Yep, it’s a keg. Take the spear out and you effectively have a large stainless carboy.
You can hook up a fancy stainless apparatus for racking/thermowell/airlock on the top if you want since a 2" tri-clamp fits on a Sankey. Some places sell them pre-assembled, but it’s going to cost as much as the keg itself. I just use a carboy cap with a large hose clamp around it and it can hold enough pressure for racking.
slick. I like the modified freezer come temp control jacket.
Yep, another bonus is that it will fit in a 5 cu. ft freezer, while a conical would require something larger than I have space for in my laundry room.
Cleaning pretty easy?
I ferment in sankey kegs a lot. They are pretty handy. Cleaning can sometimes be an issue… but if you get one of those cleaners you hook to a drill it’s not too bad… also if you boil a gallon or so of water in it the steam will loosen up a bunch of the trub/hops stuck to the sides.
I picked up one of these second hand and it works really nicely:
http://www.brewershardware.com/American-Sanke-Keg-Fermenter-Kit-with-Thermowell.html
Typically I’m pretty lazy though… so they just get one of these (not the actual ones I use… couldn’t find them online for some reason… but close enough:
Yes, I already have a carboy/keg washer that I build, and the opening where the spear would be is slightly larger than a standard carboy.
I ferment in 1/2 bbl sanke kegs, with spear removed, a lot, too. I soak them in caustic, replace the spear, and then put them on my keg cleaner. the downside is there is no way to know if they are really clean or not. You simply can’t see if the krausen ring is removed or not.
I have one of those dental mirrors that I use to look inside with for peace of mind… sometimes I do indeed still find crud in there too.
Even so, seems easy to miss that one little brown spec.
True enough but I have not had an issue yet… and for the like $2 one of the mirrors cost and the 10 seconds it takes to look around in there… worth it to me. Just be sure before you try looking in there that you give it a rinse with cold water first… If you use warm water it pretty much instantly fogs up when you stick it in there.
A buddy of mine cut holes to accommodate corny keg lids. Allows for much easier access.
Pbw through spray nozzles works wonders to remove stubborn krausen gunk. Carboy washer hasn’t failed me yet:
I think I have the same pump. Mine is built a bit smaller to fit in a five gallon bucket. I only drilled holes in the top cap. The pattern allows water to flow down the entire keg/carboy.
I also added quick disconnects to clean the dip tubes using the plumbing as the base for kegs to hold my carboy stand.
Thats genius. I want to eventually do 10 gallon batches and that looks like the way to go for fermenting. Thanks for the inspiration.
+2 on cutting the top for a corny lid – it’s easy if you have the smooth topped kegs like the OP. The lid gives easy access for cleaning, inspection and yeast harvesting, although for the OP this would negate his racking system. For mine I have my fermenters on a rack that’s elevated. I added weldless ball valves to them so I just gravity feed into kegs.
cheers
