For sanitizing funnels, spoons…etc. Can I just use a regular plastic 5 gallon bucket, or should I still use a food grade one?
I use an old fermenter but a plastic bucket of any kind will work as long as it has not been contaminated with anything.
Ok, i bought it new at lowes the other day. I’ve cleaned it out well to make sure so I think it should be fine.
I would use a food grade bucket, an old fermenter that is too scratched for brewing works well, even if it has been contaminated. It’s ok (but not ideal) if the scratches have stuff growing in them, you’re not putting your spoon in the scratch. Any contamination that comes out of the scratch into solution will be killed off by the starsan.
Even without a food grad bucket though, it will probably be fine.
That’s good…I was going to suggest a new bucket. I would dedicate that bucket to sanitizing your beer equipment only. 
No fish bait. :o ;D
As long as it didn’t contain toxic resins or oils in a previous life, you should be OK.
I have a 5-gallon Homer bucket from Home Depot I use solely for sanitizing and bottle-cleaning. perfect for the price.
I’ll also throw in my little tip I picked up from a friend
wallpaper trays. Work like a charm for long things.
I dedicated a rubbermaid container methinks it is the 30 gallon size…
it has a few scars inside but still seems to work for the purpose…
Absolutely, they work great. It helps if you build a little wooden tray to hold it, since the plastic ones can be flimsy. But you need a lot less starsan, like making one out of 4" pvc tubing with a cap on the bottom.
I’ve found that if you stack 2 or 3 of them together they hold up pretty well on their own. Still wobbly, but manageable.
Good call. The hardware store where I found one long enough for keg dip tubes only had one. And I found it, they didn’t even know it was there. I think I paid $0.50 for it. 
I think you’re going overboard. But that has it’s place LOL
A dedicated five gallon bucket is fine for general use. Keep about a gallon of Starsan solution in there all the time. Use distilled water and it’ll last forever. Everything gets rinsed- usually quickly and no problems from that- ever. No need for a long soak or drying. A 12oz plastic cup scoops out solution to completely rinse anything I choose anytime. Including dip-tubes or tubing. So I splash a little…
I don’t worry about anything before cooling. Just make sure it’s kitchen clean. After that Starsan rules. One minute contact time. Not submerge-time.
I do the same thing as Euge. Home Depot bucket with 2.5 gallons of RO water Star San solution that never goes bad. Only started doing that about 3 months ago and it’s already paid for itself.
I finally found one and am a bit disappointed… it’s still too short for a disassembled autosiphon. Where can I find one that long?
+1 Been using 2 stacked for 7 or 8 yrs. Handy dandy.
I’d be nervous storing an acid-based sanitizer in non-food-grade plastic, but I’m pretty paranoid about that stuff.
I had hard time finding a big enough one at local hardware stores. I’d recommend figuring out how big it should be and then shop online. Or make one out of pvc.
reading through the Equipment forum and the new mashtun thread someone posted a link that led me to
this:
http://brewing.lustreking.com/gear/sanitube.html
I love the simplicity…Next project for me that is for sure.
Same here! Thanks for posting this.