flask is so much easier. So now that I don't boil the wort in the flask, I have no longer have any fears of thermally shocking my flask.

 

[Drk93TT]

Mine is a glass cooktop samsung fwiw

 

[passedpawn]

I broke two erlenmeyers on my glasstop - on the same night, about 3 minutes apart. I'd used both of them a bunch (one of them, the 5L, I'd used for 10+ years).

The dumb thing I did was put DME in there without much agitation. The DME settled to the bottom, and since there was a solid down there, the flasks heated very unevenly. They both broke and created an epic late-nite mess.

 

[day_trippr]

Unless the flask bottom is dead flat across the entire surface a glass top won't heat evenly...