Will the real Carboy Please Stand Up

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ckvchestnut said:
Ya that's fine and what I've been doing but I just hate the thought of diluting kit wines or juice buckets to fill up carboy space. What's the typical amount of marbles needed to fill from the shoulder to the neck? Anyone know? I'm going to look at how I can make a PVC tube that with removable capped ends to place the marbles on so they are easy to remove. What I'm picturing is two tubes one that fits inside the other. Both with tiny holes drilled in at the same places. So if you want to use the tube to implement oak chips you slide the tubes so the holes are matching up and in the open position so the oak can do its job. When you want to displace the volume, you can use the tube to fill with marbles and you keep the holes closed. However finding 2 tubes that fit tightly and water tight might be too much of a challenge. So maybe have 2 on hand, one for oaking and the other for displacement.
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I bought 10 lbs of marbles from someone on Ebay when I first started with the intent to use them to fill headspace. 10 lbs doesn't even fill a one gal jug. It's more like about 2 qt's.
They come out of the carboy rather easy if you just tip it over into a strainer.

For my 6 gal kits, it just rack down to 5 gal carboys now. I only use the marbles in my 1 gal fruit wines.
 
Thanks Lori! What about 5 gal juice buckets? I filled my plastic carboy today with 5 1/2 gal of water have no idea if it was supposed to be 5 or 6 that's sad in my opinion

Might use my 5 gallon spring water jug to rack into reluctantly
 
I have one 6 gal glass and the rest are all 5 gal. I like to have several batches going and the only time there is 6 gallons, is when I rack from the primary.
I noticed the other day while racking from one 5 gal to another I didn't have enough room in the one I was racking to. They were both Italian too. Thats when I decided to measure and sure enough, there was about a quart difference between them. I marked a line with nail polish at the 5 gal mark so I will know which is the bigger one next time.
If you don't have a glass 5 gal, I don't think using a water bottle will hurt. At least not for a while. It's probably better than the buckets because of less air surface are.
If you are going to bulk age, I would def get a glass one.

Now that you have lost all faith in carboy measurements, can I interest you in some marbles? lol
 
Haha! You want to give me some marbles? Lol I have all 6 gals 3 gals and a few 1 gals which are plastic lol need some "5's" I guess lol
 
My local wine store sells 6.5, 6, 5, 3 and one gallon glass carboys/jugs! I bought mine while listed at 6 gallon glass Italian and they are actually closer to 6.5 gallons. I now add my water for DB to the 6 gallon+ line on my 7.X gallon primary and then add the fruit (more than the recipe). This puts me about 1/2 inch below the primary lip. Carefully stirring! I end up not having to top up the 6.5 gal carboy when racking DB from primary to secondary. I have two 5 gallon cayboys that I use for wine with more lees so that I don't have to dilute the primary or top off. I reserve any extra in 1 gallon or 1/2 gallons to top up with.
 
ckvchestnut said:
Oh and I will get some 5 gal carboys just wasn't sure how fast lol
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I don't know if you have an All in One pump, but if you plan on buying one, I would get glass carboys. The plastic can be a pain with the pump.
 
ckvchestnut said:
Ummm I get messages at my pump that say corrected volume and some temp degree what does that mean?

It appears to me that everyone must hold their gas at a standard temp in the tanks.
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sour_grapes said:
I am not sure, but I think it means you live in Canada. I think there are consumer-protection laws in your neck of the woods that are not operative in mine.
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In Canada fuel is sold with volume corrected to 15 degrees Celcius (Automatic Temperature Compensation (ATC)). 15 is what the government and industry has decided is the average temperature in Canada. So that means you are not buying an actual gallon but what a gallon by volume would be if it was sitting at 15 C. When the temperature is less than 15 you are getting less than the volume you buy and when it is over 15 C you get more. The only problem with this is that studies have shown that the average temp is less than 15. It is the view of some non-ATC retailers that, because of the average ambient temperature in Canada, the consumer would get less for his money and that the use of ATC amounted to a price increase for the oil companies.

cheers
 
To be sure, any vessel you get that advertises x-volume will hold at least that volume. In most cases said vessel will not have reference to where that volume is measured. When you get one, it is simple enough to use a known volume marked container (use same one every time) to determine and mark various volumes on a new vessel. Confusing enough?? At least all of your efforts will be consistant...
 
Wonderful! Thanks for the info I didn't know that! We CDNS gets stuck with a lot of dumb laws lol
 
Thanks Floandgary! That's what I'm in the process of doing now. Was surprised to find the plastic one at 5.5 gals. But I marked it at the 3 and 5 gal marks. Dumb me I filled it while it was on the ground and then couldn't hoist it up to the counter to syphon the water to my other empty carboys! Had to wait for hubby to come home.

Lori: ya for sure only buying glass from now on, that plastic one was given to us from somewhere...
 
Because of dealing with head space and a few other issues I'm liking my BBs more and more over my glass Italian carboys. It is why I took advantage of the 2 for 1 Bubbler carboy offer posted yesterday. I find myself using water (no more than 500ML) and like wine (750ML) and some marbles to get my Italians topped off for bulk aging. This is with making 23L/6 Gallon kits.
 
bkisel said:
Because of dealing with head space and a few other issues I'm liking my BBs more and more over my glass Italian carboys. It is why I took advantage of the 2 for 1 Bubbler carboy offer posted yesterday. I find myself using water (no more than 500ML) and like wine (750ML) and some marbles to get my Italians topped off for bulk aging. This is with making 23L/6 Gallon kits.
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I don't know of I can even get my hands on bbs. So they are regulated to have the exact capacity?
 
Cool! That's not too far from me. I'm in Renfrew which isn't too far from Haliburton! Nice to see another sort of local :D
 

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