i think my LHBS is lying to me {Carboy Prices GoinG Up}

[ChshreCat]

<---- is happy there's plenty of bucket factories still in business.

 

[knightbeer39]

Plastic buckets=scratches=infections. That's my problem with them. It's just a personal choice, when those things get stained and I can't use any abrasive or elbow grease to clean them, because the scratches will harbor bacteria, it just isn't worth it to me.

I fear the BB for the same reason. It's sanke keg fermentors, carboys and demijohns for this dude until I can feel more comfortable about a BB.

 

[ChshreCat]

Plastic buckets=scratches=infections. That's my problem with them.

That'd be why I don't scratch my buckets.

It's just a personal choice, when those things get stained and I can't use any abrasive or elbow grease to clean them, because the scratches will harbor bacteria, it just isn't worth it to me.

Stains are cosmetic. I can't see 'em when the bucket's full of beer.

 

[craigd]

Plastic buckets=scratches=infections. That's my problem with them. It's just a personal choice, when those things get stained and I can't use any abrasive or elbow grease to clean them, because the scratches will harbor bacteria, it just isn't worth it to me.

I fear the BB for the same reason. It's sanke keg fermentors, carboys and demijohns for this dude until I can feel more comfortable about a BB.

I may have been lucky but I have never had an infected beer and I use only buckets. I'm not as paranoid about cleaning them as others are either - I guess the lack of infections over the years has made me a little lax on that but I scrub them lightly with a regular washcloth and oxyclean then sanitize as normal for the next batch. Some of my buckets have a dozen or so batches through them. The stains I tend to ignore as long as they have been cleaned and sanitized. As you said though - personal choice. A good infection one day may change my opinion...

 

[weirdboy]

Seriously, how many folks here at HBT actually, personally, know someone who has had an artery severed by a glass carboy? (watch me be the next LOL). It's a scary thought, but does it happen enough to weigh-in? Or is it like shark attacks & plane crashes?

Don't get me wrong -- I love the BB but I put my glass carboys on a higher pedestal. I think it's just nostalgia. But damn, I don't like severed arteries either!

I have had a glass carboy explode during blow off when the blow off tube inexplicably clogged up. Thankfully it occurred at like 3-4am and everyone was asleep so nobody got hurt, but we were pulling glass shards out of the ceiling from the kitchen and the two rooms adjoining it for the next couple of weeks.

Put me off homebrewing again for YEARS.

 

[the_bird]

I haven't had an accidents with my carboys, but I'd put the number of first-hand accounts I've read from HBT members at somewhere north of forty and probably south of 100. It's not inevitable, it's not going to happen to everybody... but it's not all that uncommon, either. I still use some glass because I have them, but I don't see myself BUYING any more carboys in the future.

 

[Ziggybrew]

I sure do like glass. I sure do like my buckets and BBs. I see the chance of injury (based on your testimonies here) from glass is nothing to be dismissed. Maybe nostalgia must step aside for plastic?
Interesting thread.

 

[finley]

A local water bottling company sells the glass 5 gallon carboys for $20. They are used water jugs, but they have more on stock "Than I could ever use in my life". I would go all glass if it wasn't for needing the extra head room for beer in the primary. I just use the 6.5 gallon buckets for anything that is likely to form a large krausen, or is a little over 5 gallons.