Fermenting In Cube?

[Ross]

Has anyone tried fermenting in a cube rather than the round fermenter? Any drawbacks?

Just set up my brewing fridge & it will only hold 2 round fermenters, whereas it will take 4 cubes no problem...

Got my first 2 AG's bubbling away & Itching to get another under way...

 

[Dunkel_Boy]

I can't see why not, if you can seal it well, have a good draw point for your spigot, and airlocks aren't a problem. Your yeast cake will be a little weird, but if you can fit 4 cubes in your fridge, why not?

 

[Ross]

The cubes seal air tight better than the normal fermenter & I have holes drilled through the lids already for use as secondary. Thought sufficient headspace might be a problem, but now I'm fermenting at 18C, the first 2 ales I've done the kauzen is only about an inch high...

 

[Dunkel_Boy]

If headspace is an issue, use a blowoff tube.
I hope you've done your volume calculations and that your 4 cubes isn't actually less volume than 2 cylinders...

 

[Ross]

Thanks DB - didn't think of that - blowoff tube would be the go I reckon

On the volume front, considering I use them for secondary ferment already, I think I've got that one covered

Cheers :chug:

 

[chiefman]

The only Disadvantage I can see is that the inside corners / edges of the cube would be a little harder to keep clean. You may have to pay a little more attention to them to get any k out.

 

[Plastic Man]

Napi san, Napi San, Napi San (or the Aldi equivalent to save some cash !!)

 

[deebee]

The two drawbacks to cubes are the ridge down the bottom that allows it to stack on top of another cube and the difficulty in cleaning. Both of these are more of a problem in primary fermentation that in conditioning.

Cleaning is really hard. You need a long bent bottle brush and half an hour to get into those corners.

 

[pint of lager]

From Plasticman:

Napi san, Napi San, Napi San (or the Aldi equivalent to save some cash !!)

Thanks for the tip on Aldi's. I hadn't thought about them as a source of cheap Napisan.

I have been using homebrand Napisan for ages. The one drawback I found with cleaning up plastic, I had an ancient 30 litre fermenter donated to me, with faint brown stains. I filled it with water and napisan for a week, most of the stains washed off, but there was a lingering faint orange aroma, similar to that orange citrus cleaner but a much much lower level. This also occurred to another blastic bucket from another source that I was soaking at the same time. Maybe the cheap homebrand napisan had some sort of extra chemical in it.

So limit the soaking to maybe a day or so. Otherwise it is a great cleaner.

 

[sosman]

Has anyone tried fermenting in a cube rather than the round fermenter? Any drawbacks?

Just set up my brewing fridge & it will only hold 2 round fermenters, whereas it will take 4 cubes no problem...

[post="47847"][/post]​

I have used cubes for ginger beer. They work fine.

 

[Plastic Man]

Pint of LAger

I'm pretty lazy so have had the ALDI one soaking for a couple of weeks before I got around to cleaning it out. Didn't leave any smell - so maybe a good bet.

I stuff up and bought the super enzyme one though a few weeks ago. Not sure what the enzymes are or will do - but it seems to be working OK.

 

[Stagger Inn]

Is napi san ok to use in stainless steel kegs?

 

[Ross]

YES works great....