# Willow 25l Containers - Big W



## Brownie (29/1/06)

Oi,

I was a walking through the Local BigW t'other day and did notice they have 25L (light Blue) Willow (Brand) containers for $20 ($19.95) in the camping section.

Anyway would these containers be suitable as a secondary fermenter (probably ok as a bulk priming vessel), I read somewhere that for the container to be foodsafe they are meant to put a triangle with a 2 in it stamped onto the container. Alas could not find a 2 inside a triangle.

So any advice, thoughts, ponderings, even weird way out theories are welcome.


Cheers
Brownie.


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## pint of lager (29/1/06)

Regarding the triangle with a two in it, you must have read the same bit of info I did about it being food grade. This is incorrect.

The triangle with arrows on it is a recycling mark, and the number inside indicates what sort of plastic the container is manufactured from. It means, when the time comes to dispose of the container, you know which bin to put it in.

You want a container that is food grade, that is, it is made from virgin unrecycled plastic. 

The willow containers are made for water, but many people have used them as secondary vessels. 

The most important requirement besides foodgrade is as close to zero headspace as possible.


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## pharmaboy (29/1/06)

G'day, the codes are (1) for PET - as in soft drink bottles, (2) is for HDPE, 3 is for vinyl I think, all are used in food, juices etc, but different ones are used for the different flexibility of product I think. Pet is less oxygen permeable than hdpe, but plastic fermenters are usually hdpe (go figure heh!). As far as oxygen permeability goes, the main thing seems to be thickness, thicker is better - read beer can be left in longer.

a few months and up is a glass situation or at least PET, not hdpe, but upto 6 weeks hdpe of reasonable thickness is fine.

cheers


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## Kai (29/1/06)

If you can put water for drinking in it, then I think you ought to be able to put beer in it.

If you use it for a bottling bucket, make sure the sugar disperses evenly through the beer. You can't rely on a whirlpool like you can for a round fermenter.


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## Finite (29/1/06)

Speaking of BigW I was there 3 days ago and noticed they had 19L Stainless Steel Pots with a glass lid for $19.95. Bout as good as it gets IMO


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## Mr Bond (29/1/06)

Finite said:


> Speaking of BigW I was there 3 days ago and noticed they had 19L Stainless Steel Pots with a glass lid for $19.95. Bout as good as it gets IMO
> [post="105372"][/post]​



Got 2 of em as my mash tun,and boil kettle, for my small output AG brewery. Thin bottoms yes, but I use a stand alone elec h/plate and havent had any scorching with a 1050 wort.Perfect for anyone who wants to partial,all you need is a lauter bucket/tun,and your in biz  .

I use an (EX) ESBfresh wort cube to 2ndary.


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## Batz (29/1/06)

The willow water containers work well , I use them to CC in and have even fermented in one once years back.
Works OK if fridge space is a problem

Batz


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## wee stu (30/1/06)

Batz said:


> The willow water containers work well , I use them to CC in. Works OK if fridge space is a problem
> 
> Batz
> [post="105384"][/post]​



Ditto, been using them to CC for the last couple of years. Can squeeze three into my fridge. Something I couldn't do with the more, well, cubular  cubes.

awrabest, stu


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## sluggerdog (30/1/06)

wee stu said:


> Batz said:
> 
> 
> > The willow water containers work well , I use them to CC in. Works OK if fridge space is a problem
> ...



Me three, I only use this for CC and secondary. Just releasing the gas (lid loose) at the start if necessary.

Great shape containers


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## ausdb (30/1/06)

Batz said:


> The willow water containers work well , I use them to CC in and have even fermented in one once years back.
> Works OK if fridge space is a problem
> 
> Batz
> [post="105384"][/post]​



I'll second that, I managed to ferment a 40L batch of hefeweizen in my old fermenting fridge using one of them. The fridge normally was happy with 1x30L tall fermenter inside it but I put about 15L into a willow container and slipped it in next to the fermenter.

The plastic pourer that comes with them is also pretty usefull for making an airlock blowoff system as I found a drilled rubber stopper fitted nicely into the spout end and then used some clear tubing to run the blowoff down into a bottle half filled with sanitiser. With the way weizens ferment it acvtually made a nice yeast collection system!!


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## Weizguy (30/1/06)

Thanks for the tip. I reckon that might solve my brew fridge space issue. If I can have a pils in secondary at the same brew temp as the pils in the fermentor next to it, there will be enough space.
Excellent work!
...and if I use 3 of them, they should fit side by side and I can have a new 25 litre batch of Czech pils every 2 weeks (primary for 2 weeks, and 1 secondary at 2 weeks of age, and 1 X secondary at 4 weeks old). A perpetual setup!

I'm getting all excited now! 

Cheerz
Seth out


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## ausdb (30/1/06)

Weizguy said:


> Thanks for the tip. I reckon that might solve my brew fridge space issue. If I can have a pils in secondary at the same brew temp as the pils in the fermentor next to it, there will be enough space.
> [post="105434"][/post]​



You just need to watch out with cleaning if you ferment in then as the krausen can get up into the handle section and become hard to clean. I usually fill them a bit over half way (say 60% full) with either napisan or caustic then screw the lid on tightly. Leave it to sit and soak on edge so the lid is upwards for a day then downwards for a day and the crud gets dissolved pretty well. A good rinse and shake with fresh water then sanitiser.


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