I’ve been brewing for about 12 years. I was poor and I scrounged a lot of my early brewing stuff from yard sales and the like. I was so excited when I found a couple of beautiful glass carboys! Finally, I could SEE what was going on in my little science experiments! Over the years I’ve picked up more from moving friends and fellow brewers. I usually primary in my wonderful Spiedels but for long term aging I use glass. I saw some of the gruesome and horrific broken glass carboy threads pretty early on, but I ignored these cautionary tales. They did make me careful, and for 12 years I’ve been lucky.
Last night, that luck ended. I was dumping cleaning solution from a 5 gal carboy when it shattered. No idea if I bumped the sidewall or if it just gave out. The pressure of the water rushing out of this busted glass balloon gave the shards a little extra velocity and I was instantly soaked and bleeding from my right (dominant) hand. I immediately went into first aid mode, grabbed a towel, made a fist around it, and raised it over my head. Not my first rodeo. I was able to find gauze, vet wrap, and alcohol and went to bandage it up. First look as I got it under running water? This isn’t good, but it’s not nearly as bad as it could be. Got it wrapped up, finally sat down with my hand over my head. Gotta call my wonderful and long-suffering wife. ”I’m OK." “WTF did you do now?” 20 years, she knows me well [emoji16]
16 stitches and a case of the dumbass later, I’m asking you to retire your glass carboys. I know, it won’t happen to you because you’re careful. Like riding a motorcycle, an accident is not a matter of if but when. I was incredibly lucky it wasn’t worse. We have sooooo many options available now that we’ve never had as homebrewers before. Stainless buckets & conicals, loads of better plastic options. When I started this adventure glass was an awesome upgrade from my plastic buckets. But a plastic bucket never gave me stitches. Let em go folks, it’s time!
There’s an old saying in the BBQ world: there are two kinds of wooden smoke houses 1) the ones that burnt down and 2) the ones that are going to burn down.
Please, get rid of your glass fermenters! They can kill you.
Pretty sure that most of the home brewers still using them either don’t read much in any of the brewing forums or just think they’re bullet proof. Warnings like yours have been circulation for quite a number of years. Glad to hear your injuries weren’t much more severe.
My last one is going to go as soon as I rack my cider out of it. Maybe a good thing to do this weekend. I have enough plastics and stainless bucket types to get by without using glass, anyway. I see that it is just not worth it. Next question - will the recycling accept this?
I still use them for wine. Will probably continue to do so. Buying anything from garage sales is iffy especially glass. I do a lot of canning and preserving and I would never use garage sale jars even if they are name brands like Ball or Kerr.
I still use glass carboys, but I am thinking of changing to the plastic ones with the big, screw on lid.
Three have broken in about 30 years, but none of them injured anybody and I haven’t lost any beer. Yet.
Thanks everyone! I definitely see stainless fermenters in my future. And to clarify, I used some yard sale finds very early in my brewing but those have long since been put to pasture. Everything I’ve been using recently have been obtained from other brewers and inspected. Still dangerous!
Glad that you are on the mend! Thank you for going to effort to SHOW me what can happen. Its changed my mind about my carboys. More keg fermentors it is then!
Glad OP’s OK. Another brewing site has an entire thread devoted to glass carboy accidents, and you don’t want to peruse that before lunch. Lots of stitches and spilled beer.
Even though I’ve switched to a couple 7 gal Brew Buckets, I still occasionally use 5 and 6 gallon glass carboys for aging, and I have a few 3 gal glass for smaller batches.
If you insist on using glass, consider using plastic milk crates to carry them. Glass is quite slippery when wet. And only buy the good, Italian glass carboys, made from uniformly-thick glass. If it doesn’t have “Made in Italy” stamped on the bottom, then no-go. And forget about the glass BMBs, they can be wafer-thin in places.
Yeah, I still have a scar on my right thumb from shattering one of these. I have a very special relationship with glass… I try to stay away from it. I got rid of mine years ago. I had multiple 5-gallon jobbies and one 6.5 gallon… that one was scary big. Glad you’re okay.
As Kevin mentioned using them for wine, I still use them for mead when doing 3, 5, and 6 gallon batches. They don’t absorb colors and flavors like plastic, and work well for long term aging. Although I haven’t used any of the newer types of plastic fermenters, so maybe that’s not a problem with some of them anymore.
I’ve pretty much stopped using carboys with beer and usually go right from primary to keg. Here and there I’ll use one if I’m aging the beer on something and don’t want to do it in the primary.
I do completely agree that a carboy is a piece of equipment you need to treat with a lot of respect and care when using it. Hope you have a speedy recover TANSTAAFB.
Thank you sir! I have only used glass for long term projects for exactly the reasons you mentioned. This one had a brett cider in it (delicious BTW!) and I use(d) them for sour beers. Those will likely get aged in dedicated kegs now.
I use them for mead. I ferment them in plastic buckets and transfer to glass carboys for secondary then transfer to another for agreeing. I don’t like the idea of agreeing in plastic and I know of no other option so I think I am stuck being careful. Maybe I will wear gloves when handling. I have about 30 glass carboys, most in use. I also worry about being able to carry them n 20 years.
