OnederBrew.....anyone try this?

[noiz2]

To give them a bit of a break, you can buy the cone (and drill your own holes - threaded ports are already there) and use your own bucket and you get a plastic conical for $60 and fittings. That is about $200 less than buying a 7 gallon plastic conical from the other folks.

You have to compare apples to apples. It's not a SS conical. So if you want to play with a plastic conical would you rather spend $60 and some fittings or $300? They are both plastic and really this is safer in that you can swap out parts where the other one it's one piece. It gets infected and your in trouble. Same as a plastic anything. The fittings are all 1/2" NPT so there is no reason the holes should be small, and I have heard from others that with small SS conicals the yeast tends to just stick because there isn't enough pressure to push out the yeast, so building up a bit of pressure is probably a good thing.

BUT you don't have to. You can set the relief valve to anything below 15 pis including wide open.

Personally I don't find it very appealing to serve out of the fermentor so I would probably keg it but? Maybe for a specialty brew?

how he meant the "savings" to come in is that you are not going to tie up a SS fermentor to serve from so the fact that for the price of a SS fermentor you could get a bunch of these and not keg is the "savings".

And lastly you can hook up your CO2 to one of the relief ports (it's 1/2" npt) and feed gas in the top if you really wanted to.

Personally if I was going to try a plastic conical this would probably be the one. But part of the reason I would go to conicals over buckets is the ability to scrub the suckers clean, so I'm not sold on the plastic conicals. It's true that I have had no problems with buckets so I should probable also not have problems with a conical... but a bucket is $10 or so.

I would love to try one though so if one of you has one and wants to melt it down send it to me instead.

 

[mors]

My main issue with it isn't that it's plastic. It's the molding of the cone. To me it's the equivalent of buying a fermentor bucket that comes pre scratched...

 

[noiz2]

well it's not actually scratched it has some ridges, there is a difference. I'm not saying it's any good, I have no idea - never even seen one in person, just that a lot of the criticisms were not really fair.
There are a few folks who get new buckets every year "just in case", for those people a plastic fermentor that costs more than $10 is crazy. There are some who have been using the same buckets for a decade or more. Someplace in that continuum there is probably a sweet spot for this device.

Heck if your brewing sour beers nooks and crannies are probably a good thing ;~)

 

[mors]

I think the criticisms are fair. The cone will be more prone to infection because of the molding 'ridge' and poorly drilled holes. That is just fact. I own one of these units. The ridge is actually worse than a scratch. the worry with a scratch is you get bacteria in there and then it gets pressure applied over it and the plastic edges of the scratch get pushed down over the scratch 'sealing' in the bacteria. The ridge would be even more prone to this along both sides of it. The fittings that come on the fermenter are lame at best. Yes they can be replaced, but that's just added cost. The unit should just come with standard fittings. Would make it more appealing.

It's true you could use a bucket fermenter forever, however I doubt that would be the case if it were poorly molded and had a big scratch or ridge in it new.

I think this would be worth what they are charging if it didn't have these issues. The molding issue may seem minor to some, but it is a fundamental flaw in brewing logic.

I did buy one of these and these are just my observations of the unit. I have had it since the NHC and have been unwilling to put a beer in it yet. I should be brewing a 14% double chocolate stout soon, so I might throw a second runnings beer in there and try it out.

 

[PseudoChef]

This is the guy who thinks everyone should be drinking terrible, cloudy homebrew. I also love how he posts videos to youtube to just take them down a couple days later when people let him know his ideas aren't great. At least he's no longer microwaving the wort (I hope).

 

[mors]

yeah I'll agree he is not demonstrating advanced or even correct brewing techniques in his videos. But I do think his product has potential. I am liking the fact he makes the clear clones now. That's really nice. It does look like in his latest videos he has fittings that don't suck on the fermentor. If he has the molding issues corrected I think the product would be well worth the money.

Source: He posted this video on Facebook this morning. https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=tQLXuJ2EE9s

The clamp seems like it could potentially be a bit of a pain...but overall I don't think it will be too much of an issue to spend an extra 5 mins setting that up. I couldn't tell if the molding issue was still there from the video. No inside shots of the cone just outside of the clear cone...but I didn't see the molding...

 

[JoeyChopps]

The bulging bucket in the video makes me super nervous. I'm kinda upset that this product is getting such bad reviews when I first saw it I thought it was a neat idea. Good thing I found this thread to show me some insight on the product. I hope they fix all the problems so that I can still try it.

 

[noiz2]

I will give the guy credit for listening to the criticisms. There are a lot of changes in how he shows to work and in components of the system.

Dan kind of convinced me on the fit and finish issues with the cone, so unless I know those have changed I would be looking at getting just the cone and doing my own drilling and reaming and maybe flame polishing. The ridges if they still exist would be a problem not easily corrected after the fact so?

 

[noiz2]

The bulging bucket in the video makes me super nervous. I'm kinda upset that this product is getting such bad reviews when I first saw it I thought it was a neat idea. Good thing I found this thread to show me some insight on the product. I hope they fix all the problems so that I can still try it.

You don't have to carbonate in the fermentor. You can back off the pressure valve or actually just replace all of that with a hose into a blow off jar.

I don't think I would dispense from the fermentor anyway.

And it does have a pressure plug at the top that should blow before you have a bucket failure. This is another thing that was added because of people pointing out issues.

 

[JoeyChopps]

Yeah I saw all the pressure reliefs and I also keg so I would never serve from it. But people don't always follow the directions and components fail so I would still be nervous that it would blow up and hurt some one. As others said buckets aren't suppose to be pressurized. I agree with leaving the valve open and hooking up a blow off tube rig to make me feel safer. I also noticed lots of new additions to the rig. I would still like to see the top bucket white because of leeching. But I'm really happy to see the vendor is taking all of this criticism with stride and making his product better.

 

[noiz2]

If I were going to try one I would just get the semi clear cone and use my own bucket, not to keen on the black myself. Plus if you just get the cone you don't get the fittings, and I would probably replace those anyway.

My biggest problem (other than the possibly fixed fit and finish) is I'm not sure there is a lot of advantage over using a bucket. If you use metal fittings you are going to want to disassemble it each time to clean, so a lot more work and what is the benefit? I mean there is a certain coolness look factor, but I could brew in a bottling bucket and get a no syphon fermentor I have to take apart to clean.

SS with sanitary fittings has a lot of appeal (other than cost) so that is really just a cost issue.

Damn I think I just talked my self into a lot of $$$ ;~)

 

[limulus]

I wonder if you could use a standard plastic fermenting bucket with his semi-clear cone? I still have two 6gal fermentation buckets that I use for secondaries. They have the little valves inserted and a hose running from there to a bucket would be a blowoff. Drill your own holes and use your own ports/valves. Maybe he is missing the boat on a product he could sell a ton of. The only 6.5-7.0gal plastic conicals are all like $150 and up and for $250, I could buy one of those Chinese stainless conicals on ebay.

Edit:
so I added all the parts needed to make just a conical and it was $124. That is the cone, the legs the gaskets and the clamps. That is still a little expensive. You could take a piece of scrap plywood cut a hole in it and screw some legs onto it to hold the assembly and eliminate the $20 legs.

 

[noiz2]

The cone gasket and clamp come together for $59 (black) $69 (semi clear).

The leg holes fit 1/2" PVC, it's actually what they used to use for legs.

The fittings are the only thing that would start to creep up on you. Personally I would not drill out any but the bottom drain and tap ones. And stick a fermentation lock in a hole in the bottom. The "tricky" part would be corking the hole while you fill the bucket before you flip it over. Should be looking at under $100 even if you need to buy a bucket.

And yes they fit the standard buckets. At least according to the description.

 

[onederbrew]

We now offer white, black 6 and 7 gallon buckets that are pressure tested. Everything part that is in contact with the beer or wort are FDA approved materials and guaranteed not to leach. We now have a large diameter yeast port and please keep giving us suggestions because we will continue to work on them.

 

[mors]

Is there still a raised ring inside the code where the 2 parts are molded together? To me this is the only show stopper on your product.

 

[onederbrew]

There is nothing that can hold bacteria on the inside of the cone anymore. 2 parts are not molded together.

 

[mors]

Awesome. Glad to hear it. The semi clear bottoms look pretty nice. I like the idea of being able to tell where the yeast/trub level is at.

 

[Mirabotz]

Still waiting to get mine here in Egypt--darn APO mail can be SO slow sometimes! Hoping my yeast and other ingredients actually show up first, then I don't have to sit n stare at the fermenter and not be able to start a batch...

 

[mors]

Take close up pics Mirabotz. I'm curious to see what the changes look like compared with the older model I have.

 

[onederbrew]

It is interesting. Not very sexy (no stainless steel).

Do you think there would be any off flavors or smells from the plastic buckets?

Chris

There are no off flavors for the plastic parts, all parts are FDA food grade material similar to Tupperware and guaranteed not to leach.

 

[onederbrew]

whats the point of having a 5 gallon conical??? Kind of pointless other than to claim you have a conical

The advantage of a 5 gallon (6 gallon total volume) is that it easily fits into almost any refrigerator or chest freezer for temperature control for fermentation, crash chilling and even dispensing. Fits great into a Kegerator.
The size is rhe same as corny kegs, so if you go that route you ferment in the OneDerBrew use it as a unitank, reuse the yeast and use the corny as a holding tank like a brewery does.
You can also use a 6 or 7 gal. bucket to get a total of 7 or 8 gallons.

 

[onederbrew]

They were demonstrating these at NHC in Seattle/Bellevue. Seeing that bucket inflated like a balloon and bulging out at the seams while under pressure did not fill me with confidence. Now, I have no direct experience with the product, perhaps it works a treat. However, it just looked like a disaster waiting to happen.

We have never had a bucket explode, we did have some gasket leaks on some of the first units, but now we test every unit shipped.
We have inflated 10 units to 35 psi over 1000 times each with no failures.
The safety bung consistently blows out at below 25 psi
The buckets are rated to 15 psi from the manufacturer but that is for a wide temperature range.
The polyethylene does lose some strength at the lip at temps above 80 F.
But that is above fermentation temperatures.

 

[boscobeans]

Some pictures or a new video of the "impoved" product would be very helpful.

Maybe you could find out who does the injection work for the Cooper's "burp" fermenter and get a few tips. Their product (just a regular old fermenter ) comes out of the box as smooth as glass (inside and out) with no places for nasties to hide. Not one little piece of left over injection sprue anywhere. It's also designed for very easy cleanup and sanitation. With that in mind you might be better off doing away with the threading for the valves/fittings and simply go with reinforced walls and use quality washers/gaskets for traditional bulkhead fittings.

I did a little wedding photography in the past and learned:

"Never include a crappy picture in with the proofs."

IMHO

bosco

 

[JoeyChopps]

Also another question for the maker or anyone else that saw the answer. On the onederbrew websites it says the system is " expandable to 20 gallons in low cost increments." I did not see a product on the website that makes it a full 15 gallons larger and I'm also curious what the expansion would be. A 20 gal bucket?

 

[atonofhops]

I found a 10 gallon plastic bucket(read as 12) its hd food grade plastic with the same dia lid opening as my 5 gallon buckets from a plastics company localy in South East Va. I think this thing has great potential. If I can see internal pics of the new product I will buy one! I am in the process of going to 10 gallon batches, I also would never carbonate in the fermentor as designed not because I think its a poor idea I bottle and keg all my brews for easy transport to parties and gatherings.

For most of the coments I think its funny a new product comes out and people hop(pun intended)on the bandwagon of gripes and complaints with no experience with said product. Execpt for 1 person. Perhaps I will order one and try it out anyway.

 

[Yuri_Rage]

I've mentioned this before. Perhaps I'm on the aforementioned griping and complaining bandwagon, but this quote (verbatim from the catalog):

We do not recommend pressurizing and do not guarantee your bucket

does not inspire confidence. In fact, it reeks of a company not willing to accept any responsibility or liability for their product. No thanks, Onederbrew. Your product is suspect, and your business practices are deplorable.

 

[mors]

I have brewed a beligan pale ale and put it in the onederbrew now. It's still in there actually. It didn't explode...but I was pretty paranoid about it. The dial for regulating pressure is just a screw in knob with rubber gaskets. You tighten it to the point it stops leaking co2 and can maintain pressure. This worked pretty good. Problem was... after the first couple days with it open and regular fermentation... I went to try and do 15psi... It was trial and error to get it 'set' to 15psi. I did finally get it...but if you tightened it too much it could be a mess for you if you didn't check it frequently. I think I will most likely keg it this weekend...This could be interesting in and of itself

Overall... so far so good. If the molding inside the cone has been fixed (mine has the molding issue, but nothing I can do about that) It's not too bad. The supplied bucket is pretty small, I have not tried sealing it with a larger bucket such as the 6.5 gallon ones most use for brewing. This is what I will attempt after I empty the current beer out of it.

 

[blakermagee]

I've mentioned this before. Perhaps I'm on the aforementioned griping and complaining bandwagon, but this quote (verbatim from the catalog):

does not inspire confidence. In fact, it reeks of a company not willing to accept any responsibility or liability for their product. No thanks, Onederbrew. Your product is suspect, and your business practices are deplorable.

They do not recommend you use a seperately purchased bucket and pressurize as it does NOT have the safety bung feature like their buckets do.....read a bit closer!

 

[daksin]

I just don't see the point of buying this for $160 and still having to assemble it. You can get a 15 gallon inductor tank with all the stainless sanitary fittings you could ever want for under a hundred.

 

[Shooter]

We have never had a bucket explode, we did have some gasket leaks on some of the first units, but now we test every unit shipped.
We have inflated 10 units to 35 psi over 1000 times each with no failures.
The safety bung consistently blows out at below 25 psi
The buckets are rated to 15 psi from the manufacturer but that is for a wide temperature range.
The polyethylene does lose some strength at the lip at temps above 80 F.
But that is above fermentation temperatures.

I would be interested to see how the product holds up over time. It seems like you've done some testing on your end.