Spigot on Fermentor?

[mworkman]

I was thinking of putting a spigot on my fermenting bucket. My thinking is that I wouldn't have to siphon to the secondary, I could just put a hose on the spigot and run it to the secondary. The spigot would be 1 1/2 inches from the bottom so you wouldn't disturb any of the sludge on the bottom and it would just remain in the primary. Would this work? Or would it be hard to keep the spigot clean?

 

[RichBrewer]

It will work and many people use them. Check out this link.

http://www.williamsbrewing.com/TRANSFER_VALVE_E39__P172C104.cfm

 

[drengel]

theryre hard to keep clean though, and it will disturb your sediment more than a siphon.

 

[Sasquatch]

It's a fine line between working really well, and pouring so fast that you disturb the sediment, being too small, plugging easily, and being a general PITA, being too low and just not working, or being too high and leaving all sorts of beer behind. But, in an ideal world, that method aerates less than siphoning, and if you are doing a "sour mash", just brewing on top of your last yeast, leaving some beer in the thing is not a crime. Some of these questions, in my mind, are answerable only if you can decide for sure what your priorities are from these: perfect beer, maximum efficiency in brewing, maximum ease in brewing.

To me, perfect beer and lots of waste is acceptable. But there's a happy middle ground to be found.

 

[Chairman Cheyco]

I But, in an ideal world, that method aerates less than siphoning, and if you are doing a "sour mash", just brewing on top of your last yeast, leaving some beer in the thing is not a crime.

What does doing a sour mash have to do with anything?

 

[Sasquatch]

Well, what I mean is, a guy is usually worried about getting most of his brew up the siphon in order to maximize the number of bottles of beer per batch. If you are pouring new brew on top of the old stuff, you can't consider what you didn't transfer as "waste" - it's part of the next batch.